How to make Axis Constraints behave

This is one of those tips that seem silly. For years when I've been moving vertices around or moving the handles of bezier vertices I've been frustrated by the restriction changing on me. I'd move a few verts in 'xy' and then somehow click on something that would flip the restriction and the next vertex would now only move in the 'x' or the 'y' axis. I was constantly going to the icon in the menu bar and resetting the restriction back to where I had it.

I don't know why it took me years to figure this out but say you were working in 'Restrict to XY' and it gets changed. All you have to do is click on the 'axis transform gizmo' and it selects whatever you want. Look at the image capture I included. Click on the green 'y' axis arrow and the icon of 'Restrict to Y' is activated on the menu bar. Click on the yellow 'xy' axis box and the icon of 'Restrict to XY' is activated on the menu bar. You get the picture. You now don’t have to keep moving to the icon bar all the time.

I know this seems very elementary but it's these little quirks that slow us down and we all suffer from them. Once in awhile we figure one out and life is a little better. Now I hope the red mark on my forehead goes away where I slapped it...duuhhh!