Doaily

Doaily is a gamified day planner that helps you make every day count.

Download Doaily

Knowing when to quit on a project (or on anything really) is probably one of the hardest questions to answer.

I've grinded on multiple projects for months and years.

Countless early mornings.

Countless late nights.

Drinking lots of coffee.

At some point, the question always come...

Should I quit?

Again, very difficult to answer.

All I can really give you here is write about what goes through my head when I'm faced with this question and hope that it doesn't make the decision more complicated for you.

Is it when no one's really using my app?

Is it when the app isn't making as much money as I expected?

Well, shit.

If those were the only questions that mattered, I wouldn't have pushed out another update just now for Doaily to support multiple languages and fix up some bugs.

Doaily doesn't have a lot of users.

It isn't even close to making enough money to replace a 9-5.

I can't just be a digital nomad working anywhere in the world and live my dream life.

Yet.

And that right there is the trap I always find myself walking into.

//The traps

I can't just drop a project because I'll feel like a failure.

"I've already put in too much time to quit now."

"It's not done yet. It just needs a bit more work."

"Maybe if just one more person tries it, they'll love it"

Thanks to my parents, I'm wired to be resilient, persevere, and just keep going.

I identify by this so much that I actually recently got it inked on me.

I glorify the grind so much man that sometimes it's just plain stupid and stubborn to keep going.

I'm thankful for it though because another struggle is to easily give up on a project and just jump from one idea to the next without ever really getting anywhere significant.

There's always something shinier.

And another shiny or tempting idea to pursue I feel is not a good reason to quit a project. Especially when the project you are about to quit is something you've barely even started and you just find yourself good at starting things, but never at finishing things.

Finishing the development of an app or anything is a skill, because anyone can start.

Finally, with that out of the way, when do I call it quits on a project?

When do I quit on my apps after I've published them?

//When I quit

I of course consider the traction and revenue being created by the app.

But, most of all, I consider the reason why I started it in the first place.

For the two games that I have out on the market as an example, I started them to develop my skill of finishing an app and build my experience.

So, after publishing them, it was basically mission accomplished.

Even though deep down I wanted those games to be successful market-wise, it was besides the point.

Because of my reason for starting them, it was a success in my dictionary.

I got what I've wanted and learned so much from them that I can't call it a failure.

What the hell is failure even?

You learn and just try again no?

Anyway.

I just don't feel compelled to add any more features to those games. There's just no more creative spark for them anymore so I dropped em.

And sometimes, quitting some project, some thing, some person is the smartest thing you can do.

//What's next

Okay so what's up with Doaily?

Doaily is a shell of what it will be.

Right now, it doesn't have much going for it honestly.

It's a basic to-do list app that has basic game elements (streaks and leaderboards) in it to help motivate you to add things to your list and or check things off on a daily basis.

It's a minimum viable product.

It's a small part of a big life operating system that is most popularly known as bullet journalling.

A bullet journal is something I've used for years now and it's basically a highly flexible system that combines, but not limited to, all of the following:

• task management
• reflective journalling
• habit tracking
• creative planning

And Doaily was born out of this system because of the fact that formatting everything so that I could have my daily to-dos, track my habits, jot down daily highlights, and whatever else is repetitive.

On Sundays, I would go in to create the page for the coming week where I would be organizing and planning my to-dos.

Just before the end of each month, I would need to set up the following month so that I could do habit tracking and such.

I did all of this digitally using an iPad so I was able to templatize some things to save time, but it still required some time to set up.

Then, there's the fact that I would need to bring this iPad everywhere I go. It's just not as convenient as bringing around my phone.

I think you get the point.

That's the reason for Doaily.

It's solving the to-do system part of the bigger system now, but I have so much more to work on.

So, I'm still driven and don't feel like I'm just walking into the trap of continuing to develop it because I'm hoping for something that I can't really control (its popularity and the amount of money it makes).

I started it because I want to create a better solution for this system that is changing my life and many others.

And since this system is embedded in my life, Doaily is something that I see myself working on forever no matter how it's doing in the market.

I'll take breaks to pursue another app idea of course, but Doaily will be something that will have to evolve as I evolve and as it gains users.

Currently, I'm smashing my keyboard to push out a daily journalling prompt feature.

Look out for that!

That's it for this one.

I rambled, but I do hope that helps.

– Renz