Designing the Mind: The Principles of Psychitecture

by Ryan A. Bush

Anxiety exists as a kind of alarm to help us avoid threats to our genes, but more often than not, it ends up resulting in useless false positives.

Jealousy exists to retain mates, but it can be toxic to healthy, long-term relationships; possessiveness and neediness will make your relationship fragile and weak.

We can also hack our compassion impulses in the other direction when we determine it to be beneficial - universal compassion can be highly conducive to well-being and social good.

Metta, or loving-kindness meditation, is one method for cultivating this universal compassion.

As we aim to optimize our emotions, we must attempt to cultivate the ancient ideal of equanimity, a state of undisturbed tranquility and psychological stability.

Equanimity is about feeling the way you feel about your five-years-ago-problems right now, about your current problems.

Needless to say, the development of self-control is a worthy goal. And an understanding of the mechanisms behind self-control will be crucial to cultivating it and building good habits. But before we can start pulling the levers of behavior and self-control, we must become cognizant of the potential threats which are most likely to take hold of us and take away our capacity for self-direction.

But the things we are used to calling addictions are not the only type of modern pleasures that continually hold people back. Corporate entities craft many aspects of our world today. They are incentivized to meet every one of our desires as effectively as they can. Though there are far worse ways of organizing society, the incentives our economic systems provide can result in new addictions that harm people in the name of improving the world.18

Ultimately, an addiction is any maladaptive behavior which controls an individual rather than being controlled by him. Addictions often preclude adaptive behaviors, limiting people from building healthy lives and relationships and obstructing the alignment that would result in genuine satisfaction.19 And there are many times when good feelings can serve as bad addictions.

We are built to crave foods high in sugar, salt, and fat because they provided our ancestors with energy, vital nutrients, and stored fat to help them get through times of food shortage. It was beneficial for them to eat as much of these as they could find because they were often scarce.20 But the modern world has hacked the reward systems that were so beneficial in the ancient world, boosting the content of these craved compounds in the foods we eat to maximize addictiveness. Combined with the sedentary lifestyle the modern world affords, these chemicals no longer serve their original purpose, instead resulting in disease and obesity.21

In similar fashion, our innate desire for validation is exploited by social media companies who tailor the algorithms of their platforms to get people as hooked as possible. Randolph Nesse calls the result “social obesity.”22 We are provided with more opportunities for social approval and entertainment than our ancestors ever would have had. Digital votes of approval provide the same type of rewards that real social interaction is meant to provide.23 Though they are ostensibly built to foster connection, these addictions can impede social connection in real life.24

We see the same addictive brain hacks in video games, streaming platforms, digital pornography, and online shopping. They provide us with new temptations that make it harder for us to make deliberate decisions about how we spend our time.25 The problem with the modern world is that it optimizes for our drives, not for our values.

If Youtube’s algorithms were built to show you the videos that your ideal self would view instead of the ones you click on, it would be an entirely positive tool. But when the world around us is built to amplify our desires, it is easy to allow our lifestyle to be designed by others with ulterior motives. We become the products (literally) of the companies seeking to squeeze profits out of us.

Though you may detect a critical tone, there is not an inherent problem with any of these modern innovations. It is no more necessary for you to delete your Facebook account than to burn the bag of sugar in your pantry for fear that you’ll be tempted to shovel it into your mouth at any moment. Technology, by definition, serves useful functions, and there is no ...

Though the world is getting more addictive, our best tool to counter it is still found in the cultivation of self-mastery.26 We must design our lifestyles intentionally, applying the process of reflecting on our values and setting goals to the way we spend our time and energy. We have to learn to develop increasing co...

Make a list of desirable and undesirable habits, which may include how many hours you sleep, how many miles you run, or how many calories you consume, depending on the behaviors you are concerned with. It may also include behaviors like using filler words, complaining, or failing to assert yourself at restaurants. There are even ways to track your own carbon footprint.28 For any negative behavior, keep a log of the number of times you engage in it per week. This simple act of logging is sometimes enough to break a habit.