Dandelion: Blow, Then Breathe

When you can't stop scrolling, hold your phone near your mouth and blow. A few seconds later, a card reflects the breath you just took. Dandelion is a quick interruption for anxious moments. No guided sessions, no lessons, no audio to get through. YOUR BREATH SETS THE CARD Every completed breath brings back one card, chosen by the breath: long and steady, short and forceful, light, broken-up, or unhurried. The microphone reads its loudness and steadiness on your device, and only a real breath counts. Nothing is recorded, stored, or uploaded. No network requests, no account. CARDS THAT MARK THE MOMENT 205 cards: • 40 oracle cards • 100 Guanyin temple signs: the traditional Chinese verse with a gentle plain-language reading, no predictions, no good or bad fortune. • 45 angel cards • 20 landscape cards from the paper plane route On the back, choose Eased, Same, or Still tight, then leave one sentence for tomorrow's self. With the rectangular Dandelion widget on your Lock Screen, that sentence is there. FIVE WAYS TO BLOW • Dandelion: One long, deep breath clears the whole seed head. • Bubbles: Blow lightly and evenly to make them big; too hard and they burst. Tap the ones that float away. • Pond: Your breath spreads ripples and pushes a leaf across the water. • Paper plane: One breath decides its distance, and the distances add up along a route of 19 places, from a river past rice terraces, Mount Fuji and the pyramids to a lighthouse, where the route begins again. Wherever it lands, turn over that landscape card. Fly through the seed hanging ahead of it and it brings a second seed home. • Bamboo flute: No need to know how to play, no holes to cover. Blow, and the flute plays the next line; stop, and it waits. A couple of seconds later a zither answers with four notes, and a card comes, as always. The next pause carries on from there. Ten lines make a tune, then the flute moves to the other place: a watercolour peach-blossom valley, or a bamboo raft on the river. THE COLLECTION ONLY GROWS Each pause adds a stalk to the meadow. Every card you receive lights up in the book. No streak, no chain to break. THE GARDEN Every pause brings back a seed, whatever you blew and whether or not you've paid. What grows depends on where you are on the paper plane's route, which every pause moves along a little: the same stretch always gives the same flower. 27 kinds — dandelion, lavender, forget-me-not and more — each in its own pot on a long bench, in the order you first found them. Bring one home again and its pot fills out; no progress bar, no count of what's missing. Tap a pot for the name, where you found it, how many times it came home and what you wrote in those pauses, newest first. With no note, just the name and date. Each winter, from December 22 to January 20, every pause brings home an extra plum seed, for a pot of its own. READY WHEN YOU NEED IT A small dandelion appears in the Dynamic Island and on the Lock Screen with the line from your last card. Tap it and blow. A Shortcuts personal automation can make a chosen app, such as Instagram or TikTok, prompt a breath before it opens. After you blow, tap Go back and it leaves you alone for 10 minutes. Dandelion does not block apps on its own. FREE FOREVER The dandelion, Bubbles and Pond, 25 oracle cards, the breath before another app opens, the Dynamic Island, the collection and the garden are free forever. Not a trial. One purchase, not a subscription, adds Paper plane, Bamboo flute and the remaining 180 cards; the rituals then take turns, or pin one in Settings. DETAILS • Pen-and-ink style landscapes, vector card art • Small sounds for cards, book and bubbles; the wind can be switched off • A night palette in dark mode • English, Chinese (Simplified and Traditional), Japanese, Korean and German • iOS 18.2 or later. Dynamic Island requires iPhone 14 Pro or newer.