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About this quote

What does it mean?
Progress requires someone to take the first risky step to test new methods.
In plain terms
Someone has to try something new to see if it works.
What can you take from it?
Take the first step to enable progress.

Where it applies

  • social reform
  • innovation

Putting it to work

  • volunteer for new initiatives

Questions to consider

  • What risk are you avoiding?
  • Who must take the first step?

Another view

Not everyone has the privilege to take risks safely.

More from William James

  1. We must frankly confess, then, using our empirical common sense and ordinary practical prejudices, that in the world that actually is, the virtues of sympathy,…

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  2. The God whom science recognizes must be a God of universal laws exclusively, a God who does a wholesale, not a retail business. He cannot accommodate his proce…

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  3. There is no worse lie than a truth misunderstood by those who hear it.

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