Everyone I know is addicted to the bird app
I’m talking about FINCH — SELF-CARE PET of course. I’m not usually a fan of the gamified productivity app thing but this one is working for me. You have a little bird and accomplishing goals gives them energy to go on adventures. You can win or find a currency called “rainbow stones” and use it to buy clothing, furniture, or new feather colors, as well as send your bird to far-away lands to go keep exploring. There’s also a pokemon-style “micropets” system where your bird can acquire an even smaller!!!!! creature that tags along with it every day. Right now I have a bear cub named Scout, who is adorable. Before that I had a gryphon named Talon, which I got from the friend invite I used to download the app. If you invite three people you get a micropet called Cookie the Cow, which is why I have so many naked and transparently uninterested friend birds in my friend tree. (I did successfully get Cookie the Cow.)
I’ve tried a lot of habit trackers & productivity apps, including Habitica which was extremely popular for a while but was too complicated for me to ever appreciate, though a lot of the RNG mechanics of it have been recycled for Finch. The only one of those apps that really stuck was Forest: I like that it entirely removes the choice of whether I’m going to put my fucking phone down, so I do have a bunch of little trees in that forest still, and I’ll turn it back on if I’m on deadline and particularly struggling with focus. Finch has a similar timer function but it doesn’t have the same punishment system as Forest, so there’s a bit less incentive there — still, I’m using it right now to get ten minutes of writing in (a nice simple daily goal!) so I’m not going to say anything against it.
The issue with habit trackers, for me, has always been the black and white nature of the thing. Bullet journal influencers/productivity girlies/fake entrepreneurs with family money really like that grid you put in your journal to fill in your habits every day, which in my opinion really only serves to make another habit that you might forget. Apps will give you rewards for streaks but seem to waffle on how to handle a failure — either they back down and give you a loosely encouraging, aw, do better, try again tomorrow! or the Duolingo owl comes to your house and beats you to death with a baseball bat. This, bizarrely, was more appealing when I was more severely depressed and anxious, where I wanted to be punished if I failed to do the things I intended to do because the chemical levels in my brain were off and I thought God and the armies of heaven needed to get involved in that for some reason. However, predictably, failing repeatedly and being even minorly reprimanded for it does not make you more likely to log onto the app the next day, so I never stuck any of these predecessors out.
Now I’m in a much better place mentally, and I need less crisis-level day-to-day maintenance and more quality of life improvement. Finch is really good for that level of stakes, ie. low: my goals are things like “Floss” and “Wear sunscreen” and “Read one chapter of a book,” things that even my lingering Catholic self-hatred can’t twist into ways to torment myself. If I skip a goal for a day, nothing happens except that the app prompts me to optionally reflect on why. You can tie goals to micropet eggs, so if you miss the one you’ve linked it to it will delay that micropet hatching, but otherwise nothing bad happens if you don’t do something you wanted to do. It’s entirely incentive-based.
The self-care aspect of it has been less relevant, but I still find parts of it appealing. Prompted reflections or being asked to “name your emotion” always ring a bit corny to me but I’ve found them to be interesting in practice. I do like that if it asks you how you’re feeling and you give it a sad face it can prompt you to tell it why: it’s good practice for me, a left-brained rationalist who’s been logicing their way out of feelings since childhood, to take a second and stop and say, okay, I don’t feel good. Why? What am I feeling? What caused it? Do I know? Can I articulate it in a way that makes sense to myself? I appreciate the aspect of it that’s intended to bring you back to the world and your own perception, and I’ve found myself liking those parts of the app more than I thought I would. (I have not found a lot of use for the breathing exercises or crisis management stuff, but as I said before, I’m a pretty low-demand user).
The social shit is also really charming. All you can do in this app is add friends and then send them quote unquote “GOOD VIBES”. Sometimes it’s a hug! Sometimes it’s good morning or good night! (I’ve got a really sweet routine with friends that are using it actively — I get a couple of these at the beginning and end of every day now). Sometimes it’s a reminder to take a stretch break or to hydrate, which I honestly really like as a retail worker. If someone sends you good vibes you can then invite them to stay over, so they’ll go on an adventure with you or hang out at your birdhouse. They don’t do anything, you can’t actually interact with them, they’re just hanging out next to the gif of your bird walking that plays for SEVEN HOURS as he adventures in the Alps and discovers ice water or whatever. I think it’s cute and fun. I can feel the hint of the gamified addiction mechanics in how often I want to check the app, but when I check it… nothing has ever happened. My bird’s just still walking. And so I close it again!
There are only a couple things I feel like I'm missing. I'd like some sort of ability to randomly assign goals: things like "Name my emotion" or "Take three deep breaths" or "Drink water" would, imo, be more helpful for me as something that I could be told to do by the app occasionally on its own without having to assign it generically to the broad timespan of a day. Smaller grounding or calming exercises don't feel like they're necessarily something that should be checked off like a task — I would prefer if they were something you could opt into to have the app occasionally trigger. The other thing is that there doesn't seem to be an easy way to track repeated but non-scheduled tasks, which for me would be something like working on a specific writing project or answering an annoying email. I can just individually rewrite the goal every day, but something like "Work on draft" would be nice to be able to pick from a list and see my successes in the week-ish it's relevant rather than creating a new item every time. (This is probably bothersome for me because I just want a to-do list. Still: getting shit done in your life is self-care??? yes???? hot take????)
I like the bird app. I recommend it especially if you’re wanting to make regular small changes in your life in a way that’s a bit more engaging than getting pinged by your default reminders app. I have flossed more in the past two weeks than I have in months and I better get a good grade at the goddamn dentist next time I go. I love my little bird BILBO!!!
