“We seem to have ground to a screeching halt.”
“Who is putting on the brakes?”
“I didn’t know what I was walking into.”

When energy is diverted from passion about a conviction and is expressed in one of three forms—heat, noise, or material breakdown, we are alerted to the existence of one or more forms of friction within our lives. The presence and subsequent reduction of friction determines which convictions experience maintenance of motion and become habitual and which encounter resistance that impedes their progress.

We may have an awareness of our present predicament, acknowledge a high level of friction that burns valuable energy, but need more reference points. What is the root cause of our thwarted progress and depleted energy?

The running of a marathon is a microcosm of a life journey. There are considerable resistances that must be worked through to complete this race. We cannot continually have collisions with other runners, or any hope of finishing will be dashed. We don’t want to be slowed down along the way from improper clothing or drag on our progress. And we must be in the best shape possible to even consider a run of this distance in the first place. This simple example displays three major forms of friction we all encounter throughout life.