"I’ve spent the last few years feeling 'digitally overstimulated.' I noticed a recurring habit: the moment I finish a task or hit a wall, my thumb instinctively swipes to a social feed or a news site. My brain has lost the ability to just sit with a gap in time.

I tried several meditation and 'focus' apps, but they all felt like more 'work.' They wanted me to track streaks, join communities, or 'level up.' It felt ironic to use a high-engagement app to solve an engagement problem.

So I built TapPause. It’s a dead-simple utility designed with a few strict constraints:

Zero Data/Tracking: I don't want to know how many times I've paused. There is no 'performance' to optimize here.

Minimal Friction: No accounts, no onboarding, no 'daily goals.' You open it, you tap, you sit.

The 5-30 Minute Window: I found that 5 minutes is the minimum to actually 'reset' the nervous system, and 30 minutes is the maximum before it feels like a scheduled event. This is for the 'in-between' moments.

The goal isn't to 'meditate' in the traditional sense. It's to create a 'circuit breaker' for the digital reflex.

I’m curious to hear from the HN community: How do you handle the 'transition anxiety' between deep work tasks? Do you find that dedicated tools help create a mental ritual, or do they just add to the noise?

I'd love any feedback on the UI or the philosophy behind it."