
Launch HN: Simple Habit (YC W17) – Spotify for Meditation - yunhakim
Hi, I’m Yunha Kim, founder of Simple Habit (<a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.simplehabitapp.com" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.simplehabitapp.com</a>). We’re in the Winter 2017 batch of Y Combinator.<p>Simple Habit is a curated library of the best 5 minute meditations from the world’s leading teachers. It’s like Spotify for mindfulness and meditations.<p>I started Simple Habit because I used to be a perpetually stressed out banker in NYC, and I started meditating, and it changed my life. Happy to answer questions about the app, or about meditation in general.
======
tombh
I should mention my now mostly-ignored Dharma API: [http://www.dharma-
api.com/](http://www.dharma-api.com/)

It scrapes the major meditation talk websites to provide unified JSON API
access to about 25,000 talks.

------
wrd
Cool app! Thanks for sharing. I think this is great for an introduction to
meditation and to help build a habit.

One difficulty I have with apps like this is that they're not necessarily
incentivized to produce good meditation habits. If a user builds a real
meditation practice then they're likely not going to want to use an app like
this -- they'll probably want to meditate in silence and for much longer than
5 minutes. I'm curious how you think about what the ideal end-game is for each
user and if you're concerned about churn? How do you plan to serve users who
grow beyond 5 minute meditation?

~~~
yunhakim
This is a great question! It’s true that hardcore meditators often prefer to
meditate for longer than five minutes, so we do have meditations up to 30
minutes in length to cater to that. What’s interesting, though, is that even
experienced meditators can see the value of a quick meditation in the middle
of their day, like during their lunch break or right before an important phone
call. We like to think of meditation as a more integrated practice that’s
accessible anytime and anywhere, which is why we believe that 5 minutes of
mindfulness can be helpful to anyone.

~~~
tb303
there is something very weird to me about calling someone a "hardcore
meditator" for meditating >5 minutes. It takes me 5 minutes just to get my
brain to shut up. Listening to someone else put words in my brain for five
minutes isn't meditation. It's not mindfulness. It's training towards the two,
but it's not a substitute for either.

~~~
grzm
Your parent isn't defining a hardcore meditator as anyone who meditates for
longer than 5 minutes. As for the rest, I suspect your parent would largely
agree with you, though guided meditation can be useful as part of mindfulness
practice. Depending on your level of practice and what's going on, five
minutes could be a great break or just barely enough to quiet yourself for a
bit.

~~~
tb303
I hear you and appreciate the reply. I do agree, in that one minute of
meditation is better than 0 minutes of meditation, just like 7 minute workouts
are better than 0 minute workouts. So any effort to encourage folks to pause
during their day, no matter what their motivation (even "hey, a new app!"), is
net positive.

------
ploggingdev
This post should be titled as a "Show HN", not "Launch HN". The rules are here
[https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/showhn.html)

A demo page on your website would be helpful for people to get a feel for what
the service is about. Currently there is a lot of friction to even understand
the service : download the app, signup. My guess is that a lot of people
(atleast here on HN) were turned away by the friction involved to understand
the service.

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks for the feedback! The new, updated web landing page coming soon :)

------
autocorr
Neat! If you find this interesting, Thanissaro Bhikku of Metta Forest Monetary
has absolutely superb resources with guided meditations, talks, and e-books,
all for free under creative commons[1]. This is in the Thai Forest lineage, so
not purely secular, but I feel like there's so much being offered to learn
from in a full teaching tradition that it would be a loss to just focus on a
Jon Kabat-Zinn style mindfulness meditation technique.

[1] [http://www.dhammatalks.org/](http://www.dhammatalks.org/)

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks! Will check it out :)

------
bradytp
Hi, I’m Tim Brady, one of the partners at YC that works closely with Simple
Habit. We funded Simple Habit because Yunha is a great founder. She is
resourceful, energetic and has created a product that solves a problem she
understands well. Happy to answer any questions as well.

~~~
kriro
How does this turn into a unicorn? I have trouble envisioning the scale tbh
(and it seems fairly easy to imitate). I like the general idea but it doesn't
strike me as something a VC would find attractive.

