Watch Out for the Slippery Slope

"behold, my brethren and the sons of Ishmael and also their wives began to make themselves merry, insomuch that they began to dance, and to sing, and to speak with much rudeness, yea, even that they did forget by what power they had been brought thither; yea, they were lifted up unto exceeding rudeness." (1 Nephi 18:9)

So as I read this passage, I couldn't help but think that it seems to me that nobody just suddenly goes from good to evil.  More likely, a good person starts to make decisions that aren't great, and they go farther and farther off the straight and narrow.  This scripture to me illustrates this.  It doesn't specifically say this, but I think this verse represents a progression of getting worse and worse to the point where these people tied Nephi to the boat for several days, presumably to let him die. How do you go from humbling yourself and helping Nephi build a boat, to this, in a pretty short timeline? 

It is what I was describing before.  

It is easy to be led away by the small choices we make. Satan won't have an easy time convincing a righteous person to do something seriously wrong.  However, he might help them "forget" to read their scriptures and/or say their prayers.  He might convince them to stay home some weeks from church. Making these decisions drives away the spirit, which makes it progressively harder and harder to make good decisions.

It seems to me that we (meaning I, really) can't afford to be lax on the little things, or we might go further down the wrong path than we want.