It’s for a reason that product people often refer to a users’ way of getting through a product as “habit.” Because using a product, understanding the merits and pitfalls, and beginning to stick around with it could definitely feel like building a new habit. And, based on a number of attributes like depth of understanding, prior usage of similar products, and strong conviction in the problem a product solves, most users have an edge over the others who may just try a product out of curiosity or pleasure. 

There are moments you learn the meaning of something for the first time, but immediately after which you start to experience its occurrence. Learning what Horror Vacui stood for was one such incidents for me. The first time I came across this phrase, my mind thought of a filmy or a theatrical reference. But, it’s a Latin phrase very popular in visual art \[I heard this phrase from an artist/visual designer originally] that means—fear of empty spaces. It’s similar to the Greek reference ‘kenophobia’ which denotes the fear of void or barrenness. Artistically, I was more intrigued to know why there should be a fear in the first place and how it’s reflected.

Thinking the negative outcome has always been shunned, especially when dreaming of a start. Sure, startup founders and entrepreneurs go by trying for the best but hoping for the worst to happen in the path towards the best. Factoring in the uncertainties helps for a calculated start, but there’s yet another route for understanding problems and creating solutions that eventually work. It’s in the power of opposites. Not the story of opposite poles, but in thinking to combat the opposite of what you plan for. I’ve been trying some of this in my product journey—not everything is about instant success, but you gradually get good at it.

Building teams or products—the underlying need is always to solve for a challenge. Framing processes to simplify an action and trusting on techniques to arrive at a solution are usually the hacks for any team and the product they’re shipping. It all goes well only until we blur the lines that keep the actions, purpose, and solutions at their boundaries. Before we realize, we make a hodgepodge and end up yarning our complicated thread bundles.

There’s an innate trick with the human brain. It remembers procedurally anything you try to think about. What’s the remote button to switch to a channel? Your brain tries to remember the last time you performed that action and only then recollects the answer to the ‘what’ part. There’s a downside to this kind of thinking. It’s great to find a logic and revel in it, only until the human mind tries to apply the same logic to anything that it thinks is remotely related. Sometimes, it also brings in a false connection just so that it can apply the logic across to any situation. This habit doesn’t take a long time to grow. 

In the dense pages of the product rule book, one is surely to find the (over)usage of a term called empathy. Don’t mistake—this piece of writing isn’t to talk negatively about empathy or prove anything against it. If anything, this is a short take on how not to do things that are completely opposite to what empathy stands for.  

“We spent so much time building this, but it’s surprising the feature never got used.”

The last time I picked my paint brushes, I was very particular about draining the moist tip every time I erased the paint off by dipping the brush into water. I stuck to this thought because I wanted to keep my acrylic paint viscous, the same way it is, and not make it thinner by adding too much water. If you’re wondering whether a wet brush would end up affecting the quality of the paint wash for the canvas—yes it does. It makes the canvas base look like a thinning matte layer instead of a fine thick layer.