I built a mental health app after being stuck in my tiny studio in NYC

O Park
GoodnightJournal
Published in
2 min readJul 22, 2020
Empty street of New York City in March 2020.

Mental health has been a rising issue lately since the pandemic and it caught my attention right away since I was going crazy being stuck in my tiny studio in New York City that has no view. Also, I was consistently looking for ways to help users on Goodnight Journal who expressed depression and anxiety through public journals. Some of public journals really got me concerned and think more about features that I can implement to help them feel better. It kind of came naturally that I want to do something about it. I ended up playing around with a bunch of mental health and meditation apps out there and came up with the app called Happy.

I started journaling 16 years ago because it helps organize my thoughts and execute them then I found how therapeutic it is for me to express whatever I had in my mind into a writing. That lead me to built Goodnight Journal and it’s been a great journey to see how members comfort each other to help each other get through one’s hardship.

Beside making a comfort comments on public journals, I wanted to offers something more that can be used by more people out there. While I was researching and trying out different apps, I noticed that simple features like breathing exercise and teleport feature(distracting you from the stress moment) help me a lot to cope with stress and anxiety. Happy is curated with simple features that can be used without reserving much of your time. All features are accessible right away even without signing up. You only need to login to write journals in order for us to keep your journal safe.

Happy is available on iOS and Android.

Happy offers;

✌️ Breathing techniques for keeping calm and relaxed

✌️ Shift your mind from stress and anxiety

✌️ Affirmation and positive quotes to shape your day

✌️ Calm relaxing music and nature sounds to enjoy

✌️ Sleeping tips and tricks

✌️ Journal prompt / Guided journal

✌️ Daily reminder

✌️ Darkmode

✌️ Online journal community with writers from all over the world

✌️ and more!

Happy was originally designed for Goodnight Journal users but it’s available for everyone since we are all in this together to go through this rough time. I hope Happy can be a small part of your life to keep you happy.

Try Happy for free on iOS, Android, and Web.

Your opinion matters. We would love to hear your feedback, comments, or any suggestions!

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