Nip it in the bud.
Meaning: Addressing small problems immediately prevents them from growing into larger, harder-to-solve crises.
Origin: A gardening image: pinching off a bud stops it from growing into an unwanted flower or shoot. Henry Chettle wrote in 1595 of nipping affections "in the bloom," and Beaumont and Fletcher's The Woman Hater (1607) has "nip a passion even in the bud."
More proverbs about Wisdom
- Old foxes need no tutors. — Experienced people have learned through living what novices must be taught formally.
- Pay as you go. — Settling debts immediately prevents financial burdens from accumulating and maintains hon…
- Poor folk have few kindred. — Adversity reveals that people abandon those lacking wealth and influence.
- Prevention is better than cure. — Stopping problems before they start costs less effort and suffering than fixing them afte…
- Every path hath a puddle. — Life's inevitable obstacles cannot be avoided, only navigated with patience and acceptanc…
- Puff not against the wind. — Wasting energy on futile resistance exhausts you; work with circumstances instead of agai…
From our untranslatable words
- Fredagsmys — The Friday-night ritual of soft clothes, snacks and television with the people you live w…
- Gökotta — Rising at first light for no reason but to go outside and hear the birds sing.
- Poshlost' — Not merely the trashy, but the falsely important, falsely beautiful and falsely clever —…