the "No Going Back(Space)" mac app
Deactivate your backspace key. It's frustrating. But it works.
Hi friends,
Today, as promised, I’m launching a small native Mac app for writers.
No Going Back(Space) is an app that works by temporarily deactivating your backspace key so you can finish your first draft without obsessively editing.
In typical Rahul fashion, I found the inspiration for this app through random, disconnected ideas I gradually collected over the months and years. I’ll outline the major ones below.
Stephen King on writing fast
In Stephen King’s book On Writing, he says that the first draft of a book shouldn’t take more than 3 months, or the length of a season. He describes how writers can start to grow detached from their work when they toil away at it for too long.
Worst of all, the excitement of spinning something new begins to fade. The work starts to feel like work, and for most writers that is the smooch of death.
—Stephen King, On Writing
This is a hurdle I’ve had with writing first drafts, including the first drafts of this very newsletter. I take too damn long. I obsessively edit my sentences before I move on to the next one. I do this because I like editing more than writing.
Editing requires pattern matching and error detection. My brain is better equipped for noticing mistakes and I get a dopamine hit when I correct them. But, as a consequence, it takes me forever to complete a first draft.
This app acts as built-in discipline. Once your first draft is done, you can edit. Once you’ve eaten your vegetables, you can have dessert.
It’s frustrating, but the nice typewriter sound effect (you’ll hear it when you try it app) reminds me to keep moving forward and edit later.
Typewriters didn’t have backspace keys
Artist Van Neistat1, hates computers. He’s a gen-Xer. He sent his first email when he was 23. He grew up in the analog world and would like to stay in the analog world as much as humanely possible.
Below is a clip from his interview on the Rich Roll podcast, where he talks about writing exclusively on a typewriter. This interview was the triggering event that got me to start concepting the app. I think my unconscious was always working away at these inspirations, but this interview gave me the a-ha moment I needed to start building.
Have a listen:
No Going Back(Space) app was built to encourage the stream of consciousness2 style of writing. It’s going to be an adjustment, especially if you’re a compulsive editor like me, but once you build the habit writing will become therapeutic.
David Perell Tweet Thread
Reading this thread back in the summer3 was likely the first time I saw the backspace key as some sort of disadvantage. David makes several convincing arguments on how technology isn’t neutral. The tools we use to express our ideas actually influence how we think.
I created No Going Back(Space) to emulate one of the key advantages of the typewriter, namely to encourage a state of flow and speed. Don’t worry about perfection. Get messy. Get your ideas on the page.
Developer’s Commentary
This is my first time writing a native Mac app, and I think it’s crazy that I actually pulled it off. Mac apps are notoriously difficult to write. I never thought I would go through the pain of writing one. I heavily relied on ChatGPT to navigate me through the process. It wasn’t perfect (there was a memory leak I needed to debug myself) but it got me from never-have-written a Mac app to publishing one.
If you have an idea for an app and you don’t see it out there on the web, try writing it yourself with the help of AI. It’s amazing what you can pull off with modern tooling.
It feels good to bring an idea to life. If you’re interested and want to give it a try, buy No Going Back(Space) on Gumroad for $1 and let me know what you think!
Good Beats
Evening drive. Sun just below the horizon. Flow state music.
A 50¢ word (aka words that say a lot with less)
Flow (noun):
The mental state in which a person performing some activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity.
For Your Thoughts
The worst enemy to creativity is self-doubt.
—Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
Yours,
-Rahul
P.S. a reminder you can reply directly to oldmanrahul@substack.com, or you can tweet me @oldmanrahul about this edition. Thanks for reading and supporting my writing :)
Artist Van Neistat
Love a good namesake reference