
Engineering is not the art of building devices; it’s the art of fixing problems. Devices are a means, not an end. Fixing problems means first of all understanding them — and since the whole purpose of the things we do is to fix problems in the outside world, problems involving people, that means that understanding people, and the ways in which they will interact with your system, is fundamental to every step of building a system. (This is so key that we have a bunch of entire job ladders — PM’s and UX’ers and so on — who have d…
1.Give yourself a shot of awe. When researchers induced feelings of awe in people — by showing them video clips of people next to vast things like whales or waterfalls, it altered their perception of time such that they — those people felt like they had more time on their hands. So much time on their ha…
2.Create an anti-busyness ritual. Researchers believe that the brains in both humans and animals evolved to feel calmed by repetitive behavior and that our daily rituals are a primary way to manage stress. This is especially true in unpredictable environments or situations where we feel pressured, a lac…