~~~
bbcbasic
Moreover I can just go on YouTube and listen to meditation for free. How to
compete with that?

~~~
grzm
That can be said of a lot of things. Convenience of aggregation? Lots of
podcast material is on YouTube or can be downloaded from a website, and people
still buy podcast apps. Execution? I personally don't care for YouTube's
interface on either the web or their iOS apps. People have shown time and
again they're willing to pay for convenience and execution even when free or
cheaper alternatives are available.

------
benevol
John Kabat-Zinn masters the link between science and meditation and has
published very valuable books (including progressing guided/audio meditation
exercises, each 5-10 minutes), such as
[https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4180277/Mindful_Way_Through...](https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4180277/Mindful_Way_Through_Depression_-
_Guided_Meditation_Practices)

~~~
kranner
>
> [https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/41..](https://thepiratebay.org/torrent/41..).

I think it's inappropriate to encourage piracy here.

One legal way to get Jon Kabat-Zinn's material:
[https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Way-Through-Depression-
Unhapp...](https://www.amazon.com/Mindful-Way-Through-Depression-
Unhappiness/dp/1593851286)

------
richard___
Charging people as a subscription service for meditation help feels a little
queasy.

Also I think it's a Silicon Valley neurosis that you need an app or technology
to address problems like depression and low self-esteem (which meditation in
the traditional sense addresses).

~~~
brunoqc
> Charging people as a subscription service for meditation help feels a little
> queasy.

Yes and it's sad that they all do it. I would prefer a one time buy.

~~~
edawerd
I believe they have a one-time "lifetime" subscription buy

~~~
kovacs
I use this app which used to be $5 but is now free -
[https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mindfulness-app-
meditation/i...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mindfulness-app-
meditation/id417071430?mt=8)

Apparently they too switched to a freemium subscription model. Having
subscription models for meditation apps is like having a subscription model
for a music service with 20 albums. I get that there's the whole tracking
aspect of it but that's hardly interesting enough and there's not enough
demand for new content to make sense to rent monthly. Clearly I'm in the
minority because Headspace is hiring in Santa Monica and SF now.

I'll say this, if Converse changes to a subscription model for chucks there's
gonna be trouble...

------
tabeth
1\. Is there any evidence that multiple teachers are better? If so, I'd love
citations.

2\. Is there evidence that situation-specific meditations are useful?

3\. How much are the teachers paid, if at all?

4\. What's the criteria for one being a "top mindfulness teacher"?

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks for these great questions!

1\. Before Simple Habit, I was actually a power user of some of other
meditation apps so the benefit of a multi-teacher platform is something I
stumbled upon personally. Being able to explore different voices, styles, and
techniques helps users experiment with what really resonates with them. We’ve
found that our users like the diversity and will often (if not always) engage
with content from different teachers on the app.

2\. Situation-specific meditations make it easy for users to integrate mindful
moments all throughout their day. At Simple Habit, we believe that meditation
helps people do more throughout their day, be more resilient, and engage more
with life. Situation-specific, meditations make the benefits directly
applicable to whatever they might be doing, whether they’re heading into a
meeting, about to give a presentation, or going through a conflict.

3\. Yes! Part of our mission is to help meditation teachers monetize on their
impact and hard work.

4\. We primarily vet teachers based on reputable training/credentials (many of
our teachers were trained through Google’s Search Inside Yourself program
and/or top universities), and the quality of their teaching experience. We’re
aiming to create a high quality platform comprised of the most respected
teachers in the space.

~~~
imglorp
Thanks for coming by to answer questions. Here's a followup.

