How Kept works
Who do you aim to be in two years?
Not what you want. What you aim to be. Name it, break it into dated actions, and hand it to a few people who will ask you how it’s going.
Better is easier with people.
Not because you lack the will. You’ve wanted this for years. It’s that nobody gets a clean week, and when you sleep badly and work runs long and you’re travelling, the thing you promised yourself quietly doesn’t happen, and then doesn’t happen again. It goes without a sound, mostly because nobody was watching. People see the gym. Nobody sees the reading, or the praying, or the phone in the drawer at six.
Kept puts somebody there. You write down who you’re aiming to be, break it into moves with real dates on them, and hand it to a few people who’ll actually ask you how it’s going. That’s your circle: not an audience, just people chasing something of their own who follow up on each other in the weeks nobody’s clapping. It’s more work than tapping a button, which is the whole reason it holds.
The whole person, not one part of them.
Most apps take one slice. Kept holds all three at once, because you are not three separate projects.
It isn’t here to replace the tools you already use. Keep tracking your run where you track it. Keep your workout in the app that counts the sets. Kept is the layer above them: what you’re working on, said out loud, where your people can see it.
Aims
Build your plan of who you aim to be.
One year out, two years out. Habits are what you do daily. An aim is what they add up to.
How to use it
- Name the aim the way you’d say it out loud. Five is the ceiling. Pick the ones you mean.
- Break it into actions and give each one a date. An aim without dated actions is a wish.
- Write down what will get in the way, and what you’ll do when it does.
- Link a habit to an aim, so the daily work counts toward the thing you’re actually after.
Habits
Define your habits.
This is the list Today asks you about. Change it here. Keep it short.
How to use it
- One per part is enough. Three habits you keep beat twelve you negotiate with.
- Set which days it’s due. A habit due three days a week is not a lesser habit.
- Master it once it’s automatic. Archive it when it’s served its purpose. Both keep the list honest.
Today
Track your progress for the day.
Getting better rarely fails for lack of wanting it. It fails on the ordinary Tuesday when nobody would know either way.
How to use it
- Tick each habit as you do it. Don’t save them up for the evening.
- Watch the three rings fill: body, mind, soul. Full is today done, not a streak to protect.
- Travelling or ill? Mark yourself away. Your circle sees “Away today” instead of silence.
Circle
Your community feed. You form each other.
You go to the gym when a friend is waiting for you. Circle brings that to the reading, the praying, the things nobody sees you do.
This is the section people skip, and it's the one that does the work. An aim nobody knows about is a private hope.
How to use it
- Start with one person. Two is better. Twelve is an audience, not a circle.
- Pick people who will actually ask. Being seen by someone who never mentions it is the same as not being seen.
- Say something when someone’s rings go quiet. That’s the job you took on.
- The Race keeps count of the days each of you kept every habit this month, and hands out gold, silver and bronze when the month ends. Leave it any time.
History
See your progress over time.
Every day you have kept, laid out as a calendar. One bad Tuesday looks like failure on Today and like nothing at all from here.
How to use it
- Tap any day to see exactly what you kept and what you missed.
- Read the shape of the month, not the gap in one week.
Progress
See your progress this month.
Where the three parts of you actually stand right now.
How to use it
- The hero ring for the month, then one row per category with its count and percentage.
- A part sitting low is a signal to change something in Habits, not to try harder.
Insights
See your trends.
The long view. Twelve months of it.
How to use it
- The trend line per category, and the year drawn as a heatmap.
- Your mastered habits, and how far each aim has come.
- Come here monthly, not daily. Nothing here changes fast enough to be worth checking twice.
Start with one aim and one person.
Not seven sections. One aim you’d be uncomfortable to still be talking about in two years, and one person who’ll ask you about it.
You can change all of it later. You can’t skip the part where you write it down.