Each Trial is a strategy a real species uses, turned into something you can run yourself in about ten minutes. Each card says what to do and why it helps.
Trials drawn from real behaviour
What each Trial asks you to do, and what it does for you. Reading a Trial needs no account. 3,017 Trials across 2,325 species. Showing 1,741–1,800.
1Set four saucers, each with a coin and an ice cube
2Walk one loop, most ice first, picking up coins
3Go back to the cushion
The Trial
With pets out of the room, set four labelled saucers in four spots that fit one wide camera frame, such as a sunny sill, the floor, a shelf and a shaded corner, each with a coin as the prey token and one same-size ice cube placed at the same moment. After ten minutes, start from a cushion as your burrow and walk one loop that collects the four coins in order from the saucer with the most ice left to the one with least, then return to the cushion.
Why it helps
You learn where your home runs cool and practise planning one efficient round before you move.
Check three houseplants or patio pots in sequence. On each plant, inspect leaf undersides and stems for soft pests or sticky residue, wipe what you find with a damp cloth, and note which plant had the highest density before moving to the next.
Why it helps
You catch rising pest pressure early by routine leaf checks instead of waiting for a crash.
With your eyes shut, toss five bottle caps so they land around the edges of a room with a clear floor, then fill a cup to the brim with dry lentils. Walk one slow lap of the room holding the cup level at chest height, pointing at each cap with your free hand as you pass it, without stopping.
Why it helps
A few calm, steady minutes that train smooth movement and wide attention together.
Pick one thing you are defending alone. Bring exactly one other person into it today, walk its boundary with them, and let them turn away the next thing that pushes in.
Why it helps
Defending something alone means every push at it costs you personally and you eventually give ground to save the energy. One other person walking the same boundary halves what each push takes from you.
Face directly into one opposing pressure today in order to hold your position in it, rather than turning away and being moved, and stay there a set period.
Why it helps
Turning away from a pressure means it carries you off the spot you needed to be on. Facing into it is how you stay there, and it costs less than being moved.
Make one commitment today while you are in good condition and schedule its start for the right conditions rather than now: book it, agree it, sign it, with a stated later start.
Why it helps
Waiting for good conditions to commit means you commit when you are least able to think clearly. Deciding while you are in good shape and starting later gets you both.
Do one small useful thing today for someone whose help you may need later, with nothing asked in return and no mention of the future need.
Why it helps
Help asked for cold is refused or grudging, and you notice the cost. One small unprompted favour now means the same request later is easy for them to say yes to.
Set up one small recurring payment of value today, information, help, credit, sweets, to someone whose presence protects you, rather than building your own defence.
Why it helps
Building your own defence against everything is expensive and you will still miss things. A small recurring payment to someone already there covers far more.
Make one commitment today that costs you something visible and real, the deposit, the public date, the declined alternative, rather than a free statement of intent.
Why it helps
Free statements of intent are indistinguishable from the ones people never honour, so nobody adjusts around yours. One visible cost makes the commitment believed immediately.
Scatter ten small snack pieces or dry cereal across a clean floor or patio. Collect them one by one, lifting your head to scan left and right between each pickup so the next piece waits until you have looked around.
Why it helps
You keep attention split between intake and surroundings instead of burying your face in the task.
Choose a corner with a wall or furniture on at least two sides, add a cushion and a blanket over your shoulders, and take one piece of fruit such as an orange, banana or mandarin. Peel it slowly and eat it there, laying the peel neatly on a plate beside you.
Why it helps
A real pause, and a piece of fruit actually tasted.
Leave one commitment today by changing the angle rather than pulling out: reduce the scope first, hand over one piece, shift the role. Peel rather than tearing.
Why it helps
Pulling straight out of a commitment damages the relationship and you avoid doing it at all. Peeling it back in stages gets you out cleanly and people stay willing to work with you.
Join the elements of something today to each other rather than merely stacking them, so the whole acts as one structure.
