What I Learned From Sleeping With My Phone

I didn’t set out to design games. I was just lying awake at 2 a.m., scrolling through DMs from strangers who said, “This hit me right in the chest.”

Their words weren’t loud. They were whispered—fragments of childhoods lived in transit: a Korean lullaby hummed through an old speaker; an African father’s laugh echoing down a dusty alley. No children lived here—but poems did.

I used to think ‘wild’ meant roaring lions and jackpot spins. But real victory? It was the quiet rhythm of choosing yourself when no one was watching. The game wasn’t in RTP or RNG—it was in the pause between breaths, the way you held your phone like a locket around your neck.

My mother taught me that calm isn’t weakness. My father taught me that fire doesn’t need applause. Together, they gave me something quieter: an animal sanctuary made of bookshelves and midnight walks under streetlamps.

You don’t find belonging by climbing leaderboards. You find it when you save a post—not to share it, but to return to it later—to reread its shadows as if they were written for you alone.

The most powerful reward wasn’t a badge or skin—it was the permission to be still.

What did you carry today?