You are already conducting experiments in your life. Every meal you eat, every show you watch, every conversation you have — each is generating valuable data about what truly resources you and what feels meaningful to you. The only question is: are you collecting this data?

Choose an activity you do regularly — maybe checking your phone first thing in the morning, or having that afternoon snack, or scrolling through social media before bed.

Next time you do this activity, simply notice three things:

• Before: What are you feeling? What are you hoping to feel?
• During: What's actually happening in your body? Your mind?
• After: How do you feel now? Was this what you were hoping to feel?

Don't try to change anything. Don't judge what you discover. Just notice.

You might notice that simply paying attention starts to shift how you engage with these activities. This is natural and expected — observation itself can create subtle changes. But for now, we're not trying to direct these changes. We're just noticing what happens when we bring gentle awareness to our experience.

Like any good scientist, you'll want to gather enough data to see real patterns. One observation isn't enough to draw conclusions. Let yourself run this same experiment several times. Maybe the morning phone check varies based on what you see. Maybe that afternoon snack feels different on different days. The same activity might calm or positively energize you one day and leave you feeling empty the next. This variation itself is valuable information.

Remember: for this experiment, we're not focusing on data about who you are as a person. You're simply observing what happens in your experience. Judgmental voices might arise — about being good or bad, about what you should or shouldn't do. While these voices are absolutely data (and we'll work with them later when we explore healing and rewiring our inner narrative), for now we're focusing specifically on the direct experience of before, during, and after.

The experiential data we're gathering is simple:

• That morning phone check? Perhaps it starts with excitement but ends with a subtle anxiety that lingers.
• That stretch you almost skipped? It might create an ease that lasts for hours.
• That afternoon snack? Maybe it feels good for about two minutes, then leaves you slightly foggy.
• That conversation you rushed through? It might leave a subtle heaviness that affects your next interaction or activity.
• That moment you took to really listen? It could create a warmth that carries through your whole day.

When you gather enough observations, patterns become clear on their own. You don't have to force changes. You don't have to make rules. Just by paying attention repeatedly, you develop real contact with your experience. This contact itself begins to shift how you engage with daily activities — not through force or rules, but through naturally recognizing what truly resources you.

Remember: you're simply noticing how things feel before, during, and after. And if you forget to notice before or during? That's fine — just notice what you can. Any noticing is contact with reality, and gathers experiential data that's a foundation for tuning your life to what actually feels good.¹

Core Insights

• Every action you take is already an experiment, naturally generating data about what energizes or depletes you.
• Simply notice how activities affect you before, during, and after — your routine actions hold valuable information.
• No need to judge or try to change anything — just observe your experience with gentle awareness.
• Let patterns emerge naturally over time through observation, revealing what truly serves you without forcing change.

¹ For those journeying through the 101 Days to Enjoying Existing course, we explore this observation practice together in days 2-3. EnjoyExisting.org