While copy/paste of images is dangerous poison in general, there is one time it should be fine: to copy/paste an image WITHIN ONE DOCUMENT e.g. to move it or duplicate it. This should be fine as the link info should be preserved.
It MIGHT also be safe to copy/paste BETWEEN INDESIGN DOCUMENTS but I'd want confirmation of that.
By the way, if you are on Windows you might find the "navigate to source" step can be speeded up by setting up a shortcut.