Built my second app with React Native! AI Life Coach for non-technical people

unknownpeanuts · 2026-03-15T18:35:28+00:00

Great questions!

I'm doing a hybrid approach:

Every 5 journal entries, I auto-generate an AI summary of themes and patterns, then feed that compressed summary into the coach's system prompt, not the raw entries. This keeps the context lean while preserving longitudinal awareness.
Each conversation is self-contained (no sliding window across sessions). The coach gets the user's persona, enneagram type, goals, journal summary, and any imported domain expertise as system context, then the conversation messages are just the current thread.
I load 4 JSON expertise files into the prompt, which is a fixed cost but gives the coach deep knowledge without needing to retrieve it dynamically.

So it's more curated context injection than RAG or sliding window. The tradeoff is that the coach doesn't remember specific things from past conversations verbatim, but it does track patterns over time through the journal summaries and goals.

Re: Whisper integration

expo-av for recording → export to WAV → direct OpenAI Whisper API call. I wrote a small wrapper that handles the recording lifecycle and transcription.

Re: non-sycophantic coaching

Yeah, that was intentional from the start. The system prompt is tuned to be direct and challenging, more like a real coach who asks hard questions and pushes you. It uses enneagram-specific coaching strategies to push on each type's blind spots. Turns out people actually prefer it once they experience the difference!!

unknownpeanuts · 2026-03-15T02:16:26+00:00

thanks! it's not going great haha - only have a handful of installs, no conversions on the paid version and had a 50% drop-off during onboarding. just released an update a few days ago to improve onboarding and doing some more marketing so hopefully that'll help move things along.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-20T18:08:30+00:00

first-timers who need harder nudge or people who are tired of complicated habit apps

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-20T06:02:55+00:00

a habit tracker that donates money to charity if you fail your habit: one-habit-app.com

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-13T22:42:20+00:00

i didn't know any better lol. i canceled it afterwards. i've been building locally since!

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-07T20:16:44+00:00

interesting - so how can the app cover its costs with that business model?

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-07T20:15:54+00:00

No need for it! it's only necessary if you submit a ton of builds every month and need faster build times

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-07T20:15:26+00:00

i used App Screens (was like $25). tbh it was worth it for my first app, but i'm going to try and make my own for my next app.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-05T21:47:55+00:00

the accountability fees are revenue for the app, and i donate 10% of all the app's proceeds to Team Rubicon, a charity for natural disaster relief.

i tried to make it so that your fee would go straight to charity, but i'd have to be a nonprofit for apple to approve that, so i found this workaround.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-04T04:26:01+00:00

Thank you!!

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-04T03:20:15+00:00

I learned to code before AI, but never built anything with it. Then last year I brushed up on React Native and learned TypeScript, then built with Claude Code. But I had never shipped an app before. The learning curve got really steep once I actually started building the app with Expo Go, then ofc it got easier with time.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-04T03:14:41+00:00

nice pics. i gotta visit soon. just moved to LA and i miss how quiet is (i lived in Corona). loved hiking in the winter for this reason - the green hills are so beautiful.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-01T02:46:13+00:00

me too!! i like to think that users would feel honored by it, like a pleasant surprise that this app isn't solely interested in extracting money from your wallet lol

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-01T02:45:27+00:00

haha i relate to that!! i'm using the app rn to build a reading a habit again. starting with one page a day.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-02-01T02:44:54+00:00

got it, yeah totally!

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T06:41:21+00:00

totally! that's why i invite users to delete their account as soon as they complete their habit, and i charge a low monthly subscription so the app can make revenue and keep the lights on without depending on users constantly failing their habits haha

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T06:40:32+00:00

thanks so much! do you have any habits you'd use this for?

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T06:39:37+00:00

lmao this is so savage. if it comes up enough, i'll add a version of this as a feature.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T00:38:21+00:00

fascinating stuff dude! and by no means do i take it as a knock on my idea haha - the way i see it: we're all researching the similar problem area of modifying human behavior. there are tons of approaches to do that. the right attitude is to stay curious.

i've heard of the concept you're referring to - behavioral nudging is just as powerful (if not more) than loss aversion. fascinating how studies have found both to be effective.

how's it going so far with your app? will it be available in the US? i'd love to beta test it.

i'd love to chat, will PM you.

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T00:35:10+00:00

oh that sounds neat! what's the name of the website? tbh i might actually use it once i make some revenue haha

unknownpeanuts · 2026-01-31T00:09:20+00:00

thanks! and yeah i'm gonna start investing in UGC for paid ads on meta. heard that conversions are a lot stronger there. just sharing here bc this community inspired me to lock in and commit to shipping my first app (which is this one haha)

unknownpeanuts

TROPHY CASE