How do we design sustainable change? We focus less on mindset and more on access. We’re told that if we push ourselves, develop courage, and become disciplined we’ll get that promotion, land that job, or achieve the perfect body. However, success or behavior change is less about mindset and more about access. Access to the right conditions. Access to the right relationships. Access to money.

DesignShift: From Mindset to Access.

Rather than telling people to recycle, what if we make recycling easier? 
Rather than telling people to eat healthy, what if we give people access to affordable and healthy food? 
Rather than telling people to walk more, what if we create pedestrian friendly cities?
Rather than telling people what to do, what if we created the conditions where doing the right thing is easy? 
Removing barriers. Opening doors. That is how we design sustainable change.

“To expect ourselves to change without changing the environment in a dopamine overloaded world is to expect ourselves not to be human.”

Recently I listened to the podcast "The Path to Enough" where the Psychiatrist Anna Lembke discussed the addictive nature of our devices and how our behaviors are influenced by the environment we find ourselves in. As a designer passionate about designing for real human needs, this quote hit home for me.

DesignShift: What if… rather than solving for individual symptoms, we started changing the system that is actually holding us back? What if we designed environments are actually conducive to being human?

If we want to move from designing things to designing change, rather than simplifying the complex, we must find ways to hold and be with the complexity that exists around us and inside of us. Rather than rushing to fix, solve, or clean up, we must embrace contradictions and tensions as essential parts of the design process.

DesignShift: From Glorifying Simplicity to Holding Complexity.