I was looking at comments made by different ones concerning books.
There was one made by a Paul Sweeney that I instantly related to.  “you know you’ve read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend.”  I know that feeling.  Some books I finish and am sad when I do.  The good thing is I can read the same book again and again.  Books by C.S.Lewis have done that to me plus the Cossacks by Leo Tolstoy.
Another comment I read that I really like was by an Arthur Helps.  “If you would understand your own age, read the works of fiction produced in it.  People in disguise speak freely.”
To me that is true on several levels.  It was only yesterday someone was telling me that whenever they share personal stuff it is in the third person.  That way no link can be made to them, but they can speak their mind.
It’s funny but I look at that comment in relation to movies and tv programs produced today.  To me it is one of those cases of asking which came first the chicken or the egg.  The underlying theme of many shows produced today is one of violence, deception and misery.  To me that describes the age in which we live.  On the one hand is a longing for peace and stability but reality is the exact opposite.  Movies may have a happy ending but getting there so often involves wading through filth.
When it comes to books, I know I am a slow reader but there are few things in my mind as satisfying as a good book well written.   An as yet unthought of thought that can open an unexplored world.  A turn of phrase that softens and inspires.  Although subjective it can make me a better person.
Hazel Rochman said “reading makes immigrants of us all.  It takes us away from home but more important, it finds homes for us everywhere.”  Another thing I like, “from your parents you learn love and laughter and how to put one foot before the other.  But when books are opened you discover you have wings.”  That was from a book called “On Reflection.”
I love the pleasant surprise of a good book from an unknown author.  What I love about books is how they can broaden my horizons without me leaving my room. A book can change me.  As Franz Kafka said, “a book should serve as an axe for the frozen sea within us.”

Often in a supermarket I think “this would be easier if there was only one product to chose from.”  But so often it is choices, choices, choices.
When I sat down to write yesterday, I had the following quote in mind from James Clear.  But I ended up writing about another one.
Today it is this one. “"Your habits are often a byproduct of convenience. [We] seek the path of least resistance, which means the most convenient option is often the one that wins. Make good choices more convenient and bad choices less so."
This taking the path of least resistance is a lived experience for me.  All too often I heed the voice that says, “rest today.”  That is not mistaking the voice I heed when I genuinely need a rest.  It is too easy to push myself un-necessarily.  It is easy to think I am doing the right thing in that circumstance, but I have found nothing leads to burn out like over doing even a good thing.
No I am talking about a voice that encourages slackness and the lack of achievement.  To me there is a time and a place for everything.  A time to work hard and a time to give it away for a while.
Often for me the time of working hard is not the time of the most convenient.  I have found that achieving anything worthwhile is not taking the most convenient option.  It generally means going above and beyond what I think I am capable of.  I only find out what I am capable of when I attempt something I think I am incapable of.
It is certainly inconvenient.  It is often a lonely place.  Too often it is the place I am in where someone unwilling to be stretched is ready to rejoice in my fall with a quip like “I told you so.”
But for me that does not matter much.  The place I want to be is a place beyond my current horizon.  A place I reach for knowing that I may not be able to reach it yet - but I will.  What is inconvenient today leads to a more desirable place of convenience.
Good but inconvenient choices may be hard, but following and doing them crowds out the bad choices and I am way more likely to reach my goal.

It is a few days after I got the email but what is said in the James Clear email is applicable now as always. “"Use what you already know. People are so busy searching for a shortcut — or hoping an easier path will reveal itself — they let numerous moments slip by when they could get results simply by doing what is right in front of them."
I guess that sort of thing is what I hold to.  So often it seems to me that solutions, or solutions in the making, are right in front of me and not something future that I am hoping will appear.
I reckon the best thing I can do is act from peace rather than desperation.  I know I need to look around to see what I already have.  It is when I use and make the most of that, that good and useful ideas become clearer to me.
There is an ad on tv at the moment talking about dads and a son says his dad used to say something like, “I have ideas I have not even thought of yet.”  I admit I like that because it shows acting from confidence.  Something may not be clear right now, but that does not mean it will never be.  So often the best I can do is see what is at hand and use that to its maximum potential.
It may become obvious that something else is needed over and above my current resources but that is ok.  My actions are born of hope and as is often said, “the more I practice the luckier I seem to be.”  When actions are born of despair, I am inclined to want to throw the towel in and decare it is all too hard, and I can so easily miss grasping the very thing that I need.
Actions born of hope do not bury their head in the sand or declare what is not as something that is based solely on unrealistic optimism.  To some what I hold to may seem to be a bridge too far, but to me it is a bridge I will get to and cross with what I need, when I need it.   
In the meantime, I will do what I know to do and use what I have.  The more I use what I have, the more I have, and the better I get at using it.  When the time is right, I will be able to cross that bridge.