Overcoming Inertia: Increasing and Decreasing Friction

When I think about inertia, I’m usually thinking about how to help a client do something they have resistance to or to stop doing something they don’t want to do anymore. Newton’s first law of motion also known as the law of inertia says:

“An object at rest will remain at rest, and an object in motion will remain in motion at a constant velocity (same speed and direction) unless acted upon by an external net force.”

This law maps surprisingly well to human behavior. So in our work with clients, we explore it in both directions:

• How can we reduce friction to build positive momentum?
• Or, how can we increase friction to interrupt unhelpful patterns?

In both cases, friction is the external net force that we are looking to for behavior change. Rather than thinking of inertia as a personal failing, looking at it as a design problem can make it a lot less sticky and open you up to helpful solutions.

Examples of removing friction to:

• Make an early morning workout easier. Laying out your gym clothes the night before, filling up your water bottle, essentially being ready to go create momentum and reduce the friction of getting out of bed.
• Focus so you can complete a work project faster. Close your door or find a place to work where you won’t be physically disturbed. Turn on Do Not Disturb on your phone or put it away to mitigate distractions and temptation.

Examples of increasing friction to:

• Get to bed earlier. Turn off autoplay on your streaming services. That extra step gives you the chance to ask if you really want to keep watching or if you are ready to shut down and go to bed.
• Increase presence and connection with family or friends. Leave your phone in another room when you want to be more present. You’ll find that many impulses to check it vanish if it’s just slightly out of reach.
• Eat healthier. Keep tempting snacks out of direct view. You’ll still have them when you really want them, but not by default.

Light Patterns

I’ve been thinking about my own technology since I’ve learned the term dark patterns. Dark patterns are intentional design choices that manipulate users into making choices that are to their own detriment. Think autoplay (when one streaming episode goes seamlessly to the next), endless scroll, and default settings that favor the platform, not the user. These are all ways that friction is subtly removed to keep consuming our attention.

Instead, I’d like to think of light patterns. Making intentional life design choices that support alignment, awareness, and well‑being.

Aligned Action Over Inertia

• Visioning - knowing what you want and naming it, how it feels, and what it looks like so that you have a framework for what alignment looks like.
• Commitment - also known as the aligned actions that support your vision.
• Accountability - telling someone what you will do helps you overcome the inertia of resistance and get things done by adding witness and urgency.

Why Intentional Design Matters

It used to be that if we operated by default, we were likely to do what other people in our lives wanted for us, our family, our community, our cultural norms. But in this day and age, with the impact of technology across every area of our lives, if we aren’t intentional about how we move through our days, it is quite possible that our attention is likely to be captured by someone or something that was designed and optimized to keep our bodies at rest and our attention transfixed.