Decision Method
RBD uses a repeatable decision method. It is not a mood score, a habit tracker with commentary, or a system that simply selects the lowest category.
Frame the decision
Identify the user's current goal, time horizon, immediate obligation and available capacity. The same condition can have different priority under a different objective.
Establish the reference
Separate stable profile, usual baseline, current deviation and recent trend. Population averages may inform safety limits, but the primary comparison is the user's own pattern.
Validate the evidence
Check recency, specificity, completeness and consistency. Distinguish direct observation from perception, passive estimate and inference.
Generate plausible candidates
Identify which debts are supported, which are merely possible, and which are contradicted. Missing data lowers confidence; it is not neutral or favourable evidence.
Resolve cause and competition
Ask whether an upstream debt sufficiently explains downstream symptoms. If it does, reduce the downstream score unless independent evidence remains.
Estimate intervention value
Assess urgency, actionability, likely benefit, cost, risk and fit with the user's capacity. Severe but currently unactionable problems may not be the highest-leverage immediate constraint.
Select and communicate
Choose the highest-leverage current constraint, not necessarily the most severe, most likely or easiest problem in isolation. Show the evidence and the limits.
Test the conclusion
Prescribe one action and define the next observation that would support, weaken or overturn the classification.
Decision rule
The primary debt is the candidate with the strongest combined case across evidence quality, recency, deviation from baseline, severity, trend, goal relevance, causal priority, urgency, actionability, expected intervention benefit and confidence.
Causal Examples
- Poor sleep + low energy + low focusSleep is primary. Energy and Focus are treated as downstream unless separate evidence supports them.
- Clear objective, no sequence or timePlanning, not Execution.
- Clear plan, materials or cues absentSetup, not Execution.
- Clear plan and setup, sufficient capacity, repeated non-initiationExecution.
- Adequate sleep, excessive training load, soreness and falling performanceRecovery.
- Adequate total food, low protein quantity or distributionProtein, not Fuel.
When confidence is limited
RBD should ask the single question with the highest expected information value. If no answer can resolve the ambiguity, it should state that no reliable priority can yet be selected.
When evidence conflicts
Passive data is supporting evidence, not absolute truth. When it conflicts with self-report or behaviour, RBD lowers confidence, checks the likely source of error and asks for clarification where the answer can change the decision.
Method standard. A correct decision is one that was well-supported at the time and became more testable after action. A confident-sounding decision that cannot be verified is not stronger.