If quiet choices reroute lifetimes, we can design environments that make better forks the easy path. Choice architecture (Thaler and Sunstein, 2008) uses defaults, prompts, and frictions to steer behavior without coercion: enrolling by default in savings plans, placing healthy food at eye level, or scheduling weekly check-ins with a mentor. Finally, combining such nudges with personal if-then plans builds a runway for small wins to compound. In this way, the future is not seized in grand gestures but assembled, decision by quiet decision. [...]
