I heard this brilliant phrase from a colleague today, talking about advice she gives to her children. The gist is this: Life is hard. No matter what, life is going to be difficult a lot of the time. But you have some control over what kind of hard it is. Life can be hard because you’re overworked, or hard because you’re broke. Life can be hard because it takes a lot of effort to stay in shape, or it can be hard because you’re unhealthy. It can be hard because you study all the time, or it can be hard because you haven’t accomplished everything you’re capable of.

There are trade-offs to everything, and risk to everything. There are no free lunches. But you can make choices that give you the brand of hard that you’re most equipped to deal with, or that give you, personally, the most reward for the difficulty. Those choices will be different for everyone, but you do have choices.

And if you don’t make them, you tend to get the worst kinds of hard on offer.

Just as two people together are often more than twice as creative and effective as either working alone, solving two problems at once is generally more than twice as difficult as solving one. The network effects work in both directions. When you have two major issues, information about them both is fighting for your attention and brainpower, and the fight itself uses up extra energy that neither problem would on its own.

The first thing to do: isolate. As hard as it might seem, you have to pick one thing and tackle it. Call in backup if you need to – not to solve the other problem, but just to keep you on task. Write down the other thing and put it aside, telling your brain that it’s coming soon but not to otherwise worry about it.

Use whatever tricks you have to censor out incoming information about that problem. Disable updates, turn off your phone, or leave that room. Tackle the one thing first, get it stable if you can’t solve it completely. When you get to that point, you can switch to 100% focus on the other.

Part of your brain will scream that the other thing needs your attention, but that’s exactly the thing that’s making both problems harder. The total time to solve both issues will be lower if you do one thing at a time.

If someone admires you, compliments you, or brags about you – be worthy. Act in a way that makes it so they undersold you. Outpace even the greatest admiration. Let it propel you.

Things often outgrow the hate you have for them, so you have to be really careful which things you decide you’re never going to like.

If you go to a new restaurant and you have a bad experience, it’s okay to say “I didn’t like that place.” But if you make hating on that place a core feature of your worldview, you’re going to be increasingly silly as the new restaurant fixes its mistakes, grows into its own, and becomes a fantastic, five-star establishment. Everyone is talking about how great that place is, but you continue to cling to your “Joe’s is terrible” mentality, which increasingly has no basis in reality.

Especially since you haven’t eaten at Joe’s since that first time! You decided you didn’t like it, so you refused to engage with it. You never learned about the improvements.

Hate doesn’t leave room for growth. Keep it light, and revisit.

Don’t ever count on the security of Plan A. Part of thinking strategically is to give some thought, however little, to “but what if…?”

The best time to muse about a problem is before the stress of it presents itself.

Some fascinating research I just learned about: Turning something you want to accomplish into an identity instead of an action increases the likelihood that you’ll do it.

I’ve written about the opposite effect before, how people can let negative but temporary elements of their existence become core aspects of their identity and thus never overcome them. But it turns out this effect can be harnessed for good!

Instead of saying, “I’m going to get my to-do list done today,” trying framing it as “I’m the kind of person who finishes their to-do list.” Don’t just say “I won’t procrastinate,” say “I’m not a procrastinator,” and watch the change start to take hold.

I didn’t just write today. I’m a writer!

If you can come up with an idea for something you’d like to do that takes three or more steps, execute that idea the same day you came up with it, and not disrupt the normal responsibilities of your day otherwise, then you have an exceptional level of competence.

If you think that what I just described is easy, that’s because you can do it – and because you don’t realize that most people can’t.

Find a way to use that power to the benefit of others, and you’ll lead a rich and full life.

“Measure twice, cut once” is good advice. But the marginal return for each additional measurement drops dramatically.

Gathering the same information over and over again doesn’t make the cutting easier, more efficient, or sharper. But it definitely delays you, makes you question yourself, and adds to your costs.

Eventually, you can measure, measure, measure – and never cut at all.

Often, the best change you can make to your environment is to leave.

Whether it’s your job, your house, your state, your country – there will be things about “where you are” that you want to change. If you can make positive changes, do so! But there will always be limits on how far you can move the needle, and being stubbornly attached to a particular environment is just status quo bias in action.

Swap schools. Get a different apartment. Find a new job. These are all very viable options, and will often bring about the changes you want more swiftly than trying to eke out progress where you are.

Don’t abandon freedom. Go where the action is.