After surgery, I started walking again at about 700 steps a day. That was my average in December.
For most people, 700 steps is nothing. For me, it was everything.
Here’s the thing: a tracker would have called that a failure. Below average. Needs improvement. No badges, no streaks, no encouragement.
That’s when it clicked for me how blunt our metrics can be. A single number can’t hold context. It can’t tell the difference between recovery and decline.
Wintering by Katherine May gave me a different way to look at seasons.
Most products assume perpetual spring. But people have winters too.
And in those seasons, behaviour changes. People check in less often. They explore less. Become more cautious.
That doesn’t always mean the product has failed. And it definitely doesn’t mean the person has, either. Sometimes life just becomes smaller for a while.
Maybe we don’t have to label every drop in engagement as a problem to solve.