Frequently asked questions about thinking, epistemology, and cognitive tools. 1668 answers
Choose one unwanted behavior you have been trying to eliminate. For the next five days, keep an ABC log: every time the behavior occurs, write down the Antecedent (what happened immediately before), the Behavior itself, and the Consequence (what you got or avoided immediately after). Do not try to.
Take the functional hypothesis you generated in L-1085. Write it at the top of a page: "The function of [my unwanted behavior] is to provide [specific need]." Below it, brainstorm five alternative behaviors that could plausibly serve the same function. For each candidate, score it on three.
Conduct a cue audit for one unwanted behavior you are trying to extinguish. Over the next three days, every time the behavior occurs or you feel the urge to perform it, immediately note three things: the physical location you are in, the objects you can see or touch that are associated with the.
Choose one behavior you are actively trying to extinguish. Over the next three days, track every instance of that behavior and note who was present, how they responded, and what social outcome you received. At the end of three days, identify the top two or three people whose responses most.
Select a behavior you are currently trying to extinguish or have recently attempted to extinguish. Draw a simple graph on paper with the x-axis labeled "Days" (mark intervals from 0 to 90) and the y-axis labeled "Urge Intensity" (scale 1-10). First, draw the line you expected — what you assumed.
Review your current extinction target from earlier lessons in this phase. Write three specific scenarios in which the old behavior is most likely to resurface: one involving a context change (new environment, travel, disrupted routine), one involving re-exposure to the original reward.
Write your personal relapse recovery protocol on a physical card or in a note on your phone. Include five lines, one for each step: (1) "Stop. Sit down. Breathe for sixty seconds." (2) "Label: The behavior that just resurfaced is ___. The likely mechanism is ___." (3) "Extract: The context was.
Select a behavior you are currently working to extinguish or have been considering extinguishing. Run the Decision Framework Analysis. First, assess the reinforcement schedule: is the behavior maintained primarily by a variable-ratio schedule (unpredictable rewards that make each engagement a.
Choose one behavior you are currently trying to extinguish. Write a commitment contract that includes all four structural elements: the specific behavior to be eliminated (not vague — operationally defined so that an outside observer could verify compliance), the timeline (a start date and an end.
Identify one extinction goal you are currently working on or want to begin. Write down the specific behavior you are extinguishing, the contexts in which it most often fires, and the point in the extinction cycle where you are most vulnerable to relapse. Now identify one person in your life — not.
Identify one unwanted behavior you are working to extinguish — ideally the target you selected in L-1081. Document the trigger with specificity: not "when I feel anxious" but "when I finish a phone call and sit back down at my desk with residual social energy." Now design a substitution chain of.
Identify an urge or thought pattern connected to a behavior you are working to extinguish — ideally one where you have already built a substitution chain from L-1095. This should be a thought that, when it arrives, feels like a fact about reality rather than a product of your mind. Write the.
The next time you feel an urge to perform a behavior you are working to extinguish — whether it is snacking, phone-checking, nail-biting, or any other habit — set a timer for twenty minutes and practice the full surfing protocol. First, notice the urge arriving and say internally, "There is an.
Choose one extinction target you have been working on — a behavior you are actively eliminating. Create a three-tier celebration protocol. Tier one: a micro-celebration you can perform in under five seconds any time you notice the urge did not fire or you successfully surfed it (a fist pump, a.
Open a note or spreadsheet and create your post-extinction monitoring dashboard for one behavior you have been extinguishing during this phase. Build four columns: Date, Observation Window (the specific time or context you are monitoring), Signal Detected (yes or no, with brief description), and.
Conduct a Complete Behavioral Extinction Audit that integrates the tools from all nineteen preceding lessons. Set aside ninety minutes to two hours. This is the most comprehensive exercise in the phase and should produce a complete, actionable extinction plan for your primary target behavior. Step.
Identify one behavior change you have been considering but have not yet attempted, or one you have attempted and abandoned. Reframe it as a two-week experiment. Write down the following in your external system: (1) the specific behavior you will test, stated with enough precision that someone else.
Choose one behavior you have been considering changing — a new routine, a dietary shift, a productivity technique, anything you have been thinking about trying. Before you do anything else, write a hypothesis using this template: "If I [specific behavior], then [expected outcome], because.
Choose one behavior you believe affects your daily experience — a food, a sleep habit, a social practice, a work ritual. Write an operational definition of the outcome you expect it to influence, specifying what you will count, when you will count it, and what counts as one instance. Measure that.
Identify one behavior change you have been considering but have not started — a new morning routine, a different approach to meetings, a dietary shift, a creative practice. Now shrink it. Reduce the scope to the smallest version that would still give you information about whether the full version.
Choose one behavior you have been considering but have not started — something you have been putting off partly because the implied commitment feels too large. Define a specific time-box: 7 days if you want a quick signal, 14 days if you want to test habit formation, or 30 days if the behavior.
Look at your current life and identify one area where you recently changed multiple things at once — or where you are currently planning to. It could be a new morning routine, a dietary overhaul, a productivity system, a relationship strategy. Write down every variable you changed or intend to.
Choose a behavior change you have been considering, one you have either not started or have started and abandoned. Now strip it down to its behavioral kernel by asking three questions. First, what is the core action — the single irreducible physical or cognitive behavior at the heart of this.
Identify three things you have avoided attempting because of fear of failure. These might be professional projects, creative endeavors, relationship conversations, skill-development efforts, or lifestyle changes. For each one, write down the specific fear — what exactly you are afraid will happen.