日积月累

日積月累

rìjī-yuèlěi

idiom #47,972

Meanings

1 to accumulate day by day and month by month
2 to build up over a long period
3 gradual long-term accumulation

Characters

Examples

学习语言要日积月累，不能一蹴而就。

Xuéxí yǔyán yào rìjīyuèlěi, bùnéng yīcù'érjiù.

Learning a language requires steady accumulation — it can't be done overnight.

他的财富是日积月累攒下来的。

Tā de cáifù shì rìjīyuèlěi zǎn xiàlái de.

His wealth was built up bit by bit over many years.

日积月累的小问题最终变成了大麻烦。

Rìjīyuèlěi de xiǎo wèntí zuìzhōng biànchéng le dàmá fan.

Small problems that piled up over time eventually became big trouble.

Tips

history

From Zhu Xi's Song-dynasty 《答周南仲书》: 但使一日之间整顿得三五次，理会得三五事，则日积月累，自然纯熟 — 'if you tidy up three or five times a day and grasp three or five things, then day by day and month by month understanding becomes natural.' Classic Neo-Confucian self-cultivation framing.

memory

日 (day) + 月 (month) bookend the verbs 积 (pile up) + 累 (accumulate). Literally 'day-pile, month-accumulate'.

Stroke Order

日 rì

积 jī

月 yuè

累 lèi