Sometimes it’s hard to keep track of everything you need to do. Sometimes you just lack the motivation to do anything. And sometimes you just want to play video games all day. Luckily, as with most things, there’s an app that can help you with that. Habitica is an app/website that “gamifies” your life by turning your tasks into goals similar to that of a RPG (roleplaying game). By completing these tasks, you gain experience and custom rewards.

The Basics

I’ve been using Habitica for a little over a year now, and it’s helped my productivity quite a bit. The first step is to determine which of your tasks should be habits, which should be dailies, and which should be to-dos.

A habit is something that you might do only on occasion, such as helping someone or giving a compliment.It could be something you do multiple times a day, such as drinking water or taking the stairs instead of the elevator.

On the other hand it could be something negative where your character will lose health and experience if you click it. Some of my negative habits are procrastinating, taking money out of my savings account, not eating vegetables, not practicing, and being dehydrated.

Habits can also be used to create a bonus for yourself. Some of my bonus habits can only be clicked if I do something like write an additional article or have an awesome day.

Dailies tend to be what people tend to focus on the most. These are tasks that you do everyday, or would like to get in the habit of doing everyday. A few things I’ve been working on are drinking enough water, practicing effectively, and fitting in enough time to crochet. You can also set up your dailies to only be active on certain days. I do this with my daily for attending church or chapel, which is only active on the days that services are held.

To-Dos are probably the most familiar concept. These are exactly what you think they’d be: things that you need to get done such as homework assignments, cleaning, packing, or just general projects.

Getting Social

One of the main reasons I keep going back to Habitica is the social aspect of it. One of the first things I did on Habitica was join a party called the Concrastinators. Parties are groups of users that come together to encourage each other and embark on quests against fearsome beasts such as the Fiery Gryphon, Hedgebeast, and the Laundromancer. Damage against these bosses can only be accomplished by doing your tasks, and any dailies that you leave unchecked will cause damage to not only you, but your party as well. Luckily, my party doesn’t get too mad when this happens.

Something the Concrastinators are starting to jump into is creating challenges for our members, as well as the rest of the community to join in on. A challenge is a set task list that is shared by all who chose to accept it. At the end of the challenge time, the owner of the challenge will usually decide upon a winner who will win some sort of a prize.

Has It Helped?

I’d like to say yes. I like having everything I need to do right in front of me, and it is rather satisfying to hit that button saying that I accomplished something. Hitting that button makes it feel a bit more official. It’s also encouraging to know that I have people all over the world who are cheering me on and are proud of my accomplishments. And of course, the challenges are fun too!

So if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to go check off one of my dailies.