Why it helps
Stacking elements loosely means force in one place finds the gap and goes straight through on you. Joining them means the whole structure takes it together.
Stand a cardboard crow on a chair and place each consenting player at their own marked spot about three metres away, side by side and facing it, with five scrunched paper balls each. Everyone starts crouched; on one shared signal all rise together and throw all five at the crow, then count the hits, and if fewer than half hit, gather the balls and try again.
Why it helps
A daft, cheerful group game that gets everyone laughing.
Pick one situation today you have been entering with no way out - a commitment, a conversation, a purchase, a social event. Before you go in, arrange the exit and position yourself next to it: know the time you can leave, the words you will use, the seat near the door. Then go in, and use it if you need to.
Why it helps
Entering things with no way out is why you stay too long in situations that are going badly. Arranging the exit first means you can commit properly instead of hedging the whole time.
Choose one position today, a place, a time slot or a role, that puts three separate opportunities within short reach. Take that position and use at least two of the three from it.
Why it helps
Sitting somewhere with one opportunity in reach means every move you make is a long one with nothing behind it. A position overlooking three makes each short move worth taking.
2When the minute's up, point once and say what moved
The Trial
Sit at a window or in a garden chair facing one patch of view. Stay still, hands in your lap, for one full minute on a visible timer, watching only that patch. When the minute is up, point once at the single thing that moved there and say what it was.
Why it helps
You fidget and react to everything and miss the one thing worth acting on. A minute of real stillness shows you what is actually moving around you, and your one move lands where it counts.
Cut a large leaf shape from thin cereal-box card, draw a midrib and side veins, and tape a pencil or straw along the midrib underneath, resting it across two clothes pegs or books so the leaf sits level over a small toy; clip a paper clip to the outer edge of each side and show it still level. Then poke a close line of holes with a pencil tip on each side, parallel to the midrib and crossing every side vein, adding holes until each side hinges down into a tent.
Why it helps
A clever bit of paper engineering that shows how tiny cuts change a structure.
1Make up a push-up rhythm: two quick, pause, one slow
2Do the exact same rhythm three times
3Rest briefly between rounds
The Trial
Make up your own short push-up rhythm using wall push-ups or floor push-ups, for example two quick, a pause, then one slow. Perform the exact same rhythm three times in a row, with a short rest between each round.
Why it helps
Trying to be noticed by doing more and louder wears you out and blends you into the noise. A simple pattern of your own, repeated reliably, is what people come to recognise you by.
Deal with several stored items today in order of what spoils soonest rather than what is easiest to reach, and write the order down before starting.
Why it helps
Dealing with what is easiest to reach first means the things that were about to spoil do, and you lose them entirely. Ordering by spoilage loses you nothing.
Put one warning permanently in place today where it will always be met, and remove the version you currently give only when someone is already about to get it wrong.
Why it helps
A warning you only give when someone is about to get it wrong arrives after the damage and you spend the day repeating it. One that is always up settles it in advance.
Scatter twenty beads in a baking tray, tilt it slightly and pour in water to cover them. Slowly sponge water out from the shallow end, and with tongs pick only the beads that the retreating waterline has just uncovered.
Why it helps
A calm, absorbing game that shows how shifting conditions reveal new food.
1Blindfolded, face a tray of beans hiding five buttons
2Find them with quick fingertip dabs of one hand
3All five in the cup within 45 seconds
The Trial
Put on an opaque blindfold, then have a helper mix five buttons into a tray of dry beans or pasta and set it in front of you. On their go, use quick fingertip dabs of one hand to find the buttons and drop them into a cup, all five within forty-five seconds.
Why it helps
A quick, surprisingly hard game that shows how much your fingertips can tell you.
1Bend a straightened paperclip into a curved probe
2Draw each currant out between the scales
3Drop each one into a cup
The Trial
Take one dry, open pine cone and have a helper push five currants deep between its scales while you look away. Straighten a paperclip, bend its tip into a gentle down-curve, and work each currant out from between the scales into a cup, then eat them if you like.
