My Meditation - Interview with the developer of a fantastic app

Did you have any prior development or coding experience?

I am not a programmer by training. However, having started up 5 software based businesses in the past 18 years, I am quite familiar with the development cycle and methodologies. I have engaged a team of developers from Intellection Ltd. in Pune, India to develop the My Meditation app.

What was the most challenging aspect of developing mobile app?

The most challenging aspect was the app's unique virtual group meditation feature as there were complexities around using many native app features and coordinating across multiple handsets and platforms.

_{Saurabh Mishra}

Saurabh Mishra (BEng, BCom) is a serial entrepreneur based in Melbourne, Australia. He has co-founded five e-health business ventures since 2000, of which three (eClinic, SamplesPlus and PalCare) were bought by some of the largest healthcare businesses in Australia between 2009-2010, and the fourth (Healthnotes) was bought in 2016 by MedAdvisor, a company listed on the Australian stock exchange. The fifth (Imageryworks) intends to make the learning and practice of meditation easier, with a vision of helping bring about a world in which everyone meditates every day. Its My Meditation and Meditation Gateway apps are unique teaching and interactive practice tools. Saurabh is himself a dedicated practitioner of Kriya yoga, an ancient meditation technique. Saurabh also volunteers a significant amount of time for a number of not-for-profit organisations including Eastern Palliative Care, TiE Melbourne, Melbourne Hindustani Classical Music Society, and Friends of the Children’s Hospital.

Name a few of your favorite apps and reason you love them.

I frequently travel out of Melbourne, and so the Google Maps, Google Translate and Uber apps are handy indeed. I also find the Microsoft Teams app to be very useful to communicate with colleagues and keep up to date on collaborative projects. One other app I want to mention is a niche one called iTabla Pro for people who learn and perform Indian classical music. It has single-handedly replaced a number of background instruments, and made it possible for students like me to be able to practice anywhere, anytime.

How long have you been working on this app?

Since 2015.

What need of the user did you have in mind when developing this app?

Only a few of those who learn to meditate are able to establish a regular enough practice to truly benefit from it.

In what way do you think your app is better than similar apps on the market? Please describe in detail what innovation you think you bring and what you are proud of in your app.

My Meditation is a comprehensive program for learning highly useful life-skills of relaxation, mindfulness, meditation, contemplation and imagery. It is based on authentic teachings transmitted over an unbroken lineage of thousands of years, and its founders have decades of experience of teaching and practicing these techniques. Most importantly, it is unique in its emphasis on sustaining practice - with subscribers receiving daily messages of support, explanation and inspirations, able to join weekly virtual group practice sessions, and encouraged to keep track of their practice. And what’s more, it works. People who use this app do meditate much more frequently than before, and report significantly improved satisfaction with their practice.

What are your future plans and expected features of the coming new versions of this app?

We hope to make the virtual group practice sessions more interactive, with participants able to interact with the teacher and with each other before or after the sessions via the app. We would also like to build bio-feedback features for users to see for themselves, the psycho-physiological changes in their mind and body from their practice.

Assuming new users of your app are reading this page. What do you want to ask them to do (contact you about X, Share the app, etc.)?

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