Alignment between the many dispirate aspects of your life can bring balance.

The idea of making something "frictionless", means to remove those things that are causing friction, a contrast or contradiction.

When things are aligned they "line up" and flow in one direction. Life isn't like that (at least not one I'm familiar with) because it's full of many things, all going in their own direction.

So, what do we do?

Live with friction, sure, that's always a possibility.

Or, sit down, do some big picture thinking and figure out what one big picture of what you want out of life might look like.

I like this saying.

You can interpret it a number of ways, but the way I like to think of it is this:

Have a strong opinion- whatever it takes to get there; research, discussion, learning etc.

Don't just have an opinion, make it one worth holding, make it strong.

But hold it loosely.

What does this mean?

It means, be ready to change your opinion if you get better, newer, more accurate, more useful information.

To have a strong opinion, is not the end goal, it's the starting position.

To hold it loosely, brings you into the game- where you, and others, put yourselves in a position to advance, progress, develop and evolve those positions and knowledge, not to hoard, stand still and be rooted to the spot.

But be ready to change, advance, progress towards your north star.

So, form strong opinions, and hold them loosely so you may grow, and move, and see the world.

Your life can fit into a box.

You have your work space, your personal space, the spaces you want and the spaces you have. All inside the box.

There are activities that reinforce the box.

Makes you feel better about the box. Makes the box make sense.

Enhances all things to do with living in the box. A perfect unit of measurement, that fits neatly, one edge or another, into the space inside the box.

Doesn't take much to get going, but you need to get the "get going" part done.

It doesn't have to be amazing, it's not all relying on a single moment or point in time.

Just start.

And like that previous sentence, don't add anything after it, the point of that sentence finished at '.'

We all have an idea of what "normal" is, so who told you what that is?

Who defined that for you, and on what authority did they make the claim, that this or that was "normal"?

Societal norms, we understand, are what we have collectively agreed is "acceptable", for the greater good (supposedly).

But outside of that consensus, all other forms of "normal" are just our own perception and judgement of what is or should be considered "acceptable", person-to-person.

Hard things are hard.

If you're not conditioned to the activity, you get tired quick.

If you quit then, you'll only ever know and be able to tolerate that level of activity.

But you press on, you come back, you try again- now you get a chance to get a little bit better.

You try again, gain a little bit more.

That's it. That's the post. Tomorrow and the end result you want, is not promised.

The only promise is you try today, you gain something, in that moment, today.

Live to fight another day.

Resilience.

Sometimes things work out in your favour. A lot of the time, it doesn't.

Neither of these times last, and we'd do well to remember that.

When the going gets tough, keep going! A tough phase is not where you want to stop.

Get your mind right, invest in activities to boost those good internal signals e.g. eat something healthy, drink water, go for a walk, touch grass, feel the sun on your skin.

At the end of the day, believe in tomorrow. Tomorrows another day, another chance to be just that little bit better than you were today, in skills, in happiness, in life.

It's always darkest before the dawn.

If you look at life, and everything in it, as a game- or a series of intersecting games, within other games, I think that has value.

Looking at things, in terms of a game, allows you to look at the events in your life objectively, as you would watching any other game being played.

(Obviously, if you're emotionally invested in certain games (who isn't), you'll need to think of a game that doesn't make you want to riot when your team loses.)

A game has players, rules, goals, an area of play (boundaries), consequences, techniques, skill, luck and "interpretations".

All these, while not an exhaustive list, make up any of the games in your life.

For example, the "getting a job in tech" is a game. "Wanting to get into a relationship" also a game with the sequel "trying to stay IN a relationship". There's "how to navigate difficult work situations" games as well as "I want to be a rockstar in my field" game.

If you learn the rules of the game, and play them better than anyone else, with some luck, persistence and technique, you can win at the games you choose to play.

A game, like life, is not to be taken too seriously.

Discipline, will power, and consistency.

Consistency in discipline will save your willpower, to aid your consistency in adhering to your discipline, which will save....

There is freedom routine. In structure.

Life will not always be like this, but all things in life fall into two broad categories.

Those things you can control. And those things you cannot.

You can control your routine, the things you plan to do with your day.

The freedom is now you don't have to umm and aaah about that decision anymore, it's done.

And you are free to move on.

And should you choose to move on- stay the course.

Given 6 hours to chop down a tree, Abhraham Lincoln would have spent four hours sharpening the axe.

On a new venture, an new idea, project it's tempting to dive straight into action.

Why not? It's the exciting part. Action speaks louder than works right? It's time to get sh!t done!

Yes. But more effectively, No.

If you work hard at the beginning, to learn, understand what it is you're trying to do, every action from there becomes more intentional, more informed and more calculated towards your specific goal or objective.

The tempation to allay the feeling of not "doing something", just fills time in with lower-value space where a higher value of "unit of work" could have been put there instead, given more time spent doing the "sharpening".

Invest in being a better learner, being a better do-er, before doing the "doing".