Friction.
unbearable isn't a measurement, its a relationship.
I have been lurking on r/personaltrainers for a while now and one thing I noticed is the most common post seems to be a version of this: Bots (possibly ones made of flesh and blood) trying to find “friction” and “pain points” in your onboarding/scheduling/payment process – problems that can be smoothed out with this new app they are developing – it’s free, they just want some feedback from people in the industry. I don’t think my profession is special – this language is pervasive. The frictionless transaction, smoothing out the user experience. It may seem dramatic, but every time I hear that pitch all I can see is the difference between going to the grocery store and out on a hunt. Wild game versus the industrial feed lot. This massive and systemic reduction of friction for the “user” – the only real pain point in the shape of a captive bolt gun.
Comfort and safety, but ultimately in service of the one who built it.
Every time someone pitches me on reducing friction they really just seem to be trying to reduce the friction inherent between me and my wallet. Between me and my information. Me and my agency. That friction, that space between urge and fulfillment – that is the window of discernment. The weighing of want and need, of cost and benefit. It is the battle between Id and Ego, of the wants and cravings installed in me through 43 years of enculturation, of television and internet and biology – between all that history, and the person who I want to be.
Not to get too poetic, but that friction is what allows a match to spark into flame. Friction is how we wear down stone, friction and pressure allows water to cut steel. Friction is the mechanism that allows us to change that which seems permanent.
Unassailable.
Through friction. Through slowing down. Through noticing.
Those are the things that are being reduced in this world of apps and on demand. “Freedom from wants” flattens the entire experience. Smooth means no highs or lows. No stops or starts. Frictionless means that there is no need to slow down, to decide, to change or improve or grow. They sell it to us by promising that we can use all that extra time and space to follow our dreams, to work on our book or project or an app of our own, but it is like selling us running shoes for the low-low price of our feet.
“Just think of all the time you will have”
“How productive could you be if you weren’t doing … whatever”
“Optimization” sounds like a good goal, but the version sold to you comes with sponsors and discount codes, three levels of mastery and an instructors certification, corporate partnerships and bi-monthly billing cycles. In this age you have to ask what someone means when they are helping you optimize. The way Facebook helps you stay connected? The way Amazon helps you find the products you need? Optimized to what end? The ideal consumer. Trimmed and focused and streamlined directly into an instrument of someone else’s profit. It is the ultimate MLM – a financial perpetual motion machine: they sell you the answers for the price of the textbook. Pay the premium and you get to skip to the end, reading is for nerds anyway. Who needs to know how to make matches when you can rent our fire.
It is tips and tricks, solutions and subscriptions. They aren’t always wrong, but they are fucking dishonest. Reducing unnecessary friction and reducing the amount of friction you can stomach are very different things with a frighteningly similar approach.
Learn to tell the difference.
Because the worst part of all is that it works. Simple and pervasive because it solves actual problems. I can drive 15 minutes to the one store that carries the coffee filters I like and stop to get dry erase markers and hand soap for the gym, or I can order them all on my phone. Less than one stop shopping. Why even make a grocery list when I can fill an Amazon cart? Hell, they will deliver today and it’s cheaper and this way I don’t have to give up an hour – they even let me pay a dollar to offset my carbon. True: Friction for frictions sake is just bad design, but smoothness for smoothness sake is equally damaging. The point here is choice. We all know the difference – a meal cooked from scratch. A hand written note. Pen and ink and hard to read script will touch us in ways an email sent by chatGPT never will.
Creation comes from friction. From attention. From an itch, a catch… a pause or break or simply a moment to really feel. Friction isn’t always pain, it’s a sunset that steals your breath, grabs your eye and won’t let you look away. It’s that idea that keeps coming back, whispering for your attention in every quiet moment between meetings and before bed. A frictionless life is a finished life. Absent. Lacking. Sterile.
Friction is the mechanism, not the goal. Like going to the gym, friction signals us to create change. Friction teaches us to deal with more friction. Friction will teach us to hold. To wait. To reach. A chronic lack of friction is like a chronic lack of physical stress. Without resistance there is atrophy. It begins with avoidance. After all, it’s uncomfortable. Inconvenient. And at this point: voluntary.
But it won’t always be.
The slide from unhappy to unwilling to unable is both swifter and more subtle than you think. If you starve the body, the brain of information and signals, each tiny morsel begins to seem more significant. A soft light burns your eyes when you are not ready for it. Cold can feel like pain when all you know is warmth. Equality feels like attack when you are used to feeling superior. Unbearable isn’t a measurement, it’s a relationship. Remove the practice and you will be shocked at what can stop you. Remove the practice and you will be shocked at how quickly what was once normal is forgotten. Unattainable. Every choice, every decision is a vote. A lesson. A reinforcement of synapse and nerves. Do it again. Do it cheaper. Our biology isn’t wired for this abundance, it is our spirit that craves meaning, seeks out challenge. In this day and age it seems that biology has won, our ancestors streamlined our world to give us so much for so little. The natural response of evolutionary success. To avoid that decline many of us need to create the environment that gets the two working together. That embraces and rewards the effort craved by our very soul.
Lack of friction is a sirens song. It delights us and attracts us and smashes us into the rocks.
Claims our treasure and picks over our very bones.
And then it does it again to someone else.
So stuff your ears with wax, or if you dare to lead – lash yourself to the main mast and try to weather the storm. Feel the draw and stay safe through discipline and a well designed system. Through knowing what temptations you can take and where proper planing can save you from future weakness.
In the words of Lisa Feldman Barrett: we are constantly curating our past. Experiences and outcomes are collected and recollected, they create our history. Our narrative. Those stories form our ideas of possible and impossible. Of fun and fancy and fear. Friction is part of that story. The moments where everything can turn.
Frictionless is a dating app. Swipe and message, excite and delight but at a certain point you have to go IRL, meet and maybe get let down… or ghost. Swipe on someone else. Smash that dopamine button, make up for the dwindling intensity with a thousand tiny doses and it will almost be the same. For a while. Because frictionless has its own tolerance that we can build up. And when that loneliness comes crashing down we have probably forgotten that the solution is really just the problem we have been avoiding this whole time.
Friction is not the enemy.
It is a mechanism.
It can be a tool.
A doorway.
This rant comes with homework dear reader, a “call to action” if you will. Find some friction. Name it. Not as a pain point to be avoided but a scrape that can turn into a spark. A simple moment to slow down and reflect – to sit in that discomfort or ignorance, to stretch and pull and realize it isn’t that bad – let it ache like a muscle finally being used for the purpose it was built for. Maybe this is just another rep, another instance of learning to try harder – or maybe it is an opportunity for your whole story to change. Friction can be an opportunity to practice, to check back in with what you want and who you want to be. It can function as what my friend and teacher calls “the glitch”.
The interrupt.
The moment to question.
The moment to ask:
To what end?
Who does this serve?
What am I learning?
What am I practicing?
And what kind of person do I want to be?
A millionaire isn’t a kind of person. Successful isn’t a kind of person.
Helpful. Kind. Aware. Observant. Considerate.
Worthy.
Friction exposes. Shapes. Ignites.
In the hands of an artist, friction can be used to form.
To remove everything that is not.
And if you want to use friction, you first need to be able to tolerate it.
This is all practice.
This is all a Practice.
So, I ask once again:
What are you practicing?
burkey - owner/operator of Station515 || ferndale, mi || www.station515.com || physical objects
I have made many an enemy in that sub lol great words here