Admit it.
We’ve all thought to ourselves:
- “If I could just spend less time on my cell phone, then maybe I would be more productive”
- “If I was just walked 10,000 steps, I would be so much healthier”
- “If I just learned how to get in control of my snacking habit, I would be at my ideal weight”
Productivity enthusiasts, fitness influencers, and even unknowing family and friends will make it feel like it’s your fault. I mean in the end, you have free choice right?
It’s a “decision” you’re making, they’ll say.
No one’s making you use your cell phone. No one’s making you sit down all day. Or making you eat a bag of chips after the workday. We can agree on that.
But maybe we need to give credit more to the design of the incentives of the culture and the environment we’ve created.
It’s possible that maybe we’ve designed a culture and environment that:
- Pushes fast-paced, high stress, always-achieving lifestyles that incentivize a dopamine-filled escape in the form of phones
- Incentivizes suburban single family homes, car-centric and human-desolate roads/infrastructure that no one would want to walk on
- Subsidizes fast food and cheap corn crops to create a hyper-caloric environment at every corner in grocery stores and chain restaurants
So yes, ultimately, the individual responsibility is in your hands.
But let’s also acknowledge that everything is working as designed.
