Sit. · Rafał Pastuszak
On this article I’ll be utilizing Sit. as an excuse to speak about some wider concepts (motivation, psychological well being, iterative design processes). We’ll clarify why it happened, however not how. Partly 2 I’ll present you learn how to take an thought from a hunch right into a working app. Keep tuned!
Earlier than you learn on, open the app and test it out for your self. It shouldn’t take greater than 1–2 minutes and if it does I’m sure it’ll be time nicely spent.
This web page isn’t going anyplace, I’ll anticipate you right here.
Glad to have you ever again. Did you cheat?
Sit. is a brutally easy alarm clock, not far more complicated than an egg timer. You select a size of time to simply sit in silence, set it and neglect it. When that point is up, a gong gently brings you again after which repeats each minute till you turn it off – so that you don’t lose monitor of time.
Some folks (myself included) use it to meditate, however there actually isn’t any proper approach of having fun with it.
To be honest, “simply sit” can be a well-known zen koan. However whatever the purpose, so long as I can get you to sit down down in your ass for a second and cease attempting to be productive, I’m a contented man.
Sidenote: why do we are saying “brutally” easy and never, say, “elegantly” easy? The choice technique of constructing issues like this app might be thought-about “brutal”, however we don’t name poetry or arithmetic “brutal” the place each areas are primarily an artwork type based mostly on searching for simplicity.
We don’t actually say, “Did you learn that haiku? Was it brutal?”, can we?
I’ve all the time liked the concept of easy, atomic (as “indivisible”) instruments, objects with a brütally™ easy goal. They’re straightforward to clarify, you possibly can stack them like legos and compose. Sit. is an train in that.
A few of my different tasks, like Ensō, Façade, and the goat telling me to slow down when I talk too fast, additionally observe the identical precept. So let’s deal with the specifics: why are we speaking about Sit., and never, say, Squanch?
Motive #1: Time
“Dwell Gradual, Die Previous”
an historical Doom Steel koan
Up to now decade the Net has develop into a type of a shitty metaverse. Each step you’re taking is watched and assessed when it comes to its monetisation potential, each interplay is supposed to extract worth from you. Wonderful, IndieWeb and Mastodon are making issues marginally higher, however there’s a lot extra to be achieved exterior of their little bubbles (which I really like dearly).
Identical to promoting, which assumes consent by default, a lot of the Net in its present form robs you of your time. You may withdraw consent, however solely after we’ve proven you the mind parasite.
So, a lot of the Net is a time/cash/consideration grabbing machine. It’s Sting strolling behind you buzzing Each Breath You Take. We’ve established that.
What I needed to construct was the other. I needed to provide you a little bit of your time again. That’s why once you open Sit., there are solely two issues you are able to do:
- shut the tab, or
- sit down in your butt and watch the grass develop
I hope you selected the latter. If not, I do hope that since you’ve got learn this far I’m providing you with one thing price your time. Identical to anybody else I need to really feel helpful.
A humorous factor can occur once you use Sit. Whenever you simply sit and do nothing, each minute drags on into what seems like infinity. However once you mindlessly watch TikTok or doomscroll by Twitter then again, hyperspace appears to bend in the other way: I blink and the pasta is overcooked, I blink once more and the sunshine within the kitchen is completely different, cooler, the shadows have moved. Are we actually alive if we’re not right here?
Whenever you open Sit., I don’t attempt to fill your mind with something. It’s simply you and your ideas. That may get uncomfortable. However once you end, for some unusual purpose you are feeling higher.
Various title for purpose #1: the time I need again.
The 2 different causes I constructed Sit. are extra trivial and fewer more likely to generate a rant.
Motive #2: Motivation
I’ve determined to drop full time work and transfer again to non-public tasks, which suggests I’m nonetheless determining a construction for my day, which suggests it’s straightforward to get caught in a rut.
You see, I endure from a situation generally known as irony deficiency: although I preach simplicity when mentoring or operating workshops, I battle with the exact same factor in my very own observe. Communicate along with your GP if these signs appear acquainted.
After a number of days of operating round in circles, I made a decision to take a detour and construct one thing else to spice up my morale a bit, ideally one thing so small I couldn’t afford to not end and share it (maintain that thought, we’ll get again to it within the second submit).
Essentially the most prolific and inventive folks I do know get their enhance of motivation from tasks with a brief suggestions loop. This manner they’ll have contact with the consumer, and watch as their work is loved by others or on the very least interacted with. Constructing issues for others is a type of communication, and it fulfils a really primary human want.
