Think small: achieve something / Think big: probably fail

Some time around 1998 I mentioned to my girlfriend's mam, then headmistress at the local infant school, that I could probably make her a website. I had a knock-off copy of Dreamweaver that I barely understood, so off I went.

The problem is one I've come to recognise in myself in the intervening 30 years: thinking way too big. What did she want from this website, which would have been one of perhaps a dozen UK infant school websites in 1998, had it ever existed? She'd have been happy with a handful of pages with a couple of images.

Had I created a handful of pages I could see a future where I got a small contract with Suffolk County Council, slowly learned my trade, and spent the 2000s making a fortune as an independent web developer.

Unfortunately, I had Dreamweaver. Dazzled by this technology, I tried to develop something way beyond my skills. I remember trying to work out some sort of fancy breadcrumb solution. 1998, remember. The internet existed but there was nothing on it. Nobody to tell me what to do.

So I just gave up

That's what I did. I just … stopped. There was never a website. I don't even remembering telling her that I couldn't do it, it just fizzled out.

Start small. Small is achievable. Just do some minimal version. Make a thing that works. Make it good – I'm not saying churn out rubbish – but make it minimal. Now, did people like it? Did you enjoy making it? Okay, now learn a bit more and make it better. And now keep doing that.