The 5-Minute Mental Reset That Actually Works

A few years ago, I inherited a mental health feature that was, frankly, broken.

I was the Lead Game Designer at Sidekick Health, a digital therapeutics company that built apps for people with chronic illnesses. The app had a gratitude feature called “10 Fingers of Gratitude” where users were supposed to list ten things they were grateful for each day.

Almost nobody used it.

When I dug into the user research, the reasons became obvious. Ten things is a lot. What if you can only think of seven? Does that mean you failed? The interface was tedious: just a blank text field staring at you, waiting. Users told us they found the whole experience confusing and, worse, guilt-inducing. The exact opposite of what a mental health feature should do.