The Trap of a Good Puzzle: When solving becomes the problem

The problem with trying to optimise for certain things is that the more data points you collect, the more complex navigating to the outcome can become.
If you decide to run and all you do is open the door, run, and come back after a while, running isn’t complex.
As soon as you time the run, giving yourself something to optimise for, you’ve introduced some complexity which you now have to be cognisant of. Now you’re doing timed runs. Next, you’ll be doing timed miles. Then you’ll be measuring your calories, your stride length, and your Vo2 max and now running is incredibly complicated and you have more vectors for you to be unsatisfied with.
Contrast creates data
Every time you define an aspect of your identity, you create a new data point.
Being a Protestant wouldn’t mean anything if there weren’t also Catholics. Being Republican wouldn’t mean anything if there weren’t also Democrats.
Many data points, by necessity, create other data points. More complexity.
You add a new vector of explanation and suddenly it’s not just about having faith, it’s about having a sect, and deciding which granular aspects of doctrine you agree with.
I see people fastidiously following complex diets. They don’t even know what they’re supposed to be eating until it’s confirmed by a book or a post in the reddit community.
The problem is that more data about your diet you become aware of, the more complex your diet has to become. Suddenly you’re doing blood work, wearing a continuous glucose monitor and sending off stool samples to be analysed in a lab.
Do you actually need someone to tell you what good food is?
You’re trying too hard
I think we like to kid ourselves.
I know what good food is—it’s all the stuff I walk past on my way to grab the biscuits, the cakes, and the sweet treats. It’s the stuff that grows on trees, comes from the ground, and doesn’t have an ingredient list that reads like the Magna Carta.
I track my sleep. I have all the data points to know if my sleep was good or bad. But knowing them adds complexity, and suddenly getting good sleep is complex. Should it be?
A part of me knows that if I had a moment of stillness where I did some reading, lit a candle, did something slow and meditative, and then clambered into bed at a decent hour, I’d wake up feeling great. But I don’t. Because my life is full of complexity.
So instead, I tell myself I need an ‘evening routine’, and must eat at a certain time, dim the lights at a certain time, drink certain drinks, and take certain pills. Sleep becomes an operation.
Seeing the full picture
If I gave you one tile and it had a picture on it, what do you have? A picture. If I give you two tiles, which together make a single picture, what do you have? A puzzle.
Simply adding an additional data point adds complexity before you see the full picture.
Then try adding another tile. And another.
Once you have four or more tiles, you realise you can’t immediately get the full picture at a glance; you have to spend some time arranging things first.
While each granular piece might seem useful, the more puzzle pieces you have, the more likely you are to lose a few, and suddenly you’re frustrated because you can’t finish the puzzle. You can’t see the full picture.
So many things become needlessly overcomplicated.
A life of complications
In watchmaking, all the additional features of a watch, beyond simply telling the time, are called complications.
Do you want a chronograph? That’s a complication. Moonphase? Complication. World time? Complication.
Each complication makes the watch thicker, more expensive to repair, and more difficult to maintain.
Data is great. I love it. I built my entire life around gathering data points. But a lot of the data initially gathered as a feature can easily become a complication.
‘I need to stay hydrated’ turns into counting your water by the glass. ‘I need to eat more healthily’ turns into weighing rice and tracking macros.
Sometimes you have a fixed target. A certain goal. A defined timeframe In those circumstances, it can be well worth adding complications. Get more data, shorten your feedback loops, know how well you’re progressing.
Not all of life needs to be objective-oriented. Targets are useful, but they can also become traps. How many complications do you need in your life?
Maintenance comes at a cost.
What would your life look like if it were less feature-rich? Less complicated?
What if you were more directionally correct instead of granularly precise?
Would things really spiral wildly out of control, as you might sometimes tell yourself? Or would you actually be just fine, moving on with one less thing to worry about, blissfully unaware of how complicated life might otherwise have been?