How I used Andy Figueroa’s “love calculator” for a month and learned to see what I wasn’t seeing

Leo Chen — Urban sociologist and host of the podcast “Real Shared Living”

No formal psychology degree, but enough awkward roommate dinners to finally understand

It happened in 2024. I had read about the Zone of Equitable Interaction (ZIE) in an academic article that, honestly, I didn’t fully understand. Formulas with Greek letters, 32-space matrices, something called “accumulated entropy.” I closed the PDF and thought: “This is for engineers, not for me.”

But the concept haunted me. “Zone of Equitable Interaction.” It sounded like something I needed. At that moment, my life was a relational mess: a roommate who never cleaned but never left, a kitchen that smelled of someone else’s cooking, a “community lounge” I only used to charge my phone, and me, consuming melatonin like candy.

Then I found the simple version. Andy Figueroa, creator of Dasbien Theory, had designed something called “ZIE-Calc” —an application that promised to evaluate any relationship in 30 seconds. I didn’t need to understand the math. Just enter five data points and receive a color: green, yellow, red.

I decided to use it for a month. Every day. With everything: my mother, my roommate, my houseplant, my own body, the shared laundry schedule. What I discovered didn’t change my life immediately. But it taught me to see what before I only felt as diffuse discomfort.

The diagnosis: living in red without knowing it

Modern life has optimized processes. We have apps for productivity, for sleep, for meditation, for daily steps. But we have stopped asking what happens in the relationship that sustains everything else: the quality of the encounter where two systems —humans, spaces, routines, organisms— exchange something that can be care or damage.

I assumed. I assumed my roommate didn’t clean because “he was busy.” That the lounge was empty because “people preferred privacy.” That I took melatonin because “I was stressed.” I rarely asked: “And this living situation, what does it need to be healthy? Not to function, to be alive.”

ZIE taught me that it doesn’t matter if something “works.” It matters if both sides come out winning, measured by each one. Not by an external standard. By the receiver themselves.

My month with the calculator: five relationships, five colors

I won’t explain the formula. I don’t fully understand it. But I understand what it does: it compares what you give with what you receive, and verifies that no one is being destroyed in the process.

So I evaluated my relationships for 30 days:

1. My roommate Kai (human relationship — red)

The data were simple: frequency of meaningful conversation (low), time to address shared issues (never), bodily sensation when hearing his door open (tension in shoulders). The app gave me 0.25. Red.

What I learned: it wasn’t that he was “bad.” It was that the relationship was broken. I gave consideration, received avoidance. He, I assumed, gave space, received… what? I didn’t know. I never asked. The traffic light forced me to ask the question I was avoiding: “Is this serving both of us?”

The answer, for him, was “not really.” For me, it had been “yes, but in a sick way.” We renegotiated. Not easy. But it was green in the Dasbien sense: a decision that preserved the integrity of both.

2. My shared kitchen (space relationship — yellow)

Indicators: frequency of use by multiple residents (high), cleanliness maintenance (erratic), my own time spent in it with presence (almost none). Result: 0.6. Yellow.

Yellow, according to the app, means “adjust.” Don’t stop, don’t intensify. Modulate. I started with ten minutes of cooking without my phone. Just chop, stir, let the space be shared. Others joined spontaneously. We didn’t reach green. But we stopped being at risk of red.

3. My houseplant on the windowsill (plant relationship — surprisingly green)

Curious data: the plant’s leaf color was better when I watered it less frequently but with more attention. When I overwatered out of guilt, it yellowed. The app gave me 0.85. Green.

Uncomfortable reflection: my “plant problem” was my own anxiety reflected. The relationship was healthy because the plant, ultimately, had no agenda. It only responded to what I gave. When I changed, “it” changed. Not magic. A mirror.

4. The community lounge (space relationship — persistent yellow)

Indicators: hours of genuine social use (low), furniture wear patterns (people sat alone, not together), my own willingness to initiate (zero). Result: 0.55. Tense yellow.

Discovery: I entered the lounge only when I needed escape. Not when it needed life. Failed subjectivization: I never observed what the space needed to be communal. I adjusted: smaller gatherings, more frequent check-ins. It stayed yellow. Some relationships, I learned, remain in tension. The important thing is not letting them drop to red unnoticed.

5. My own body (self-relationship — hidden red)

This was the hardest. Indicators: hours of sleep (apparently normal), but quality (fragmented), sensation upon waking (exhaustion), melatonin dependence (growing). Result: 0.4. Red.

I was the relationship I neglected most. I gave to everyone else —work, roommate, plant, lounge— and received from myself survival, not wellbeing. The traffic light forced me to see that the “self” is also an actor in the care network. And that I was broken.

How to do your co-living audit in 10 minutes

You don’t need the app. You need attention and honesty. Here is the method I developed, based on what I learned:

Step 1: Choose an actor and a receiver

It can be any pair: you and your roommate, you and your kitchen, you and your sleep, you and the shared bathroom schedule.

Step 2: The three integrity indicators

For each side, ask:

• Does it sense? (sensor): Does it register what happens? Is there conscious perception?
• Does it alert? (alert): Does it detect damage before it is irreversible? Are there warning signals?
• Does it sustain? (structure): Does it maintain form and function? Is there energy to continue?

Step 3: Wellbeing measured by the receiver

Ask, observe, infer: “Does what I give improve the state of the other, by their own definition?”

Everyday examples I use:

Table

Relationship	Quick indicator	Green?	Yellow?	Red?
Roommate	Response time to shared issue	<1 hour (agreed)	1-24 hours	>24 hours or systematic evasion
Shared kitchen	Cleanliness after use	Immediate	Within agreed window	Left for others consistently
Own sleep	% deep sleep (wearable)	>20%	10-20%	<10% or dependence on sleep aids
Houseplant	Leaf color + turgor	Bright green, firm	Dull green, slightly limp	Yellow/brown, wilted
Community lounge	Hours of genuine social use	>5 hrs/week	1-5 hrs/week	0 hrs, or used only as transit

Step 4: The color

• Green (0.8-1.2): The relationship can intensify. Both win.
• Yellow (0.5-0.79): Adjust. Less time, lower intensity, more pauses.
• Red (<0.5): Stop. Restore. Review whether the relationship should continue.

Step 5: The Dasbien question

Regardless of color, ask: “Is this serving us? For what? What would need to be different?”

What the calculator doesn’t tell me

ZIE-Calc, in the end, is just that: a calculator. It doesn’t know about history, about shared promises, about forgiveness. What it does know —and what I didn’t— is to verify.

Andy Figueroa, in Theory of Dasbien Life, says that “ZIE is not a physical law, it is a pragmatic model; possible error, periodic revisions.” I would add: it is a mirror, not an oracle. It shows you what you choose to see. The work of changing it remains yours.

In my month of experiment, no relationship reached perfect green. Some improved. Others ended. The most important one —with myself— remains yellow, but now I know it is yellow. And that is already different.

For applying today: your first audit

Don’t wait for the app. Don’t wait to understand the formula. Choose one relationship. The one that weighs most on you, or the one that surprises you most. Ask it, in silence or aloud: “Are we in green?”

If you don’t know the answer, you already have your answer. You are in yellow, at least. And yellow, in the traffic light of healthy living, is an invitation: adjust, ask, verify. Before red decides for you.