There’s a saying in French which comes to mind right here, on the precipice of this unpredictable journey.
Il n’y a que le premier pas qui coûte
It’s equivalent in function, you may have guessed, to “A journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step”, but it doesn’t exactly say the same thing. I guess a possible translation would be:
Only the first step costs
So for a given enterprise , the first step is not only necessary, but also the hardest one, which is somewhat encouraging I think. I always understood it as meaning: don’t overthink it. Do the first step, and then momentum will progressively take over. Something like that. It’s not as obviously true as the English one (which as I understand it, simply means that you have to start walking at some point or you’ll never get to any place that isn’t the one you’re already in), but it has value in motivating you to start something.
It came to mind as I decided to launch this little thing, BRAC, of which this is the first post, and wondered how to start it. So here it is, a start without overthinking it. Another way to look at starting a thing, of course, would be “You only have one shot at a first impression”, but this has the opposite effect, it’s a terrible paralytic to think that way, and let’s focus on the one that at least gets something done, if imperfectly.
So what is BRAC? What are we doing here? Well, the gist is that I have a collection of quotations that I’ve been compulsively building, in fits and starts, since I was a teenager, lo all these years ago. Might as well share the wealth, right?
So at some given interval, let’s say once a week to start (but don’t hold me to it), I’ll pick one of these quotations at random and post it here, along with some form of personal commentary. You may ask whether the personal commentary is strictly necessary, and I have nothing further to say on this matter.
Beyond that we’ll see how it goes. I should also note that the fact that my native language is French will have two consequences: first my English won’t be always perfect, and second I’ll sometimes post quotations in French and write about them in that same language. If that’s not for you, just ignore it, there’ll be one in English soon enough probably. The first twenty or so quotations have already been drawn and the ratio so far is 60% English to 40% French.
In any case, I’m overjoyed that you read this far, and I hope maybe you’ll subscribe or comment or stick around a little. I’ll post the first note right away, and we’ll coast on from there, all costs having been expended in that first step, and everything after that, consequently, being then effortless.
Oh, and about the illustrations: I’ll generally use generative AI to do them. I’m still not quite sure about how I feel about it, but I’m having fun making them, and I’m not hurting anybody right now since nobody is reading these.
