A novel in the mornings, before the day job
Jonah writes a novel before he leaves for his day job. He is on the second draft, and he aims for 500 words a day. This is one of his weeks, and the six moments in it where HourLife does its work.
- A second draft
- 500 words a day
- An hour before work
Jonah's week, Monday first. Each lit hour is a moment below.
Jonah is an example, not a customer. The week is made up; everything HourLife does in it, the app does today.
The week without a system
A novel is not written in the hours anyone sees. It is written at six in the morning, in fifty minutes, before the commute. It is not lost in one bad week. It is lost one skipped morning at a time, until the draft has gone cold.
The draft lives in his writing software, and that is the right place for it. What had no home was everything around it: whether he wrote today, the line that turned up on the bus, what the last scene was for, and how many hours the book really got.
A week with HourLife
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Hour 6 of 168 Monday 06:00
Three steps before the house wakes
“Before the page” is a routine in Routines, set for 6:00 on weekdays, with three steps: a Todo to put the kettle on, a Todo to reread yesterday's last paragraph, and a ten-minute Timer for notes on today's scene.
He taps “Begin” and the run shows one step at a time. The timer step starts on its own, and with “Auto-advance timed steps” on, the run moves on when it ends. The streak counts only the days he scheduled, so the weekend is not a miss.
Morning Startup with “Begin 3 steps”, its Todo and Timer steps, and a History panel with streaks, total runs and last run. -
24 hours later Tuesday 06:00
500 words, or the smaller version
The 500 words are a habit in Habits: a counter with a target of 500, repeating on weekdays. When the session ends he types the day's count into “Enter amount…” on the habit's page. On the Habits page, its ring sits over twelve weeks of days, darker the closer each came to 500.
Tuesday the scene will not come, and at ten to seven he has 140 words. He gave the habit a “Minimum version” of 100 words, for the days he does not feel like it. He long-presses the ring and logs the minimum. The streak holds, and the day shows lighter.
Habits in the guide Free
Editing Drink water: quick-add buttons +1 and +2, and a minimum version of 1 glass “for days you don't feel like it”. -
40 hours later Wednesday 22:00
A line from the bus, out of his head
On the bus home a line for chapter nine turned up, along with two things for work tomorrow. At ten he taps “Begin ritual” on “Close the day?”, answers “What went well today?” and gives his evening energy.
Each line he types under “Clear your mind” becomes a Brain item for tomorrow, so the chapter nine line is waiting in the morning. Tomorrow's priorities are kept for the morning too, and the first is the scene that line belongs to.
Today in the guide Free
The end of Close day, with “What went well today?”, the evening energy score, “Clear your mind” and the “Close day” button. -
23 hours later Thursday 21:00
A page about the writing
Thursday's page in Journal is about the morning's writing. He made his own template with “Create new template”: what the scene was for, what he cut, and where tomorrow starts. At nine he taps +, picks it and taps “Start writing →”.
The note he saved at lunch, typed into “What's on your mind?” on today's card, is on the same page with its time, and the page closes the day, marked “PAGE”. The month at the top gives each day he wrote a dot that grows with the words.
Journal in the guide Free
“Choose Template”: Free write, Evening review, Morning reflection, Weekly check-in and Decision log, each with its prompts. -
38 hours later Saturday 11:00
The hours the book actually got
Saturday has no day job, so the book gets the morning. He added a Writing tile to Hours with “Activities” in the … menu, tapped it when he sat down at eight, and stops it at eleven.
Tuesday he forgot the tile, so he adds that morning with “Log past activity”: the activity, the date and the time range. The Log tab shows one day at a time, with its total, its sessions and “Where time went”, and Insights splits his tracked time across activities over the last 30 days.
Hours in the guide Free
The Log tab for Mon, Oct 12: half an hour in two sessions from 13:53 to 14:23, “Where time went”, and the afternoon timeline. -
33 hours later Sunday 20:00
Lines worth keeping
On Sunday evening he goes back through the week's reading. Two sentences from the novel by his bed go into Wisdom as a Book entry, with the author and title under “SOURCE”, and under “WHY DOES THIS RESONATE?” what they do in one line that his chapter three takes a page to do.
One of his own goes in as an Original: stop mid-sentence, so tomorrow starts easy. His own words are set upright, with an “OWN” badge. With “Today” left on, Today's “WISDOM” card works through his entries in the order he saved them, one a week unless he changes it.
Wisdom in the guide Premium
The Wisdom list with “Presence is a gift people can feel.” on the rotating card, the type filters, and entries badged Book and Person.
The screens show HourLife's own sample data, not Jonah's.
Where Jonah would start
Four modules, set up in the first week. The rest can wait until the week asks for them.
Related
Common questions
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Can I write my novel in HourLife?
No. HourLife is a personal planner, not a manuscript editor or a writing app. It holds the habit, the routine and the hours around the book, and a page a day in Journal, but the draft itself stays in the writing software you already use.
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Which of these modules are free?
Routines, Habits, Today, Journal and Hours are free. Wisdom is part of HourLife Premium.
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Does missing a morning break my writing streak?
By default, yes. Set “Grace misses per month” in the habit's Advanced Settings so an occasional slip keeps the streak, or log its minimum version on a hard day, which keeps it too. Until today is done, the streak counts back from yesterday.
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Does my morning routine's streak break at the weekend?
No. A routine's streak counts only its scheduled weekdays, so a routine set for Monday to Friday keeps its streak through Saturday and Sunday.
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Does it work on my Mac too?
Yes. HourLife runs on iPhone and Mac, and your data syncs between them through iCloud. The app is in English.
Your week, not Jonah's
Every moment above is one module. Most people start with Today and one other, and add the next when the week asks for it.
HourLife runs on iPhone and Mac, and syncs between them through iCloud.
