SPARC Load: Mental Energy

Not all days weigh the same. SPARC Load measures what a day costs you: not how many things are on it, but what each one actually takes. Two numbers, two questions The score, from 0 to 100, says how intense the day is. The hours beside it say how much day is left. A morning with one heavy meeting and a day filled with small errands can score the same and feel nothing alike, because the score is an average and the hours are a sum. Added up, the hours are told against sixteen: the day you are awake for, twenty four minus sleep. Eight axes Describe a commitment across Mental Energy, Physical Energy, Importance, Deadline, Friction, Dependency, Span and Drain. Four of them carry a percentage weight and make the base. Friction and Dependency correct it, up or down. Span and Drain multiply what the others decided. A fixed start time adds ten percent, because knowing something is coming has its own cost. Three bands From 0 to 40, a light day: room to think, to be flexible, to say yes to surprises. From 41 to 70, an intense day: it asks for focus and a real evening to recover in. From 71 to 100, a full day: maximum concentration, minimum margin. A day like this needs a light one after it. The price before you pay it When you add a commitment, the sheet says what it costs: plus two hours, and the day it leaves you with. Past twelve hours it says the rest out loud. SPARC Load does not stop you and does not tell you what to choose. It tells you the price first. Predicted against lived In the evening the app asks how the day went: lighter, as expected, or heavier than the score. It is not a correction. After seven check ins, Stats shows whether you systematically overestimate or underestimate your load. Knowing which way you lean is the whole point. Not a calendar SPARC Load does not tell you what to do or when. You can log commitments after the fact: forgot a morning call, add it in the evening. The only rule is the honesty of the estimate. Everywhere your day is iPhone and iPad, with a two column layout on iPad and a radar for every commitment. Apple Watch, with the day averaged into one shape and three complication styles. Home Screen and Lock Screen widgets. A Live Activity that follows the heaviest commitment of the day. And on Mac, with the load in the menu bar. Where the name comes from SPARC is an acronym, and each of its five letters is a way of looking at a problem: simplicity, pragmatism, abstraction, reasoning, context. The eight axes are not those five words, they are what the words become when the problem is a day instead of a project. The method is told in full in Framework SPARC, a book by Luca Infante that is written in Italian. Free, with no ads, no subscription and no tracking. If it earns its place, there is a one time tip inside.