Why it helps
A fiddly, absorbing dexterity puzzle made from a fallen pine cone, with a small snack at the end.
With gloves and a litter picker, walk slowly to a patch of a park or verge and pick up to five pieces of litter into its own numbered bag; a patch counts once it gives at least three, and if it is too clean, move on at least twenty steps to a new patch, as many times as needed. Stop when four patches have each filled a bag, then do a second clean-up afterwards if you like, off the clock.
Float ten plastic bottle caps, open side up, in a large bowl or basin, then cover the surface with torn lettuce or spinach leaves. Using only thumb and finger, pick every cap off the surface into a cup.
You wear a blindfold and headphones playing music while a helper sets six upturned cups on a table, lifts and replaces every cup, and leaves a phone set to vibrate under one of them. Take the headphones off, keep your hands off the table, let the helper call the phone, then listen with your head close to the cups and tap the one you choose; repeat for six rounds with the phone moved each time.
Why it helps
A surprising test of how precise your hearing can be.
Hold position over one decision for sixty seconds, choosing the exact line you will take, then commit to it and make no correction once you have started. If the line was wrong, let it be wrong.
Why it helps
Steering mid-commitment is why your attempts land somewhere between two plans and work as neither. Choosing the line and holding it gives you one clean result you can learn from.
Choose one position today with real care, then stop choosing: hold it without sampling alternatives for the rest of the day.
Why it helps
Sampling alternatives after you have chosen means you are never actually in position when something arrives. Choosing once and holding is the whole method.
Look at one thing you organise the same way everywhere and change its structure today to suit the specific place it is in: alone where that fits, as a group where that fits.
Why it helps
Using one way of organising everywhere means it fits badly in most places and you keep forcing it. Matching the structure to the place is usually the whole fix.
Sit side by side with a partner, each with a tray of rice mixed with thirty dried beans and an empty cup. Pick the beans into your cup one at a time with your heads down; every time you reach ten, give a chirp, and your partner must chirp back before either of you carries on.
Why it helps
A funny, focused bit of shared work that shows how little you need to stay in touch.
Count exactly thirty lentils or other small seeds of a different colour, stir them into a baking tray of dry rice and spread it level. Pick them out one at a time with your fingertips and line them up in a row beside the tray until all thirty are recovered.
Why it helps
A calm, absorbing fingertip task that settles a busy head.
Set twelve blueberries in egg cups or on a counter edge two steps from a stool. Make twelve short sallies: stand, step out, take one berry without stopping, step back and sit, then eat it before going again.
Why it helps
A light, cheerful snack that turns eating into a rhythm game.
Take a message you need to land and send it through whichever channel actually reaches that person furthest, even if it feels wrong: the phone call, the handwritten note, the in-person walk-over. Send it today.
Why it helps
Sending things through the conventional channel means they land in the same queue as everything else and nobody reads yours. Picking by what actually reaches that person gets you a reply the same day.
Find someone else facing the same hard stretch as you and combine the cost rather than each paying it separately: share the batch cook, the childcare, the commute, the subscription. Set it up today.
Why it helps
Paying for a hard stretch alone costs you double what it needs to, because somebody nearby is paying the same bill separately. Combining it halves the cost for both of you.
Kneel or crouch on a clear, soft floor while a helper rolls eight scrunched paper balls past you, one at a time, from unpredictable angles and speeds. Spring forward and pin each ball under both hands in a single pounce.
Why it helps
A quick, silly, full-body game that sharpens reactions.
Choose one thing about you that is a little odd and that you usually keep quiet, such as an unusual hobby, a favourite strange word or a fact you love. Make a small badge, patch or label that shows it, and fix it to the front of the bag, case or jacket you use every day, where it shows without you saying anything.
Why it helps
The odd thing you keep hidden is often what people would remember you by. Letting it show without making a speech about it saves you the effort of hiding and helps the right people find you.