You addressed situation specific above, but in general, is there any evidence
that the type of meditation affects the outcome, as long as directed focus is
achieved? I realize it's hard to quantify results, but what is known?

~~~
pkghost
They absolutely have differing effects, just like different sports can produce
generally fit athletes with different specializations in musculature and skill
sets.

Furthermore, directed focus is not strictly necessary, depending on what you
mean. There are techniques that do not entail keeping the attention fixed on
one object, though in my experience attentional control is super important.

Shinzen Young has a talk on YouTube where he discusses the flavors of
enlightenment as they differ from lineage to lineage. I'm not aware of
research, however, that compares the effects on tradition/technique to
another, though there may be some out there.

------
tmaly
I tried the headspace app for the free trial, and I liked it a lot, but I did
not want to pay their price.

A friend tried transcendental meditation but the price for the course was
pretty steep.

If I were to try your app, how does it compare to the others in terms of
features and price?

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks for the question!

What sets Simple Habit apart is that

1) we are a multiple teacher platform instead of just one teacher. We bring
top meditation and mindfulness teachers from all over the world and put them
on one platform.

2) We focus on 5 minute meditations designed for busy people.

3) Our meditations are designed for different situations and moods so you can
find meditations for just about any use cases. For instance, my favorites are
meditation for before public speaking, before an important meeting, for going
to bed.

We’re a freemium model and we have a LOT of free meditations available. You
can find several months worth of free content so try them out first. If you
like them and want to access to our premium meditations, then you can
subscribe. We have three different pricing options: $11.99 a month, $99.99 a
year, $299.99 for lifetime.

------
sadok
I have a suscription to Headspace that I rarely use to be honest. 10-30
minutes feels like "too much" time to take out of my day. Like most people
here, I feel like rests will make me fall behind.

SimpleHabit's 5 minute meditations can be done anywhere and are really easy. I
find that 5 minutes is just what I need to kickstart this habit. The "stress
fix" is a godsend. Thanks for this!

~~~
kranner
"You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes a day. Unless you're too busy,
then you should sit for an hour."

\-- passed around as old Zen saying

------
mmikeff
I've also recently launched a meditation app (iOS only for now), I'm taking a
slightly different tack in that I'm not planning to deliver multitudes of
teachers and am going for longer duration meditations. The first version only
went live in the App Store yesterday and provides a breathing and bodyscan
meditation if approx 10min, each time it is played the content is slightly
different so as to avoid becoming repetitive. Something like Pzizz for
meditation.

The reason I've taken that approach is that when listening to pre-recorded
guided meditation from a book that I found myself getting so familiar with the
guidance that I knew what was coming up next, and this was quite distracting.
In subsequent releases I aim to introduce options to configure the duration
and to dial up or down the guidance to silence ratio.

If anyone is interested it's called Alive Meditation in the App Store, and I'd
be more than happy to hear any criticism or suggestions.

------
OrBaruk
"This item isn't avaible in your country" on the android play store.

Any plans to make the app available worldwide?

~~~
yunhakim
Hey there! Thanks for the question. While our mobile apps are not available in
some non-English speaking countries, our web app
([http://simplehabitapp.com/](http://simplehabitapp.com/)) is available
worldwide. Try it out and let us know what you think!

~~~
thecupisblue
Honestly, I don't think people would expect the meditations to be available in
their native language and having at least access to english ones would be
amazing.

~~~
OrBaruk
It's not about having them in my native language, it's about having them on my
phone as an app instead of a website.

At least the website seems to work well on mobile.

~~~
yunhakim
Awesome! Just curious, which country are you based in? We can look into
enabling it. The only concern for enabling in non-English speaking countries
is that often users give 1 stars for not having meditations translated in
their languages, and that's challenging to do so quickly for a small startup,
as you might understand :)

~~~
mrsheen
Please enable it for Poland! We usually speak English pretty well :)

