Countless intrusions have infiltrated my day's routine and pleasures: - My soothing morning shower was stained with the smell of cat poop on the floor - My reading habit on the train was infiltrated by obnoxious children's songs loudly playing beside me - My reflective walk to work turned into a tiring, overworked sprint to arrive on time for a meeting - My after-work nap and deep work time were replaced by a mindless 2-hour binge on gaming streams and videos Tiny events continued chipping away at my energy and happiness. And now, here I am, trying to write something meaningful and reflective when I'm in a headspace feeling anything but the above. But as Marcus Aurelius says in Meditations, > Choose not to be harmed – and you won't feel harmed. Don't feel harmed – and you haven't been. And Maxwell Maltz from Psycho-Cybernetics puts, > You act, and feel, not according to what things are really like, but according to the image your mind holds of what they are like. Why am I piling so much mental friction onto myself? In each scenario, I had a choice on how to react to the situation. And my choice was to bathe in frustration. What if… I was to simply be mindful instead? Instead of the eventual self-sabotage I was committing, what if I didn't indulge in any negative emotions? To not taint my judgment and mind, allowing me to respond in the most virtuous way possible? And just like that… I didn't have a bad day today. Perspectives are powerful.