Gamify life from BayesianMind

[P. João]

This post presents an interesting framework for personal improvement, but I see we can enhance it by reconsidering two key aspects:

What Works in the Original System

The author effectively demonstrates how gamification can transform mundane tasks into engaging challenges by:

• Assigning point values to activities

• Creating a progress system similar to video games

• Building consistent habits through regular engagement

Proposed Improvements

1. Eliminating Negative Scoring

The current system subtracts points for undesirable behaviors, but I propose a philosophical shift: nothing should have negative value. Just as darkness is merely the absence of light, “bad” behaviors simply contribute less value rather than negative value.

Benefits of this approach:

• Avoids punishment-based motivation which can be discouraging

• Creates a purely growth-oriented mindset

• Aligns with positive psychology principles

Implementation: Assign very low (but still positive) point values to less beneficial activities while giving significantly higher values to highly beneficial ones. The relative difference remains motivating.

2. Dynamic Confidence-Based XP System

I propose that experience points should be gained when the system identifies variables that impact progress with higher confidence levels.

How it works:

• The system tracks correlations between your activities and measurable outcomes

• When it discovers a strong correlation (high confidence), you gain XP

• This rewards you for finding what truly works for your specific situation

• Points become personalized and evidence-based rather than predetermined

This creates a self-improving system where your actions continuously refine your understanding of what works for you personally.

By implementing these two improvements, we create a more psychologically sound and adaptive gamification system that evolves with you rather than imposing fixed external values.

[Viliam]

I agree. Any punishment in a system has the side effect of punishing you for using the system.

The second suggestion is an interesting one. It would probably work better if you had an AI watching you constantly and summarizing your daily activities. If doing some seemingly unimportant X predictably makes you more likely to do some desirable Y later, you want to know about it. But if you write your diary manually, there is a chance that you won’t notice X, or won’t consider it important enough to mention.

[P. João]

You’re right — ideally we’d have an AI watching and tagging everything, but since that’s not feasible (yet), I’ve been experimenting with a workaround.

Instead of trying to record everything, I just register the moments that feel most impactful or emotionally charged, and then use AI tools to help me unpack the surrounding details. That way, even if I miss a lot of low-signal noise, I can still train a kind of pattern recognition — looking for which contextual features around those moments tend to correlate with useful outcomes later.

It’s far from perfect, but it increases the odds of catching those subtle X→Y chains, even when X seemed insignificant at the time.