~~~
mlitwiniuk
Oh yeah, that would be nice.

~~~
yunhakim
Will do :)

------
thecupisblue
Looks simple, great, like something I'd wanna use and later on when I fall
into the habit possibly subscribe to. Buuuut, not available in my country. How
come it isn't worldwide?

Now, I got a bunch of questions:

Why don't you link your instagram/twitter from the site? Had to google it
which was "ugh" already.

How do you pick your teachers?

Why do you think you can take the piece of the big player's pie in this
market?

What is your marketing strategy (if not secret)?

How well do you sync with calendars (can I put reminders in my Google
calendar)?

How come you moved the focus from "keeping the streak" to "choose your
meditation"?

Are teachers getting paid based on the number of plays, finishes, fixed rate
or?

Congrats on launching and wish you all the best! Go kill it!

Also now that I've found your instagram, why the hell don't you post a 60
second meditation as an instagram video? That would be so awesome.

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks for some great questions :)

1\. Thanks for pointing that out! We’re going to link our Instagram/Twitter
accounts on our site right away :)

2\. We vet top meditation teachers from around the world — most if not all of
our teachers have been trained through reputable programs (e.g. Google’s
Search Inside Yourself), and teach at top universities and institutes, like
the University of Pennsylvania or Columbia University. Teachers who express
interest in working with us go through a rigorous vetting process to ensure
that we’re consistently onboarding high quality and respected teachers in the
space. You can read more here: simplehabitapp.com/teachers

3\. You can use Simple Habit's daily reminder feature to set a time for your
meditation. Also, Simple Habit is synced with Apple Health under Mindfulness
Minutes and can track your daily meditations. A lot of our users use both
features and find them helpful.

4\. Simple Habit provides a revenue stream for meditation teachers.
Subscription prices help both Simple Habit operate its business and meditation
teachers making a livelihood :)

~~~
thecupisblue
Thanks for answering Yunha! This is the second time I've heard about Google's
"Search Inside Yourself" today, guess I should start meditating. Also, my last
question! Why don't you post a 60 second meditation as an instagram video?
That would be so awesome and I know I'd love it, think that as a sponsored
post would be a pretty interesting marketing tactic.

------
philipkuklis
Hi Yunha, are there any tangible (e.g. psychological) differences between
guided/unguided meditation? What do you prefer more?

~~~
yunhakim
Strictly speaking from my own personal experience, I found that guided
meditations are much more effective and helpful in building a daily habit of
mindfulness. A couple reasons:

1) I love learning new techniques every day and this really motivates me to
meditate daily. For instance - This morning, I meditated to Simon Moyes' new
year meditation on Simple Habit and I learned how to associate a happy moment
with an unhappy moment in my day and that was super interesting. I can't laern
new techniques from unguided meditations.

2) When I meditate to a guided meditation, I build a personal relationship
with certain meditation teachers (even though it is just through recordings)
and this helps me to look forward to meditating daily. Perhaps I feel more
accountable for meditating.

------
sebleon
Interesting, your app store description mentions previous launches from before
June 2016. Seems like you got some solid attention on previous launch(es),
what kind of traction are you looking for on your definitive launch?

Big fan of the Airbnb approach of launching until someone notices!

[http://www.businessinsider.com/top-17-startups-launched-
in-2...](http://www.businessinsider.com/top-17-startups-launched-
in-2016-2016-6/#simple-habit-wants-to-help-stressed-out-millennials-7)

~~~
yunhakim
Thanks for checking us out — we’ve been growing quickly since our launch in
June on iOS. Now, we're available on Android and web as well. We’re excited to
announce Y Combinator’s investment in Simple Habit!

------
philip1209
How did you settle on the five minute length for meditations?

~~~
yunhakim
One of the biggest obstacles for busy people is that they feel like they don’t
have time to meditate. As a startup founder and ex-i banker, 5 minute tracks
make daily meditation accessible and doable, and significantly lowers the
barrier to entry. Studies show that brief meditation, even if it is just a few
minutes, if practiced consistently, can have powerful benefits within a few
weeks.

------
gburkhard
FWIW, I think I am a good example of the intended audience for this app: I
have never meditated/done mindfulness exercises until ~2 weeks ago, when I
found out about Simple Habit from a post Yunha made to the YC class list. I
have been stressed recently and have had trouble sleeping/etc, and when she
sent the email it sounded like a great use of just 5 minutes of my time. On my
first try, I felt noticeably calmer after the 5 minute meditation. I am one of
those people who (at least feels) "super busy and doesn't have time to
meditate", and if I have time I would prioritize sleeping over anything else.
But for me, the 5 minute exercises really reduce any immediate stress I feel,
so I am a big fan! While there are lots of people in the world who make
meditation a big part of their lives, there are many more who wouldn't do it
without an easy and short option, and this is easy and short.

------
sremani
I like the name Simple Habit, without much back ground, its sounds like tiny-
habits school of thought. By making the task sound simple, getting rid of
starting inhibitions is a great tool. I hope it comes with daily tracking and
daily "nudging". Hey, get 5 minutes of meditation for today. The Ultimate goal
is to get people meditate way beyond 5 minutes.

------
bigmanwalter
After checking out a few guided meditation apps, the one with my favorite
library has got to be Mindbliss [https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mindbliss-
mindfulness-medita...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mindbliss-mindfulness-
meditation/id1092634583)

------
mmayberry
Hi Yunha,

The hardest part of meditation for me was building the habit. Every time I
started to build a practice I either lost interest, had a hard time staying
engaged, or simply stopped. What have you done from a dev or design standpoint
to help your users build a habit around mindfulness?

Thanks for the AMA!

