Books · Habits & Behavior
Book summary and verdict
Tiny Experiments
Anne-Laure Le Cunff says try one small thing, give it a deadline, and see what happens, because apparently missing one walk is data, not proof you're genetically unfit for happiness. Your inner prosecutor is going to hate this. Good.
Should you read it?
Read it if one jog ends with you buying a watch that talks to satellites and telling people you’re training. Skip it if you can try a habit without turning it into a new identity. This is for the rest of us, people who buy equipment so the failure has somewhere expensive to sit.
L.Try one small thing for a week, then keep it, change it, or stop without convening a trial. I tried this with running. The evidence recommended walking.
The ideas
I · Experiments
Miss one Tuesday and a goal asks what is wrong with you. An experiment asks what was wrong with Tuesday.
Most goals are written as though the future has already signed a contract with us. I will get promoted. I will lose fifteen kilos. I will write a book. Then your company restructures, your knee starts making the sound of an old screen door, or you discover that writing a book involves writing.
You miss a goal twice and suddenly your planner is conducting an investigation into why you are garbage. Calm down. Try one small change for a set time, see what happens, and adjust the plan. Your calendar is not qualified to diagnose you.
You do not need to discover your purpose first. The person you imagine being ten years from now is imaginary, and somehow you have still allowed this hallucination to conduct your performance review.
L.You keep making plans for a person you have never once been. An enduring friendship.
II · Pacts
I will [specific action] for [specific duration]. Not become a new person by lunch.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
III · Evidence
You are collecting data, not evidence for the prosecution.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
IV · Decisions
Persist, pivot, or pause. Running into the same wall is just a concussion with branding.
The rest of this idea is in the app.
What to actually do
Pick one stuck area. One. “My entire life” is seventy-eight departments, and none of them answers email.
Smaller: Choose something you can touch tonight: breakfast, writing, walking, sleep, or one work task.
L.One department. No reorganization.
Write one pact: “I will [specific action] for [specific duration].” Keep it small and completely under your control.
Smaller: Try: “I will write for twenty minutes after breakfast for seven days.” Not: “I will become a writer.” One is a plan. The other is a new personality your friends have to sit through.
L.Set the timer. Your new personality gets no vote.
Do the action once tonight. No app, dashboard, public announcement, or tiny government built to supervise an egg.
Smaller: Read for ten minutes. Put your phone outside the bedroom. Prepare tomorrow’s breakfast. One clean attempt.
L.Administration is not an experiment. It is hiding with stationery.
When the trial ends, ask: What helped? What got in the way? Should I keep going, change the plan, or stop?
Smaller: If writing at 5 a.m. made you hate language, you did not fail. You discovered that dawn is a hostile work environment.
L.Change the hour before diagnosing the soul.
Still in the app
- What happened when people tried them
- Bullshit?
- Where readers disagree
- The one thing worth remembering
The rest of this book is in the app.
Skip the Book reads the self-help books so you don't have to: what each one argues, what happened when real people tried it, which claims are exaggerated, and what to do tonight. 108 books and counting, new ones most days.
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