Breakdown of Pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut hitaasti kohti päämäärää, vaikka en huomaa edistystä heti.
Questions & Answers about Pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut hitaasti kohti päämäärää, vaikka en huomaa edistystä heti.
Because they are all in the plural nominative, and in Finnish adjectives must agree in number and case with the noun they modify.
- valinnat = choices (plural nominative of valinta)
- pienet = small (plural nominative of pieni)
- päivittäiset = daily (plural nominative of päivittäinen)
So:
- pieni valinta = a small choice (singular)
- pienet valinnat = small choices (plural)
- päivittäinen valinta = a daily choice
- päivittäiset valinnat = daily choices
All three words match each other: plural + nominative.
Yes, you can say päivittäiset pienet valinnat. Both orders are grammatically correct.
In Finnish, the order of multiple adjectives is usually flexible and doesn’t change the meaning much. Native speakers will often choose the order that sounds nicest to them in context.
Sometimes:
- The adjective closer to the noun feels more “essential” or descriptive.
- The first adjective can feel a bit more like a “comment” or emphasis.
But here, pienet päivittäiset valinnat and päivittäiset pienet valinnat are practically the same in meaning: small daily choices.
The dictionary form is viedä (to take, to carry, to lead).
vievät is:
- present tense
- 3rd person plural
- agreeing with pienet päivittäiset valinnat (plural subject)
Conjugation (present tense):
- (minä) vien – I take
- (sinä) viet – you take
- (hän) vie – he/she takes
- (me) viemme – we take
- (te) viette – you (pl.) take
- (he) vievät – they take
The -vät ending marks 3rd person plural in standard written Finnish.
Spoken Finnish often just uses vie for both singular and plural (e.g. Pienet valinnat vie), but in writing, vievät is the correct standard form.
Minut is the object of the verb vievät and is in the accusative form of the pronoun minä.
Roughly:
- minut = me as a whole object (take me)
- minua = partitive, often used for incomplete / ongoing actions or “some of me / about me / to me” types of meanings
Here, pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut kohti päämäärää presents the movement of me as a whole person toward the goal. It’s a “total” object, so minut fits.
Some contrasts:
- He vievät minut kotiin. – They take me home. (total, endpoint)
- He ajattelevat minua. – They think about me. (partitive, ongoing mental activity)
So minut is used because I am the direct object being moved toward a goal.
The postposition kohti (towards) typically takes its complement in the partitive case.
- kohti päämäärää – towards (a/the) goal
- kohti maalia – towards the finish line (maali → maalia, also partitive form)
So:
- päämäärä = goal (nominative)
- päämäärää = partitive form used with kohti
This isn’t about incomplete or partial in the usual partitive sense; it’s mainly because kohti as a postposition governs (requires) the partitive here.
Both can mean goal, but they have slightly different flavors:
päämäärä
- more like an end goal, ultimate aim, destination
- can sound a bit more abstract or “big-picture”
tavoite
- often used for targets, objectives, aims, including concrete and measurable ones
- very common in everyday speech, work, and study contexts
In this sentence, päämäärää suits the idea of an overall life goal or long-term aim.
You could say kohti tavoitetta, and it would still be understandable, but the nuance shifts slightly toward a more concrete/defined target.
Here vaikka means although / even though and introduces a subordinate concessive clause:
- vaikka en huomaa edistystä heti
= although I don’t notice progress immediately
Structure:
- vaikka
- a full finite clause: en huomaa edistystä heti
You can also move this clause:
- Vaikka en huomaa edistystä heti, pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut hitaasti kohti päämäärää.
The meaning is the same; only the emphasis and rhythm change slightly. Starting with Vaikka… puts more initial focus on the contrast/problem (not noticing progress).
In Finnish negatives, the “not” word is a verb that takes the personal ending, and the main verb appears in a special “connegative” form without a personal ending.
Present tense positive:
- (minä) huomaan – I notice
Present tense negative:
- (minä) en huomaa – I do not notice
- en = 1st person singular of the negative verb
- huomaa = connegative form (no personal ending)
So the person and number are marked on en, not on huomaa.
Similar patterns:
- hän ei huomaa – he/she doesn’t notice
- me emme huomaa – we don’t notice
Two reasons support the partitive here:
The verb is negative:
In Finnish, the direct object of a negated verb is usually in the partitive.- Näen edistyksen. – I see the progress. (affirmative → possible accusative)
- En näe edistystä. – I don’t see any progress. (negative → partitive)
edistys (progress) is an unbounded / abstract noun:
The partitive often expresses an indefinite or uncountable amount, which fits “progress”.
So:
- en huomaa edistystä ≈ I don’t notice any progress / I don’t notice progress (at all).
If you used edistyksen (accusative/genitive), it would feel like:
- en huomaa edistyksen – I don’t notice the (specific) progress
That sounds more like there is some clearly defined, concrete progress that you fail to notice.
The sentence as given is more natural and general in meaning.
Hitaasti is an adverb meaning slowly, formed from the adjective hidas (slow):
- hidas → hitaasti (typical -as/-is → -aasti/-ästi adverb pattern)
About its position:
- Pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut hitaasti kohti päämäärää.
- Pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut kohti päämäärää hitaasti.
Both are grammatically correct.
The default, neutral position is usually before what it modifies (here, the whole “taking/leading towards the goal” process), so hitaasti kohti päämäärää feels very natural.
Putting hitaasti at the very end can sound a bit more marked or emphatic, like you’re stressing that the movement is slow.
Heti means immediately, right away, at once.
- en huomaa edistystä heti
= I don’t notice progress right away / immediately.
You can:
Leave it out:
vaikka en huomaa edistystä – although I don’t notice progress
(still correct, but less specific about when)Move it:
- vaikka en heti huomaa edistystä – although I don’t immediately notice progress
- vaikka en huomaa heti edistystä
All are acceptable; the nuance is minimal, but:
- Right before the verb (en heti huomaa) tends to emphasize the time aspect of noticing.
- After the object (en huomaa edistystä heti) sounds very natural and neutral in this sentence.
Yes:
- Vaikka en huomaa edistystä heti, pienet päivittäiset valinnat vievät minut hitaasti kohti päämäärää.
This is fully correct. Finnish allows you to place the subordinate clause at the beginning or end.
Meaning-wise, it stays the same:
- Main idea: Small daily choices slowly take me towards the goal.
- Contrast: …even though I don’t notice progress immediately.
Starting with Vaikka… just highlights the contrast first and can make the sentence feel slightly more formal or rhetorical, but the content is unchanged.