Concepts
The irreducible epistemic atoms underlying the curriculum. 4,828 atoms across 8 types
A ratio above 1.0 is mathematical proof of failure — no…
Maintain a commitment-to-capacity ratio below 0.85 to accommodate variance, treating any ratio above 1.0 as mathematical proof that some commitments will fail regardless of willpower or prioritization.
Same constraint for three weeks straight = structural…
When the same operational constraint appears in three consecutive weekly reviews, treat it as a structural issue requiring architectural change rather than tactical adjustment, escalating it from the weekly action item to a dedicated project.
When deferred maintenance costs 3x more to fix later…
When a deferred maintenance task's recovery cost exceeds its immediate execution cost by 3x or more, prioritize it above tasks with lower cost multiplication ratios.
Track operational debt explicitly — what was deferred…
Maintain an operational debt register that records what was deferred, when, why, and the estimated cost of continued deferral, reviewing it during weekly rhythms to distinguish strategic from accidental debt.
Run simplified systems for two full cycles before…
Validate simplified systems by running them for at least two full cycles before declaring success, as one cycle cannot distinguish between successful simplification and lucky conditions.
When debt grows despite repayment, simplify the system…
When a system's operational debt register grows despite consistent repayment, shift from maintenance to simplification rather than increasing maintenance effort.
Read logs for five minutes before proposing theories…
Before acting on snap judgments during debugging or incident response, read system logs and dashboards for five minutes without proposing theories to prevent hypothesis anchoring from corrupting observation.
Eliminate first, simplify second, automate last — never…
Follow the automation hierarchy of eliminate-simplify-automate in strict order, because automating waste entrenches it and automating complexity makes it brittle.
Automate only fully-specifiable tasks — if it needs…
Automate only tasks where the rule can be stated completely (fixed rule, known inputs, predictable outputs) and execution requires no judgment about exceptions or novel cases.
Track every automation in a registry — function, tool…
Maintain an automation registry listing each automation's function, tool, last verification date, failure indicators, and review cadence to prevent automation debt accumulation.
Start automation with checklists and templates before…
Start automation at the lowest-tech level that solves the problem (checklists, templates, calendar events) before considering platforms or scripts, because simplicity reduces maintenance burden.
Tier your habits for graceful degradation — know which…
Rank operational habits into three tiers (minimum viable, performance-improving, optimizations) so you know which to preserve under moderate disruption (tiers 1-2) and severe disruption (tier 1 only).
After 2+ day disruptions, triage before processing — many…
After disruptions longer than two days, triage accumulated items (actionable + time-sensitive, resolved itself, archive) before chronological processing to eliminate waste from self-resolved issues.
Restart habits tier by tier after disruption — confirm…
Restart operations sequentially after disruption by adding tier 1 first, confirming stability, then adding tier 2, then tier 3, rather than attempting simultaneous restart of all habits.
Weekly
Add a single recurring check at the end of each weekly review that compares your operational handbook to your actual operations and updates discrepancies immediately.
Run systems at 70-85% capacity — full utilization means…
Run operational systems at 70-85% of measured capacity to maintain adaptive buffer, because systems at full utilization cannot absorb environmental change without breaking.
Budget 30 min to 2 hours weekly for system maintenance…
Calculate maintenance budget for entire operational system (30 minutes to 2 hours weekly) as binding constraint; reject additional components when aggregate maintenance would exceed sustainable capacity.
Physically pause for 90 seconds before responding…
When receiving critical feedback, insert a physical pause (close laptop, stand up, or wait 90 seconds) before responding to allow prefrontal cortex engagement rather than amygdala-driven reaction.
After every operational failure, run five blameless…
After any operational failure, write a blameless post-mortem using five questions: what happened (factual description), what was the timeline of contributing events, what were the systemic factors, what are the action items (specific system changes), and what would have prevented this.
One hypothesis-driven improvement per week — state…
Run one complete PDCA improvement iteration per week on a single operational system: state a hypothesis predicting how a specific change will improve a specific measurable outcome by an estimated amount, implement for one cycle, measure the result, then adopt, adjust, or abandon based on whether the prediction held.
Add backup slot and automated reminder to critical…
When operational maintenance is scheduled at a time with no buffer, no reminder, and no fallback slot, add redundancy through a primary slot, backup slot, and automated reminder rather than increasing willpower.
Test 'busywork' by asking what breaks if you stop…
For every operational task you currently frame as 'busywork,' write one sentence describing what would break if you stopped doing it for a month—if nothing breaks, eliminate it; if something breaks, relabel it as infrastructure.
Draft the reactive version first, then wait 10 minutes…
In emotionally charged messages, draft your reactive response first in a private document, then wait 10 minutes before composing the actual message, using the comparison between versions as data about emotional distortion.
Use AI as an emotional distortion mirror, not a ghostwriter
When using AI to draft difficult communications, compare your reactive draft against the AI-generated neutral version to measure where emotions are distorting your message, rather than sending the AI version directly.