Here’s a line of dominos, each one bigger than the last. The first is the size of your fingernail. The last one is five hundred feet tall.
You can knock over the smallest one with a small puff of air. If you start a handful of dominos further up the line, you’ll need a gentle push. Once knocked over, the chain reaction will keep going until the giant falls. But try marching straight up to that last one and giving it a shove — you’ll bounce off it. To move the big one, you have to start with one you can actually move.
It seems to me that that’s how most of this marvelous creation works.
My kids like playing Othello. They know that to win you have to have the most pieces, so every move they take is based solely on getting the most peices. And they lose every single game. Because counting pieces isn’t how you win. You win by placing the right ones, and ignoring the one metric you think matters. You have to go back a few dominos.
Here’s a few more examples.
You can’t just “have bitachon.” That’s the last domino. You start by learning Who you’re trusting — His kindness, His omnipotence, His track record in your own life. Once you see that, trusting Him comes easy.
You can’t just “be friendly.” You start with an ayin tova — noticing something good in the person. The warmth shows up later by itself.
You can’t fix a relationship with a big talk and a spreadsheet of feelings. You start by being grateful for one small thing. Gratitude knocks over the next one.
You can’t diet through willpower. Willpower is the skyscraper domino. You start by understanding what food actually is — and what the fake stuff does to you. Once you see that clearly, you don’t need willpower. Or so they tell me.
You can’t get organized by buying matching bins. You start by throwing out one thing.
Everybody is fixated on the the five-hundred-foot domino. And they think its a waste of time to bend down and flick the tiny one. But that’s how it works.
Find the first domino you can move, and the impossible will take care of itself.