Do Not Count your Chickens Before They Are Hatched
This proverb is used to warn someone not to plan anything that depends on a good thing that is expected to happen in the future. Through this proverb, we advise the person to wait until it really happens. Thus, this proverb is used to tell people not to be too sure that something good is hoped by you and it will surely happen. It might not happen after all.
Once upon a time, a woman carried a basket of eggs. While she was walking, she began to think about how many chicks she will have. She also thought that how much money she would make by selling the chicks and the things she will buy with all the money. While thinking about all this, her basket of eggs suddenly dropped. The woman was left with no eggs and no chicks. Hence, the expression, ‘Do not count your chickens before they hatched’ is applied on this woman.
By using this proverb we can warn someone to wait until a good thing they are expecting actually occurs before they make any plans about it. For example, before the loan is sanctioned and the money is received a person starts thinking about the expensive things that he will buy for his house in future. Similarly, if a person thinks that all the eggs will be hatched and become chickens, he may be wrong. Some eggs may be rotten and others may get broken or cracked. Thus, one can never be sure that all the eggs will be hatched and chicks will come out.
When people buy a lottery ticket most of them start thinking that they are going to win and become very rich. They begin to make plans as to what they are going to do with the money. By using this proverb, you are asking him to wait for the announcement of lottery result before he starts making plans. When we tell a person not to count the chickens before they are hatched, we are trying to advise him in order to avoid disappointment in future. In the same way, when you are telling the individual not to make early celebrations of success in business, you are advising him not to count his profits in advance until the money is not in his hands.
A person must stop talking about the places that are yet to be visited in future because he still does not have the visa. Thus, he must not count his chickens before they are hatched. He must not be too optimistic or hopeful about a favourable outcome. We must wait for the result. A flower and a bud are the two different things. The bud blossoms into the beautiful flower. However, until that does not happen, we cannot say that the bud will become a flower because it may be plucked by somebody.
It is not intelligent to build too much hope on anything that we do until it becomes a reality. Too much eagerness on something to happen may result into disappointment. Thus, the proverb advises that it is silly to keep excessive hopes on things that we do in our everyday life.
