Instrument status
An original synthesis, not an established psychological scale
LifeByLogic created the Inner Economy metaphor, its thirteen dimensions, tension engine, thresholds, and archetype routing. Related research on approach, inhibition, regulatory focus, motivation, self-control, and everyday desire provides conceptual background. That background does not validate this specific instrument.
The legitimate use is narrower: generate language for a live tradeoff, inspect allocation, and design a reversible reflection experiment. A result can suggest questions. It cannot certify what your personality is, explain a symptom, or predict what choice will succeed.
The working model
Appetites pursue, protections guard, treasury regulates
The instrument organizes thirteen owner-authored dimensions into three systems. The names are LifeByLogic's synthesis; they should not be treated as replacements for established constructs or scales.
Where energy wants to go
Ascent, Tether, Sovereignty, Novelty, and Imprint describe pulls toward advancement, connection, autonomy, newness, and leaving a mark.
What the system tries to guard
Vigilance, Regard-Cost, Certainty Demand, and Guarding describe sensitivity to threat, evaluation, ambiguity, and exposure.
How resources are budgeted
Restraint, Replenishment, Modulation, and Coherence concern delay, recovery, a usable middle gear, and how reconciled the pattern appears.
Where strong pulls share a reserve
The tool flags modeled combinations when opposing or competing demands are both elevated. A flag is a design output, not proof of inner conflict.
An appetite is not automatically good, a protection is not automatically pathology, and restraint is not always superior to action. Context determines whether a pattern is useful, costly, or both. A high guard may be proportionate in an unsafe environment; low novelty may support a season of consolidation.
Interpret both sides
A tension becomes useful when it preserves two truths
Many self-descriptions fail because they make one side virtuous and the other defective. An allocation lens asks what each side is financing.
- Name the pursuing side. What opportunity, connection, autonomy, novelty, recognition, or impact does it seek?
- Name the protecting side. What loss, uncertainty, exposure, depletion, regret, or relationship cost does it guard against?
- Identify the shared reserve. Time, money, attention, social capacity, recovery, risk tolerance, or credibility may be the scarce account.
- Locate the current cost. Do not assume tension is harmful. Record where it creates delay, oscillation, overcommitment, rigidity, or repeated recovery debt.
- Preserve a benefit on each side. A good experiment does not “defeat” protection or suppress appetite. It tests a new allocation.
A two-truth sentence
- Pull A
- Part of me is trying to pursue ___ because ___ matters.
- Pull B
- Part of me is trying to protect ___ because the credible risk is ___.
- Shared reserve
- Both are drawing on my limited ___.
- Current cost
- The allocation becomes costly when ___.
Original utility
Complete an allocation-and-tension ledger
Use one current situation, not your entire personality. Complete the ledger before looking for an archetype label. The goal is to create a small, observable reallocation.
| Field | What to record |
|---|---|
| Situation | The specific choice, recurring episode, or calendar period in which the tension appears. |
| Appetite | What you are pulled toward and the legitimate value it may serve. |
| Protection | What you are trying to prevent or preserve, including context that makes the guard reasonable. |
| Treasury | The finite resource being allocated: time, attention, energy, money, recovery, or risk. |
| Evidence | Observable examples for both sides, plus what remains interpretation. |
| Current allocation | What each side receives now and the cost that shows up repeatedly. |
| Small reallocation | One reversible change that keeps a protection while funding a measured amount of pursuit—or vice versa. |
| Review | Date, observation, and stopping rule. Review the experiment, not your worth. |
Possible observations include start latency, recovery time, number of interruptions, money spent, hours protected, conversations completed, or whether the feared consequence actually occurred. Choose a measure close to the allocation, not a grand outcome the experiment cannot control.
Worked example
Novelty and guarding in a side-project decision
You want to publish a new project. One side wants novelty, imprint, and evidence that you can create publicly. Another side guards professional reputation and recovery time. Both draw on evenings, attention, and willingness to be evaluated.
- Preserve the appetite. The project offers learning and expression; suppressing it completely creates its own cost.
- Respect the protection. Reputation and recovery are not cowardice. The credible risks are unfinished work, public error, and depletion.
- Specify the reserve. Two weeknights and one weekend block are available without taking sleep or a primary obligation.
- Reallocate reversibly. Build one private prototype, then share it with three informed reviewers instead of announcing a full launch.
- Review the right signals. Record energy after each block, feedback specificity, appetite after contact with real work, and whether the guard becomes more or less proportionate.
This example does not prove the tool's tension score. It shows how the metaphor can organize competing evidence into a reversible test.
Interpretation limits
Do not turn a reflection framework into a hidden diagnostic system
| Reasonable use | Unsupported leap |
|---|---|
| “This result gives me language for a current tradeoff.” | “This score reveals my stable psychological type.” |
| “I can compare my own observations across contexts.” | “My number is high or low relative to a population norm.” |
| “A tension flag suggests two pulls to investigate.” | “The algorithm proved the cause of my stress or delay.” |
| “I can test a small allocation change.” | “The framework predicts which career, relationship, or treatment is right.” |
| “Related theories help explain why the metaphor may feel plausible.” | “Conceptual sources validate LifeByLogic's dimensions, thresholds, or archetypes.” |
Do not create a page for each of the thirteen dimensions simply because the instrument names them. A standalone route needs distinct reader intent, independent utility, and evidence. Until then, one flagship guide preserves context and limits fragmentation.
If a pattern involves persistent distress, major impairment, impulsive risk, disordered eating, substance use, trauma, or another health concern, use qualified care. The Inner Economy is not a screening or treatment instrument.
Tool and documentation
Explore the model with the limits visible
The Inner Economy
The free tool uses forty-five owner-authored questions across thirteen dimensions and three systems. Its methodology documents the item bank, scoring, tension engine, thresholds, and current lack of psychometric validation.
Explore the free assessment Read the full methodologyConceptual sources—not validation
- Carver & White, 1994. Behavioral inhibition and activation sensitivities. The Inner Economy is not the BIS/BAS Scales. DOI record.
- Higgins, 1997. Regulatory focus theory. Conceptual overlap does not validate LifeByLogic's dimensions. DOI record.
- Deci & Ryan, 2000. Review of self-determination theory. The LifeByLogic systems are not equivalent to its measures. DOI record.
This framework is original and unvalidated. It is educational, non-diagnostic, non-predictive, and not a basis for consequential decisions.