I’ve by no means been constant with regards to meditation. I lean on the apply after I’m careworn, which is counterintuitive. The aim is to do it each day, so you possibly can higher middle your self.
I do not love having to seek for a particular meditation on YouTube or having to pay for an app that I do not use sufficient to make it value the fee. I additionally discover there are seasons of life I theme my classes round. Proper now, it is getting pregnant.
After two years of fertility remedies, I needed to see if I might create an app that would assist me join with my womb, course of the ache and get in a very good headspace earlier than my subsequent embryo switch.
And would not it’s cool to ship it to my fellow IVF warriors, if it labored properly? I got here throughout Thunkable AI, which helps you to ideate, construct, take a look at and launch a totally native cellular app on a single platform. Thunkable launched again in 2016, however its no-code layer (also referred to as vibe coding) was launched in March. There is a free tier and paid choices that vary from $19 to $189 per 30 days.
Deep breath. Right here goes.
Vibe coding a brand new app
I signed up as a free person and was taken straight to the construct web page. I used to be curious to see how far I might get as a non-technical artistic individual, with none tooling coaching.
Earlier than I put something into the immediate, I spent a couple of minutes pondering what I needed the app to do. As a result of IVF makes conceiving a medical expertise, I needed the app to assist convey me again into my physique and to faucet into the power supply within the womb.
This is what I advised Thunkable: “I have been doing fertility remedies for 2 years. I had a latest early-stage miscarriage. I wish to construct a meditation app particularly for myself, that different IVF sufferers may have the ability to use, too.
“I would like it to convey me again into my physique, join with my womb and the supply of creation. I’ll do each day meditations for the following few weeks within the lead-up to my subsequent embryo switch. I wish to be calm and assured, with out placing strain on the state of affairs.”
This is the preliminary response:
I hoped to have the ability to choose a number of preset prompts, nevertheless it would not let me, so I picked essentially the most relevant one. This is the way it regarded:
Then, Thunkable AI opened this display and coded for a couple of minutes to create this.
There was a Runtime Error difficulty that I could not resolve with the “Repair with AI” button, so I requested Thunkable within the chat. I prompted it to generate prerecorded mediations.
The end result was fairly spectacular. It generated six themed meditations, created a dashboard to trace classes, and a piece for intention-setting. I do not do any journaling on screens, so I requested an even bigger library of meditations so I would not have to maintain repeating. It even gave my app a reputation: Bloom.
I adopted it up with extra context: “Please create extra variations of every matter, like womb connecting, womb creativity, physique scans, switch prep, put up switch, difficult limiting beliefs that I can not get pregnant.”
It additionally advised I add options like problem ranges, a bookmark choice so it can save you your most well-liked meditation classes, and a filter for session length.
It created a library of 20 meditations, which was an incredible begin. I requested it so as to add 10 extra, with a couple of particular to IVF — and it did it inside seconds. It even created one known as Irritation Calm as a result of I advised it I’ve silent endometriosis.
However after I pressed play to take heed to one of many meditations, nothing occurred. I advised Thunkable I could not hear the audio, however I acquired hit with a utilization restrict, so I wanted to improve. Maintain this in thoughts for those who’re creating an app, as you may possible want the $19-per-month plan for greater utilization limits.
Silence is golden?
I wasn’t in a position to hear the audio, which I believed was as a result of I wanted to improve. I queried it within the chat.
I moved on to run a reside take a look at preview of the app on my iPhone to see if the audio would work there.
I downloaded the Thunkable app, generated take a look at code and fed that again into the dashboard I used to be constructing in. The audio nonetheless did not work.
I reached out to help, and so they confirmed the AI software does not generate the audio content material. I might need to create the meditations individually, then add them into code within the app.
I jumped over to ChatGPT to create a 10-minute script, utilizing the immediate: “Create a 10-minute guided meditation script for a each day grounding apply within the lead-up to IVF. This meditation app will likely be solely targeted on IVF/for sufferers.”
Then I went over to ElevenLabs to generate the audio by studying ChatGPT’s script:
I then had to make use of yet one more platform to host that audio, so I might add the general public hyperlink into Thunkable. I prompted it to replace the code within the chatbox, then checked if the code had been up to date.
However nonetheless, it did not play.
I advised Thunkable help I could not no-code my manner out of it. They gave me the immediate and code repair.
That labored, however solely on the internet, not within the app. It is also a bit buggy, because it does not present the progress bar within the audio. Plus, the audio voice sounds very robotic and never essentially the most meditation-friendly.
You possibly can take a look at my AI-generated app and try the meditations here.
The decision
I used to be in a position to create one thing that regarded like an app however did not precisely work as I might imagined. If the platform had been in a position to generate (real-sounding) voices in addition to scripts, I might’ve been in a position to ship an app from scratch inside a few hours.
I appreciated the concept of getting a customized app only for meditations, so I haven’t got to seek for fertility meditations on YouTube and get interrupted with advertisements.
But it surely’s a a lot larger undertaking than I anticipated with out the audio generator.
I am additionally cautious about being guided by AI-generated recommendation with one thing so intimate. Making a sequence of phrases of affirmation is perhaps the higher transfer. In a journey that is already so medical, I wish to lean into humanity and never add something synthetic.
If I continued engaged on this, I might most likely simply choose a couple of meditation matters which might be extra private to my IVF expertise and possibly file them myself.
For instance, including a meditation for every IVF milestone, resembling “ready for the embryologist name” after the egg retrieval. Solely an IVF affected person will know the significance of those intimate moments and milestones.