How complex should mindfulness interactions be?

Before Lumos Labs developed their first mindfulness app, they set out to determine just how interactive it should be. Mindfulness practices seemed like promising candidates for a highly interactive interpretation, blending technology with proven techniques to engage people in new ways.

On the innovation team, we took on the challenge of prototyping an interaction-focused mindfulness experience for early user testing. We explored a range of interactions, from the simplest—swiping, tapping, and holding—to more complex gestures like tracing lines and combining multiple input methods in a single session. Through this process, we discovered that only the most basic interactions truly enhanced a mindfulness practice. Anything more complex became distracting, pulling focus away from the body’s internal state, which is where the magic of mindfulness really happens.

This prototype eventually led to Lumosity Mind