I'd sure hate to start-off a new part of a forum talking about the unfortunate happenings of someone else, so I thought I'd ask a few of you guys and girls how YOU went about setting your own personal standards in the way you fly instruments.



What I mean by that is in your day to day flying, what sort of things did/have you taken into account when, say, approaching to land in the murk. Did you accept those conditions and start flying in them from the very moment you passed your IFR checkride, or did you expose yourself to them - slowly at first, and then work your way down to a level where you were comfortable going right down to minimums?



The reasons that I ask this are purely to find-out how the thought process should be directed from the point of view of someone who has only just got my instrument rating (here in Australia). I've had both types of advice; "build down to it slowly" and the other end of the spectrum "go gettum, you've earned the licence, now proove it" types of advice.



What sort of timeframe did you take to build to "minimums" approaches, or did you just "go for it"?



CF.