SoYi in practice
Open it. Follow the flow. Zero friction. The autopilot rewires itself. Easy peasy.
As soon as you calm down, you regret.
You wish you had stopped earlier, before you got too full. Or chosen something that actually nourished and sustained you better. It all seems so obvious — yet the next time the craving arrives, that clarity is gone. Before you realise, your mouth is already busy crunching. That's the infuriating part.
They say drink to drown your sorrows. Snacking works the same way — for far more than sorrow: tension, boredom, loneliness, discomfort — while the mouth is busy, the feeling goes quiet. Except once you start, you can't stop. And when you do, whatever was there surfaces again, exactly as you left it. And it's not just the hard moments — excitement, celebration, a good evening — binge eating and drinking sounds right fitting! There's always a reason. It never ends.
I spun in that loop for years: the calm me and the craving me felt like two different people, and the wrong one kept winning. I sighed at my willpower.
Until one day I understood it wasn't a willpower problem. The calm me wasn't mute either — she just always spoke too late, after the automatic response had already fired. What was missing wasn't the thought. It was someone who understands me, present at the exact moment, before the mouth got busy — to create that pause and hold me in it — so that I could catch myself, hear myself, step outside the habit just long enough to choose.
I named her Serene, and I built SoYi to make that wish come true.
I spent a long time building SoYi properly — shaping it until it truly fit me. What I didn't expect was that the process itself would absorb the method into me far more deeply than reading ever had. You can't build something without truly understanding it. Round after round, I found I'd internalised it — and understood my own patterns in ways I hadn't before. The result: the app kept getting better, and I kept opening it less. Not because I gave up — because the process now flashes up in my head on its own. These days I only open SoYi when I feel myself getting wobbly — to press down on that old habit when it starts stirring again. Some stretches I don't touch it for days. Not a wasted effort — isn't that exactly what success looks like? My automatic response has been reshaped. The calm me won the wrestle. And so will I the next time.
Pause. Feel. Choose.
It's a Tuesday evening. She's been on back-to-back calls since nine, and the last one just ended badly — not a disaster, but she feels knotted up. She just ate dinner, yet she wants to chew again.
This is the moment SoYi is built for. Not the eating itself — but the one second between wanting and actually carrying it out, the chance to pause, catch herself, and decide whether to answer the craving or not — instead of following habit straight on autopilot.
She opens the app. Not to be virtuous. Just to pause for long enough to see what's actually happening. Serene reflects it back: a draining afternoon, the kind where the body wants a quick exit. She taps the first trigger. Yes. That — and the craving already feels slightly less automatic.
SoYi shows her three things she prepared for herself in calmer moments: a four-minute breathing exercise, a short walk, a note she wrote last month — "make tea, sit down, the feeling passes in ten minutes." She recognises that last one. She wrote it after a day very much like this one.
She makes the tea. She doesn't eat. Or sometimes she does — but then it's a deliberate choice, not an autopilot. That distinction sounds small. Yet it matters a great deal.
The next time this happens — and it will — the pause comes a fraction more easily. The pattern hasn't vanished. It's just no longer invisible. And what you can see clearly, you can choose differently.
Designed for the moment you need it most
It's 3pm. The craving hits again. Your sensible side says — you're not even hungry, lay off the junk! But you're exhausted and fed up. The last thing you need is a fight with yourself.
But you have just enough in you to reach for your phone and open SoYi. You tap the pink button — and feel yourself relax a little already. You know all you have to do is hand yourself over to Serene and let her take you through the next step. The notes you wrote on a calmer day for exactly this moment — triggers you recognised, the responses that actually help you — she's kept them safe, and surfaces the right ones now. No need to think hard. Just pick from what's already there.
Following the prompts, it clicks: you're not actually hungry — there's a restless feeling that needs an outlet. A walk outside, a breath of fresh air — that's what always works for you. So that's what you do. If you still want munching when you're back, a fresh apple. Refreshing, grounding. What you were looking for.
Grinding through a deadline, you reach for a bag of crisps. Something to chew — and the brain turns over again. Body trapped at the desk, but at least the mouth is moving. Less unbearable.
You're scrolling your phone for a break when you notice SoYi on your screen. You open it. One of the trigger situations catches your eye: Sensory & Oral Stimulation. That's you, isn't it? You ask Serene. She says: your nervous system needs sensory input to stay focused — this isn't a willpower failure, it's your body self-regulating. The crisps are doing a job.
She surfaces your notes. Written on a calmer day: a handful of nuts, carrot sticks, gum. Same fix, lighter on the system. You swap for the carrots. Back to the grind.
The child is finally asleep. The guilt sets in: "She's so little — why do I keep holding her to adult standards? I made her cry again. This morning I was dreaming of a lovely evening together. So much for that." Then your partner appears from nowhere with a list of what you did wrong. The anger on top of the guilt on top of the exhaustion. Too much. You cut yourself a slice of cake.
You're eating and scrolling when you catch SoYi on your screen. You open it. One of the trigger situations stops you: Avoidance & Numbing. That's you right now, isn't it? You ask Serene. She says: there's too much pain right now and you need somewhere to put it. The cake numbs it for a moment, keeps it at bay. But when it's gone, the feeling is still there, unresolved.
Any feeling is temporary. Don't try to fix it or fight it — just sit with it, watch it rise and fall, and it will pass on its own. You breathe with her. Something settles.
She surfaces your notes. Written on a calmer day: a hot bath. A face mask. Yoga. A voice message to a friend. Walk the dog. You'd already given the voice message five stars, so you reach for it again. Two sentences in, the tears come. Your friend calls back. The feeling has somewhere to land. Later, you fall asleep at peace. The cake is still there. You had one bite.