Welcome to the final post of intelligent environment design week! Over the past four days (1, 2, 3, 4), we looked at ways to automatically reduce levels of Craving, Ego, Sloth and Frustration, while boosting levels of Inspiration, Altruism, Flow and Tolerance. 

Today, we’ll finish up by tuning Worry and Excitement to just the right levels.

Worry

If you want to Worry less, start by exposing yourself to less worrying information about things you have no control over. Remove all those worrying digital feeds from your different devices and, if possible, tone down worrying relationships. 

Worry about things that are actually within your control can be very valuable. But only if you use this Worry to drive you to take positive, proactive action.

Do some strategic thinking to determine the action(s) that will diminish your Worry the most. Then be sure to write it down on your to-do list so that it will get done ASAP. 

Also keep in mind that Worry can be a sign that you’re stretching yourself too thin. In this case, the right response is not to do more, but rather to refrain from making too many promises that put you under pressure. 

Excitement

Do you have some stuff going on in your life that gives you a feeling of excitement about the future? Can you see your life five years from now being much better than it is today?

If so, you’re all set. But if not, you really need to do some soul searching. Human beings must grow to be happy. As the old saying goes, if you’re not growing, your’re dying. 

I think everyone should have a long-term master plan for their life – something that, if it works out, will make life totally awesome. Sure, this plan will be flawed in many ways and will change many times over the years, but that’s not the point. 

The point is that an attractive vision of the future creates the Excitement required to keep moving forward. Make sure you have such a vision and Excitement will give you plenty of energy to live life to the fullest 🙂

So, that was that for our week of intelligent environment design.

Remember this principle of adding and removing friction. If you find yourself indulging in a bad habit, ask yourself how you can make this bad action harder for yourself. If you want to do more of something good, do everything in your power to make it as easy and pleasant as possible. 

Have a great weekend!