There are too many projects to be built to be limited by even a small injury.
It is so easy to lose focus and come close to an accident. I have read so many wood magazines and looked at so many woodworking blogs, I sometimes get sick of seeing all the stuff about safety. I’ve been around long enough to know how dangerous woodworking is so why do I have to read a safety article in nearly every edition of every magazine I read. You may be thinking the same thing as you read this. The reason is as obvious as all the safety tips we read over and over – no matter how many times you read about it and no matter how hard you try to follow every single safety rule, we all get a little distracted once in a while. Often there are several things on your mental list to do, and it is easy to lose focus even for a second. Also we live in a society where if you can’t multi-task, you are not efficient.
Finally, that deadline to get your project finished pushes you harder and faster than you should go. Like all the other articles and blogs, you’ve read a million times, I’ll say it again here. You can’t lose focus on the single task you are working on when it comes to power tools. Sometimes all that happens is you get a friendly reminder from the woodworking gods that you should slow down, and you have to go in and have your spouse remove the plank that was rammed into your hand when the router table kicked the board back into your hand. Heed that warning because next time it could be so much worse. There is no list, other task or deadline worth major or even minor injury.
I recently had one of those experiences or I wouldn’t have brought it up. I was working with my new table saw, and I had a relatively small piece of wood kick back and slam into my left hand. I will have a pretty good blood blister under the nail of my index finger for a long time. It was enough to slow me down. BE CAREFUL out there.