| Idiom | Can't See the Forest for the Trees |
|---|---|
| Example | My teacher catches all my grammar mistakes, but he misses my brilliant writing. He can't see the forest for the trees. |
| Meaning | to overlook the overall situation because of a focus on small details; to be so involved in details that you miss the whole picture |
| Origin | This idiom, which has been popular for many years, created this picture in the mind of the writer who invented it: a person in the country focuses so intently on each individual tree, leaf, branch, and twig, that she misses the splendor of the huge forest she's in. Afterwards, if someone asks her, "How did you like the forest?" she might answer, "What forest? All I saw were some trees." This saying means to be unable to understand the whole situation because you pay too much attention to the small parts. |
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