Iterative methodologies like Agile usually are not solely helpful as a result of they permit us to separate issues into smaller, extra testable chunks, bringing us nearer to the essence of an issue. There’s additionally a psychological well being and motivation facet to it which truthfully deserves its personal article.
Various title for purpose #2:
I’m caught, go the shovel, not this one, the small one.
Motive #3: Black canine
The ultimate purpose will sound trivial, however it’s a type of trivial issues price repeating until they’ve lastly carved into our brains: psychological well being is essential.
I’m concerned about psychological well being each from an expert and private viewpoint. I’m not a therapist or a professional medical skilled, so I attempt to assist utilizing the talents I’ve. The areas the place I can contribute considerably usefully took the type of my work on privateness, utilizing music and psychedelics for therapeutic functions at Wavepaths, and writing instruments supporting psychological well being in my spare time. The great thing about constructing these (digital) instruments for myself is that it prices 0$ to share them with others.
Rant: It simply feels perplexing how preoccupied we’re with sending folks to a lifeless rock 138600000 km away by treating some random tech bro like your favorite soccer group, the place on the identical time we’ve 1000s of Curies, Teslas, Newtons price of human potential, mind energy which might be unlocked with generally comparatively little work. These individuals are not 1 au away. But, we fetishise those that make us depressing as a substitute.
There’s a lot low hanging fruit right here.
Motive #3.1: I’ve very particular clock wants.
I don’t need to be clever. I need to be clockwise.
However severely now. One other massive purpose why Sit. is constructed this manner is behavior reinforcement. Stopping points is simpler than disaster administration as soon as the black canine pays a go to.
I attempt to meditate on daily basis within the morning. For me it’s a type of psychological hygiene and a “non secular” observe solely when it comes to connecting with one thing larger than us (nature, not faith). One of many sorts of meditation I practise, known as shi-nè, is sort of difficult as a result of it includes studying learn how to detach your self from the voice in your head with out specializing in the rest specifically like breath or music.
There’s no anchor, however there isn’t anyplace to go, both.
The straightforward instruction for shi-ne is to take care of presence of consciousness with out specializing in something, that’s, stay uninvolved with no matter arises in thoughts source
The purpose right here is that this will shortly get each irritating and boring. Our mind always appears for issues to deal with, it abhors a vacuum. So the constructive results of this train take time to manifest. And sustaining a behavior that originally feels disagreeable is tough.
Bear in mind earlier after I mentioned that though sitting down and doing nothing will be disagreeable at first, once you end for some unusual purpose you are feeling higher? It seems, you profit from habits extra in the event you take a while to replicate on them after you’re achieved. It additionally makes them simpler to stay, by instructing us to affiliate reward with an initially annoying exercise.
That’s why the timer in Sit. is gentler than an everyday snooze button. It lets me wind down and replicate with out aggressively throwing me again into my common routine like an alarm clock would. And it offers me extra management over my meditation schedule: I nonetheless understand how a lot time has handed however I can afford to spend one other minute or two on it .
Various title for purpose #3: The truth that I preserve snoozing shouldn’t be a bug, it’s a characteristic!
Closing phrases (for now)
How did it go?
Thus far the customers of Sit. “wasted” a mixed few days’ price of labor by sitting down and doing nothing. Somebody wrote a short article about it, and I obtained heat feedback from individuals who apparently wanted to be distracted from their distractions.
I put all of these wasted minutes collectively into one imaginary individual. Think about you despatched somebody you want on a spa trip for a number of days. Now think about that that hypothetical individual is an ideal sphere.
Pay attention, I do know it’s not rocket science, I do know it’s a small factor. However understanding that someplace, somebody sat down, watched the grass develop and had time for themselves as a substitute of doomscrolling or crafting a world-altering submit on LinkedIn… It made me really feel higher and let me get out of my very own head. We’re easy folks right here, with easy, but mysterious wants.
Subsequent steps
You’ve in all probability observed that Sit. was an excuse to speak about wider concepts.
Within the subsequent article I’ll use Sit. to introduce to you my speedy prototyping workflow. It is a multidisciplinary course of involving consumer analysis, Human Centred Design, and code.
If you wish to see learn how to flip a hunch into an thought, after which an thought right into a working piece of software program utilized by precise folks, keep tuned!
I additionally provide free workplace hours, the place I discuss to random folks about concepts massive and small, pair program or rant. If that feels like your cup of tea, come and say hi or book a chat!
And keep in mind: each minute spent in Sit. is $0.01 Mark Zuckerberg cannot spend on metaverse.
PS. This text wouldn’t be doable with out Alexandra Ciufudean who translated it into human.