Peanut Buttering

One plus one equals three

I wanted to start running. It'd be good exercise and it'd improve my mood. But running was kind of boring. I also wanted to meet new people, and deepen my friendships. But I didn't know what concrete steps to take to do so.

I wasn't doing either of those things. Then I started running, and suddenly I was doing both. This happened because I discovered a synergy.

Go for a run... with other people. Now running is less boring, because I'm having a conversation while doing it. And now I've taken time that I would have otherwise been alone (exercising) and instead I'm spending time with friends.

When I had the idea to run with other people, it blew my mind. It's not a revolutionary idea, of course! But it was a shock that I had two activities that I sincerely wanted to be doing, but couldn't find the motivation -- and suddenly, I had pushed both at once past the threshold of activation energy and into the zone of not just "worth it" but "obviously worth it".

The synergies kept stacking up. I was feeling burnt out at work, so I wanted to slightly reduce the duration of my workday, but I didn't want to change the time I started or ended work. Go for a run, with other people, in the middle of the workday! Boom. Synergy.

But wait, now the midday run and shower afterward are going to energize me, so I'll be more productive for the rest of the workday. Another synergy!

I heard on TikTok that run club is where you meet people to date. I want to meet people to date! If I run, I'll be able to go to run clubs and maybe meet someone to date. Synergy!

I went from having one insufficient motivation to run, to having five separate reasons motivating me to go for my run each day. Running went from not clearly worth it, to extremely worth it and feeling like an absolute life hack.

Not only does synergy amp up the motivation, but it also buys you more of your most priceless resource: time. If I can socialize while also running, I've sort of bought back 30 minutes of my day if I would have otherwise spent 30 minutes running and then 30 minutes socializing. It might sound weird quantifying it like this, but if you enjoy the exercise/socialization as much if not more than you would have alone, you really do have a sum that's greater than its parts. 1+1=3!

Another quick example: learning Chinese. I wanted to spend time learning a language, and I had some Chinese experience and had enjoyed it. Wait, I have Chinese workers -- I can chat with them and it'll be fun, and improve my abilities, and make studying feel even more rewarding. I've also been wanting to take more trips -- I can visit Taiwan, and I'll be able to both utilize and improve my Chinese skills. Triple the motivation, just like that.

I haven't yet distilled the science here. I don't have tips on discovering synergies. My main takeaway for now is that they are powerful.

Roguelike video games also have a concept of synergies, where two powerups might be mediocre on their own but overpowered when combined. This incentivizes a strategy where you roam around collecting as many powerups as possible until you chance upon a combination that synergizes well. And once you've found a good synergy, you capitalize on it as much as you can.

I think that's not a terrible strategy for designing your life. Finding lots of different things you enjoy, and being aware of what you value at any given time, increases the surface area for finding synergies. Then it's a matter of looking at all the things you want to be doing, and figuring out which ones check multiple boxes at once. And when you find it, do it, and keep on the lookout for ways to stack on more and more synergies with other elements of your life.