Hello. I just bought an 08 manual transmission mazda3. The car runs great and the majority of the time I have no issues shifting, especially 1st-4th. The shifter does occasionally get really stiff/stick a little when moving over to 5th/reverse, and seems to require a bit more muscle to get it to go over to that side of the H. Generally that works fine and it'll downshift just fine from 5th. Occasionally though everything seems to get misaligned after that shift to 5th and then I have to wiggle the stick around in neutral for a moment to get it to line back up to go down into 4th or 3rd.

I should note I did see a video about how to adjust the shifter position via the little clip on the shifter cable to the left. I tightened it up a bit and it seemed to help overall, and when everything is shifting normally the stick is straight vertical when in neutral and when shifting between 3rd/4th it stays in a straight line as well.

This is my first time driving a stick, so while I have some knowledge about how the shift assembly works mechanically this is still pretty new to me. Any advice on what I can look at that may cause the shifter to misalign itself would be appreciated.