~~~
yunhakim
Hey there - I totally hear you. This has been a challenge for many of my new
year resolutions personally, and I think this is also a challenge for those
who design and build products in health & fitness space.

We're all about tackling this challenge (thus the name 'Simple Habit!'). And
we do this by making meditations as simple and accessible as possible. Try out
the app and you may understand what I mean!

Users also have the ability to get daily reminders to meditate at a certain
time of day, and this has been quite effective.

------
nopinsight
I'd love to try it. I have been using Headspace for the past few weeks and
getting good results.

Once getting to Google Play Store download page, it says the item isn't
available in your country. I currently live in SE Asia and use a local credit
card.

~~~
yunhakim
Our Android app is currently not available in some non-English speaking
countries, but try our web app
([http://simplehabitapp.com/](http://simplehabitapp.com/)), which is available
worldwide!

~~~
nopinsight
May I ask why, since there are usually many expats and often locals who speak
English fluently in most countries around the world?

What are the benefits of restricting distribution and thus market penetration?
I'm curious both as a user and a fellow startup entrepreneur.

~~~
yunhakim
The only concern for enabling in some of the non-English speaking countries is
that often users give 1 stars for not having meditations translated in their
languages, and that's challenging to do so quickly for a small startup, as you
might understand :)

------
xackpot
Yunha, Great App! I have been using it every morning for more than a month
now. I have explored Calm, Headspace, etc but I have finally settled upon
Simple Habit. Easy to understand UX and great gamification.

------
sdx23
Sadly, the website doesn't show anything without JS.

------
greenspot
How do you see the competition, not just Headspace but also other upcoming
players?

Do you expect many more in this space and how defensible is this model?

~~~
yunhakim
The meditation industry is growing fast, and it’s exciting to see what other
companies are doing. Simple Habit is one of the only meditation platforms
bringing top teachers from around the world to one place and helping teachers
monetize their content. We’re continuing to scale our platform, and speaking
from personal experience, it isn’t the easiest model to replicate because it
requires bringing the best meditation teachers onto one platform ;) We’re
aiming to become the go-to resource for meditation and mindfulness content.

------
kowdermeister
Why do I have to sign up in order to meditate?

~~~
BugsJustFindMe
Because it's a business.

~~~
kowdermeister
Well, showing some teaser might actually help me comprehend what it's all
about. All I see is three icons. I moved on to the next post.

~~~
yunhakim
Yup, thanks for that feedback. New & updated web landing page coming soon :)

------
SnacksOnAPlane
What makes this better than Insight Timer? That's currently my go-to
meditation app.

------
NumberCruncher
Why is the app not available in Germany in the android app store?

------
neves
Do you plan do have meditation in multiple languages?

~~~
subpixel
The awesome thing about meditation is that it involves no language, and is
therefore internationalized, right out of the box!

I'm not belittling 'guided meditation', which I assume this app provides and
may be a good first step for beginners interested in meditation - but if
there's a voice coming out of a speaker giving you suggestions, you're not
actually meditating at all.

------
philippeback
App not available in your country (BE). Meh.

~~~
yunhakim
Our Android app is currently not available in some non-English speaking
countries, but try our web app
([http://simplehabitapp.com/](http://simplehabitapp.com/)), which is available
worldwide!

------
wodenokoto
Pricing?

------
Kiro
Mods, please change the title to "Show HN". It's outrageous in its current
state.

