The Challenge
Long stretches of focused work feel productive, but without regular reflection, it’s easy to drift. I needed a tool that would reliably interrupt me so I could ask whether I was doing the right thing. Regular timers didn’t work. I’d dismiss them reflexively, forget to set the next one, and abandon the habit within a week.
I designed and built Intention, a macOS app that solves this by asking what I’ll focus on and gradually blurring my screen if I don’t set the next timer.
Process
Tools like Cursor and Claude Code have dramatically changed the way I approach the design process.
In the past, I would have sketched some potential solutions, put together a clickable prototype, and user tested that. But how much does that user test actually test? A traditional prototype in Figma or the like is paper-thin. I’m testing much less than the full experience.
Now I can sculpt functional software as I go. That means I can build something, really use it, notice opportunities to make it better, and implement the changes I’d like to see, all in the same working session. This fast and robust feedback loop means better software.
That said, sketches are still faster. I’ll bounce back and forth between sketching and building as appropriate.
Craft
It’s far more practical to draw usable imagery than to generate it. The dock icon is drawn by hand in Figma with the pen tool and layer effects. The candle in the dark serves as both a metaphor for the app’s purpose illuminating the way forward, and an allusion to meditative practice.
Why does this menu bar application appear in the dock? The answer is in the riddle of keyboard focus. An app that steals my keyboard focus every 3 minutes would be impossible to use, so instead the appearance of the timer window in the top right of the screen gently reminds me, and the gradual blurring of the screen gets more insistent over time. But the app does not take keyboard focus itself. This balance is what makes the app work. So I need a fast and intuitive way to switch to the timer window when I’m ready. Cmd+Tab has to work, and having the app appear in the dock enables that.
Inspiration
The app itself conforms to the macOS look and feel. The visual inspiration for the supporting branding, however, is the early 1600s Caravaggio painting Saint Jerome Writing. The aging scholar Jerome, remembering the nearness of death, absorbs himself completely in the most noble work he can find to do while ignoring everything else. This is our task.
