Everyday Systems Podcast

Know thy calendar, know thyself.

I'm now practicing 33 Everyday Systems. How is that possible? Is it even a good idea?

The No S Diet take on Ultraprocessed foods. 

My 7th annual review covers just the highlights from 33 total systems: How color-coded spreadsheets changed my behavior more than goal-setting, fine-tuning Glass Ceiling with precision drink accounting, the Spider Hunter sleep expansion pack, and gamifying my rage at Duolingo.

For the 100th episode, a clip show of course—in which I revisit Mantrafication and share an actual full clip of my current mantra. Part tour of all the systems compressed and contained in that mantra, part useful tool you could use yourself.

Moleskines for Monkey Mind

What if your fridge had a soul? Would you keep it clean? 

Tweet to yourself, spreadsheet diaries, soul sampling.

Brokenhearted about breaking your streak? Let Greenishness Be Thy Motivation.

When "growth mindset" hits its limits, it's time for another approach.

A mock superpower for not looking at porn

Specific rules and a general approach for managing your relationship with technology -- battle hardened by over 20 years of practice. 

Game mechanics as life hacks (also some game recommendations).

6th annual review of the Everyday Systems and how they are doing for me personally

Bounce back from injuries and setbacks by recasting progress as a reward

How to stop permasnacking on news. Use techniques inspired by the No S Diet and read it like a meal.

Todo Lists Are Your Salvation / Todo Lists Are Your Damnation

A more nuanced approach to systematically moderating alcohol (and other substances)

When you don't like what you want

Urban Ranger, from scratch, as if I'd never spoken or written about it before. Draft chapter for the upcoming Everyday Systems Compendium, and hopefully interesting and useful in its own right.

Cure all your ailments with dirt, pain and danger

The No S Diet, from scratch, as if I'd never spoken or written about it before. Draft chapter for the upcoming Everyday Systems Compendium, and hopefully interesting and useful in its own right.

Build habits by leaning on the clock and calendar rather than fighting against them. Beyond N and S days. Cutesy task phrases. Powerfully silly times. Calendar-First Tasking.

Annual update on all the Everyday Systems and how they are doing for me personally 

I think I mix about 14 metaphors in this episode:  We've got a goose-stepping white bear baseball player with devil horns doing jiu jitsu on the death star. A ridiculous Chimera, if you put it all together. But maybe just the guardian-gargoyle image you need to keep the antimantras at bay.

Self-saboteur? Time to stop playing with your pet demons (maybe).

Anxious? Here's a fun technique for getting over it. It's halfway between gamified mindfulness and exposure therapy.

Aristotle: "You are what you repeatedly do." Well, what do you repeatedly do? In this episode, an exercise for finding out.

Practice being human with AI

Everyday Systems as Apps for Human Minds.

Four catchphrases for tidier habits

A lighthearted approach to imposter syndrome.

A little later and much shorter than last year.

A two-word anti-mantra to snap you and your family out of automatic bickering

Food logging: apparently it works. But it's torture to do long term. I discuss a way you can practice a limited, strategic, surgical form of food logging with the No S Diet (or any other diet) that gives you the benefits of food logging – which are real, potentially at least – without the protracted and probably futile misery.  

After 20 years of swinging my sledgehammer injury-free, I discovered that that even Shovelglove can cause or at least be impacted by injury. How Shovelglove principles like "schedulalistically insignificant time "and "maintenance is more important that progress" have been key to my recovery.

Be a Mensch, not a rockstar. It's surprisingly hard, even though you probably don't have any alternative.

What to do when your appetites keep routing around your rules to contain them

Technology for habits, and habits for technology. Also a story about my Roomba.

A lighthearted Jedi mind trick for calming yourself down in certain mundane situations

Meta Systems are systems for managing other systems: to track and boster them. Personal Punchcards, The Life Log, Mantrafication, and Loose Lips Sink Ships.

Soul systems are systems for detaching yourself from the frenzy of everyday life to reflect, for learning, for recovering, for devoting more of your limited time to what's important, for figuring out what's important to begin with. Systems discussed include: Audiodidact. The Study Habit. Demogorgon vs. Asmodeus, Timebox Lord, G-Ray Vision, VC Cat,  Posifactive and Weekend Luddite.

2021 was miserable in most respects, but it's been another fantastic opportunity to test the true mettle of Everyday Systems. Part 1 reviews Body and Spirits systems: The No S Diet, Shovelglove, Urban Ranger, Lawful Good Biker, Glass Ceiling, Low Smoking.

An inspiringly ridiculous image to ward off the dreaded "what the hell" effect.

Specific techniques for making study a daily habit

How to go from "study=cramming" to making learning a lifelong habit

A helpful image from WWII propaganda to keep you from sabotaging your self-improvement efforts with premature talk.

All the self-help books ever written distilled into one word, with a note of enlightened self-mockery that makes the whole thing bearable:

Engineer intentional redundancy into your habit systems to make them fault tolerant.

Habit tracking when apps or magic markers won't cut it