Matt's Idea Blog

In his HBR post Live Life as an Experiment, Peter Bregman describes a fascinating mini-experiment where he tries to get out of paying a 20% restocking fee simply by asking. He doesn't push (well, other than to keep asking :-) and he treats the store's employees with respect. It's a fun read, it brings up excellent points about life-as-experiment - 100% Think, Try, Learn. You'll find the comments stimulating as well. Following are my two replies.

I'm curious: Have you tried anything like this yourself? How did it go? How did they react? Did you get the discount? Did you learn something?

(P.S. If you'd like to try it out yourself (or maybe something related like bartering on a price), head over to Edison.)

On the benefits of experimenting in life

Recently I've been having trouble falling asleep, and it's making me tired during the day. I'm trying some experiments in Edison to figure out what the causes might be (improve sleep hygiene and try melatonin), but it's difficult pinning it down. Why is that? Here are some thoughts. Please tell me what you think!

The human body is a complex system, and complex systems have many variables. Our goal is to understand the system by teasing out the variables that matter and then identifying patterns. Following are some possibilities for sleep in particular. (Note that the default hypothesis when starting it is to ask for each variable, "Is there a significant relationship between this and the problem?")

• Taking naps
• Exercising right before bedtime
• Eating right before bedtime

I have an invitation to try out a new productivity tool for households or families. Contact me if you want to give it a go - http://matthewcornell.org/contact.html. Blurb follows.

To give you the gist of We Geo, it offers you a new way to complete the many activities it takes to run a household or family. We wanted to build a service that made it easy to manage hectic schedules by connecting you and your loved ones in their own private network. We Geo syncs family members with shared task lists to tally what needs to get done and who’s going to do it. The iPhone app helps you save time as they accomplish errands, chores, and shopping all while taking advantage of money saving coupons at the places you visit. You can also find new ways to explore your city with local group-buying promotions for restaurants, spa services, kid activities and more.

Nathan Yau (http://flowingdata.com/about-nathan/) asks an important question: Why do people collect data? However, there are plenty of others who collect data in an effort to change their behavior in some way. They might be trying to lose weight or stay more disciplined with their exercise regimen.

My thought is that this is the central question and the whole point to self-tracking - to gain insight, change behavior, and ultimately be happier. The "Tool Trap" (focusing on tools, rather than purpose) is tempting, esp. to us early-adopting self-tracking pron-loving geeks (myself included!)

In How Will You Measure Your Life?, HBS business professor Clayton M. Christensen talks about applying his models to personal development. He asks his students to find answers to having a happy career, happy relationships, and staying out of jail (apparently this is up there, given the financial chicanery). The idea of applying a model to living is exactly what Think, Try, Learn is about, though in our case the model is the scientific method, not business ones. What’s always attracted me to models is that they teach us a way of thinking, instead of what to think. The best self-help books do this, and I treasure them. They’re the keepers. I also like his section Allocate Your Resources: “Your decisions about allocating your personal time, energy, and talent ultimately shape your life’s strategy.” My TTL take on this is Deciding What Matters, i.e., deciding what is worth your time.

Laura Stack has just released her new book, SuperCompetent: The Six Keys to Perform at Your Productive Best, and I wanted to give her a big round of applause. I interviewed her a few years ago (see A Conversation With Laura Stack, The Productivity Pro), and she continues to impress. And as I continue writing my own book I feel deep admiration and respect for the process. Great work, Laura.

I'm happy to announce that we've added some tasty Edison improvements to make the site more engaging:

• Email notifications: You can now get emails when someone comments on your experiments. Just check "Receive an email if someone comments on my experiments" on your profile page. To subscribe to someone else's experiment, simply comment on it; you'll get emails of all subsequent comments. To unsubscribe, click "Unsubscribe me" under "EMAIL SUBSCRIPTIONS" on of the right of the experiment's detail page. You can also see how many people are subscribed.