From the bed of Abdoulaye
New York City
10:17 PM

Dear friend,

Life is lived one way and one way only. That’s the way of always moving forward. It’s a simple unwritten rule to life. You either keep moving forward or you die. You stand still and you die. There is no other option but to keep on moving forward no matter what.

The Beginning is Always The Hardest

Newtons first law states that an object at rest will stay at rest unless a force acts upon it. To put that in layman terms, for you to begin any endeavor, you must apply considerable force at the beginning to get the ball rolling.

Let’s take going to the gym for example. If you’ve never gone to the gym before or are on a very long hiatus, starting back up is really hard to do.

There are two routes you can take. You can either put in a little effort to start or you can put in a lot of effort to start.

Putting in a little effort: All you do is just watch a few youtube videos. Maybe you even signed up for a new gym membership. You’ll end up going to the gym. But you’re going to stop going soon enough. Once the first road block shows itself, you’re out of there. The amount of effort you put in is related to your commitment. You put in such little effort, you have no commitment of sticking to it.

Putting in a lot of effort: You watch a bunch of youtube videos. On top of that you research ways to train your muscles properly. You research your diet and even managed to create a workout routine for yourself. You buy new gym shoes, and gym clothes. You even buy some supplements. You write down in your journal, the fitness goal you set for yourself. You write down why you want to achieve that goal and how you’ll feel once you’ve achieved that goal. You’ve just put in a lot of effort. You’ve generated a lot of energy to start moving the gym momentum forward. Once you start going to the gym, you are not going to stop. No matter if it snows and you have to walk through inches of snow, no matter if you’re tired from work. You are going to go to the gym no matter what it takes. You’ve invested a lot of energy to start and you’re damn sure not going to let it all go to waste so you keep going. You’re going to stick to your plan no matter what obstacles show themselves.

It’s Easier To Keep The Momentum Going Than Starting It.

Once you’ve started moving the ball forward, you’re going to need much less energy than you used in the beginning to keep the ball rolling.

You’re already in the groove of things at this point. Back with the gym example. All you’d need to keep the ball rolling is continued stimulus to keep your mind on the gym such as a few workout videos here and there. ON top of that you can also add looking at the notes you wrote before on why you’re working out and how you’ll feel after you’ve reached your goal.

You’ll be doing this until you reach a certain point. A point where the momentum of the goal is so strong you wouldn’t need anything to make you go to the gym. This is the point where it’s a part of your life just like drinking water. At this point, you’d barely need any energy at all to keep the ball in momentum. It moves by itself.

Once you’re in momentum, your goal is to always stay in momentum. I get it that life can happen. The unexpected can make a dent in your plans. The momentum you’ve built, all the energy gathered in your pursuit, it’ll take some time for it all to come to a halt. This is why if you stop for a few days, it’s fight. You’ll still feel the drive to get back in to it.

But don’t be mistaken. There is a point of no return.

The Point Of No Returns

There is no worse thing than having built such tremendous momentum to only slack off and have the momentum gradually start to slow down until it reaches a full stop. Atrocious. That’s like getting a million dollars but waiting so long to claim it that it’s gone by the time you do.

Do not lose the momentum. Do whatever it takes. If the pursuit is something you care about, DO NOT LOSE THE MOMENTUM.

Once you stop taking consistent action on keeping the momentum alive, the momentum will gradually start slowing down. It’ll slow down until it stops moving completely. And when it does, You’re going to need even greater effort than the first time to get the momentum to start moving forward again.

We’ve already seen that it’s much easier to keep the momentum going than to start the momentum. So this goes to show that you should guard the momentum of the things you care about with your life. If you don’t use it, you lose it. As simple as that.

The way is the way of moving forward. The way is the way of forward momentum. You stop you die. There’s no such thing as pause. This isn’t a video game. This is real life.

The key to life is always moving forward. The key to life is momentum. You either put one foot in front of the other and keep on going or you stop and die. Death is the cowards way out. Put that foot in front of the other. Catch you on the other side. My momentum is still moving forward. Yours should be too.

Until next time
Your man

Abdoulaye