Stage 2. Stop Breaking Things
Stage 2 - Stop Breaking Things
Category 3 - Week 3
Category 3 - Theft and Appropriation
One week minimum, as many as it takes.
You need 7 consecutive days scoring 3.0 or higher in Theft and Appropriation specifically before the next category opens. If a day drops below that, the count restarts - not as punishment, but because that's genuinely what the number is meant to show: a sustained pattern, not a lucky streak.
"They must make full restitution for the wrong they have done, add a fifth of the value to it, and give it all to the person they have wronged." - Numbers 5:7
A full correction here often means returning something - credit, attention, an acknowledgment - not just resolving to do better. Naming it out loud ("that idea was actually yours, I should have said so") is the uncomfortable, actual target. Watch the trap on the other side: turning the correction into a show of humility that pulls the spotlight back onto you. Return what's owed. Don't make a performance of returning it.
Today's Practice
If you catch this category today, name specifically what's owed and return it - credit, time, an acknowledgment - without turning the moment into a display.
Evening Sit + Scoring
10-minute sit. Score.
- 0: Didn't catch it, ran on autopilot.
- 1: Caught it after - retrospective awareness, real but late.
- 2: Caught it during, aware, and kept going anyway - harder to admit than a zero or a one, more useful than either.
- 3: Caught it during and changed course - the target.
- 4: Saw the setup forming and chose differently before it started - rare, and worth noting when it happens.
"He who is contented is rich... he who knows when to stop does not perish." - Tao Te Ching 44
This category is easiest to interrupt when the stakes are low - a stranger, a coworker you barely know. The real test is correcting it with someone whose good opinion you need: a boss whose credit you've quietly kept, a friend whose time you've assumed you're owed. Name, honestly, the one relationship where you tend to under-correct here.
Today's Practice
Name the one person or context where you under-correct this category most.
Evening Sit
10-minute sit. Score.
"Let none covet the wealth of any." - Isha Upanishad 1
A reset is information, not failure. But watch the opposite trap too: a clean run of scores starting to feel like proof you're no longer someone who takes more than their share. That feeling is the pattern returning in a new form - pride in the scoreboard instead of the original taking.
Today's Practice
If today's streak is strong, notice any pride in the number and let it go.
Evening Sit + Scoring
10-minute sit. Score.
- 0: Didn't catch it, ran on autopilot.
- 1: Caught it after - retrospective awareness, real but late.
- 2: Caught it during, aware, and kept going anyway - harder to admit than a zero or a one, more useful than either.
- 3: Caught it during and changed course - the target.
- 4: Saw the setup forming and chose differently before it started - rare, and worth noting when it happens.
"Godliness with contentment is great gain... if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that." - 1 Timothy 6:6-8
Seven consecutive days at 3.0 or higher in Theft and Appropriation means you can see the impulse to take and interrupt it. It doesn't retire the impulse. When you've held criterion, move to Category 4: Sexual Impropriety.
Today's Practice
Review your last seven days of scores. If you've held criterion, move to Category 4 tomorrow.
Evening Sit
10-minute sit. Score.
Track your scores and streak for this category here.
Open Daily Tracker