On the psychology of the progress bar

The progress bar can be your best friend or your worst enemy. It can tell you you're doing a good job or it can tell you you have a long way to go. But that's entirely under your control. When starting NoFap I decided to use an exponential model for setting my current and future goals, as I anticipated maintaining no-PMO status would eventually get easier and easier. However, my first goal was 60 days. Before that, the longest known time I went without PMO was approximately 30 days, so I was being consistent with my model. However, I started at 0. I ended up making it to 40 on the first go, quickly spiraling down into despair around 38. I prefer powers of two, so after my second relapse I changed my goal to 64. That's still a pretty big number.

With the exponential model, I realized that after the first goal in an iteration has been reached, the progress bar will NEVER BE BELOW 50%. Therefore it will always be encouraging me (and hopefully you guys!) saying "Look, you already made it at least half way!"

I'd like to get a handful of others to try this, starting with 2, 4, or 8 days, to see if it is as effective as I hope. Even if it seems to work with me, I'm just one data point.