A list of reflective questions to ask yourself Antifragile Availability bias Black Swan Bottlenecks Cause and Effect Compound Interest Confirmation Bias Create momentum to make progress Emergence Environment Design Every field has some core principles and ideas upon which all other derive Evolution Excellence is mundane Fail Fast So You Can Fix Early Feedback Loop First instinct fallacy Force multiplier Free Rider Problem Friction Gall's Law Hanlon's Razor Haskell Hickam's Dictum Hindsight Bias How to Acquire Mental Models Increase your leverage to become more productive Innovation Multiplier Inversion Leverage Local maxima vs. Global maxima Mario Marketing Mental Models Metcalfe's Law Minimize time getting into position, just go Mise en place Network Effects Not making time for yourself first leads to burnout Occam's Razor Opportunity Cost Overton windows Perverse Incentive Positive Sum Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc Fallacy PP 1 - Introduction to Haskell PP 2 - Types and classes PP 3 - Functions and lists PP 4 - Recursion PP 5 - Higher-order functions PP 6 - Declaring types and type classes Premature Optimization Reciprocity Regression to the Mean Sharpen the saw Sherlock Holmes and Mental Models Signal vs. Noise Skin in the Game Stop being ungrateful of having so little life, and be grateful that you were given any at all Survivorship bias Take on the role before you can assume the role The Barbell Strategy The Diderot Effect The Dunning-Kruger Effect The Feature-Positive Effect The Ivy Lee Method for daily planning The Law of Inertia The Lindy Effect The Map Is Not The Territory The Mere-Exposure Effect The Pareto Principle The Pauli Exclusion Principle The Pratfall Effect The QEC method The Red Queen Effect Theory of Constraints To catch a second wind, you have to stay in the game long enough Using notes to advance in life Via Negativa Wittgenstein's Ruler Working on vs. working in Your second brain should actively grow and compound Zero Sum

Environment Design

If you don’t want to slip, don’t go where it’s slippery.
— Alcoholics Anonymous

Changing your environment is one of the best and easiest ways to change your behavior. Environment design marginally improves your ability to be disciplined by reducing the willpower necessary to be so.

If you want to prevent a behavior, add friction. If you want to encourage a behavior, remove friction. The less willpower necessary to perform the behavior, the easier it becomes.

Environment design is a way of doing Systems Thinking for your environment.

You want to live in an environment that gets the best out of you. And not just the current best you—it should be almost forcing you to level up. Helpful, but insistant.

Adding friction

If you want to spend less time on your phone, remove the prompts that make you want to use your phone. You can’t scroll Instagram if you don’t have Instagram.
If you want to eat healthier food, don’t have unhealthy food in your apartment. Having to go to the store to eat unhealthy food induces friction to the process and can help prevent the behavior.

Removing friction

If you want to work out early in the morning, make it easier by putting out your gym clothes the night before.
If you want to take your vitamins, put them somewhere visible, instead of somewhere hidden away.

How to design your environment

First, ask yourself: “How can I make this new habit easier to do?” And then you troubleshoot (Premeditatio Malorum): “What is making this new habit hard to do?”
Be very mindful any time you encounter any friction. Friction is the enemy when cultivating new habits.

Incoming links: Friction

Outgoing links: Alcoholics Anonymous, willpower, Systems Thinking, Premeditatio Malorum