Wrap a loop of tape sticky side out around two fingers and sit still on the floor. A consenting helper slowly drags a pompom or paper ball on a thread across the floor in up to three passes on routes you do not know, at least one passing within a hand's length of you at an unannounced moment; you get one sticky strike only, pressing the tape onto the pompom while it is within a hand's length of your hand.
Why it helps
A patient, low-key game of timing that is harder and more satisfying than it looks.
While you look away, a helper tucks one dried lentil between two pages somewhere in the first thirty pages of a magazine and closes it. Blindfolded, turn the pages slowly, feeling with your fingertips for the lentil, then pinch it out with tweezers.
Why it helps
A slow, satisfying touch puzzle that calms busy hands.
Take a message that has not been getting through and send it lower and slower today: fewer words, plainer tone, no urgency markers, one point. Send the calm version rather than the loud one.
Why it helps
Adding urgency to a message that is not landing makes people defensive and they still miss your point. The low plain version with one point in it gets read and acted on.
Take something you want noticed and move it to a channel or format nobody around you is using: the handwritten note, the voice message, the early hour, the different venue. Send the same thing through the empty channel instead.
Why it helps
Your message competes with everything else in the same channel and loses on volume. Moving it somewhere nobody else is gets it read, and it costs nothing but the choice.
1Drape a pale sheet over chairs in shade, one door
2Turn the door to face the breeze
3Rest inside with water for ten minutes
The Trial
On a warm (not extreme) day with a light breeze, in existing shade, drape a pale, light sheet over a clothes airer or two chairs so it is covered on top and round the sides except for one door, and tape a tissue strip hanging inside at the back. Turn the door away from the breeze and watch the strip hang still, then turn the roost so the door faces the breeze and the strip moves, and rest quietly inside with water for ten minutes.
Why it helps
A cool, quiet ten minutes out of the heat, in a shelter you set up in five.
Set two chairs back to back about a metre apart and drape a sheet over a cord or broom handle laid across their backs so it falls into an inverted V on both sides. Put a clock where the camera can see it, then crawl under with a cushion and rest quietly for ten minutes.
Why it helps
A cosy ten-minute den that genuinely lowers stimulation.
Choose the form of one message today specifically for the obstruction it must get through, the noise, the layers, the inbox, rather than for your own convenience.
Why it helps
Sending messages in the form that is easiest for you means they are absorbed before arriving. Choosing for the obstruction is what gets them through.
Spend the first part of today locating something precisely from where you are, gathering position from several angles, then act once without announcing it.
Why it helps
Acting before you have located something precisely means repeated attempts and people notice every one. Two angles first means one quiet move does it.
Prepare one genuinely striking version of something today and then deliberately present the plain one, keeping the striking version in reserve unless the plain one fails.
Why it helps
Leading with the striking version means the plain facts never get a hearing and people discount the drama. Holding it back means you still have somewhere to go.
2Stay still fifteen minutes: no phone, no greetings
3Count those who pass without noticing you
The Trial
Choose a busy place where people know you and make yourself unnoticed for fifteen minutes without hiding: stay in plain view, sit at the edge, and move as little as possible - no phone, no fidgeting, no greeting anyone. Count how many people pass without registering you.
Why it helps
You assume being noticed is about how you look, so you fuss with appearance and still draw attention. Finding out that stillness does the work gives you a way to go unbothered anywhere.
3Slap every note on the door within fifteen seconds
The Trial
Give each of two or more people a pad of twenty sticky notes and stand everyone a step back from one door or a sheet of cardboard. On a shared count of three, all start at once and slap every note from your pad onto the door within fifteen seconds.
Why it helps
A loud, fast group moment that ends in a door covered in colour.
Once it is dark outside, cover at least three quarters of a small plate with figs or other soft fruit, fresh or dried. Add one spoonful of nuts, seeds or yoghurt as the small protein share, drizzle a little honey over the fruit, and set the plate by a window showing the dark.
Why it helps
A pretty, fruit-heavy evening snack that is easy to make.
