Life as herding cats
I like this zen habits essay (a). The whole thing is good, here's an excerpt:
How do we herd the disorder of our lives in some semblance of a direction? How do we herd the cats to go somewhere we’d like them to go?
If we accept that we’re herding cats and not trying to run a smooth bullet train ride, we can work with the chaotic nature of the cats. We know cats aren’t going to follow directions or go on a schedule. We know the nature of cats, and to expect them to be a bullet train is ridiculous.