# 020 — Say It Clear

## Problem Situation

People can't structure difficult feedback. They know what happened, they know it bothered them, but in the moment of writing, the thoughts come out as rambling, over-explained, or buried under qualifications. The workaround is either avoiding the conversation entirely, blowing up, or sending a 500-word message that buries the point somewhere in paragraph three. The SBI framework (Situation → Behavior → Impact → Request) exists and works, but it's invisible in the moment you need it most.

## What Was Built

A constrained sequential editor. Four prompts appear one at a time: What happened? → What did they do? → How did it affect things? → What do you want instead? Each step has a character limit (200) and a specific hint guiding what belongs here vs. the next step. You can't skip ahead. After all four, the composed message appears as a clean, structured paragraph ready to copy and send.

## Why This Form

The form is a constrained sequence — not a form with visible fields, not a template with blanks. You see one question at a time because the ORDER is the design. People write bad feedback because they start with the wrong thing (their feeling, their judgment, the demand). The sequence forces situation before interpretation, behavior before feeling, impact before demand. The constraint IS the value.

## What Is Actually Interesting

The transformation. The same rambling thoughts that would become a 500-word confused email become a 4-sentence clear message. The user types the same amount of content — but the structure changes everything. The "reveal" at the end (seeing your composed message) is the moment of understanding: "oh, I actually said something clear." The constraint didn't limit expression — it focused it.

## Iterations

No v1.1. The form is deliberately minimal — one prompt, one input, one output.

## Next Step

Add a "tone preview" — before composing, show the user how their message might land (assertive, diplomatic, aggressive). This would add a feedback loop that helps calibrate tone, not just structure.

## Art Direction

Light theme, editorial minimalism. White background, black text, no decoration. The emptiness IS the design — a focused, calm space for thinking about something uncomfortable. JetBrains Mono for prompts, Geist for input. Progress bar at top shows the sequence.

## Promotion Candidate Read

Maybe. The form is genuinely different — a text-based constrained editor, no geometry, no instruments, no grids. The SBI structure is well-established and the constraint mechanic is clean. But the artifact is thin — essentially four text inputs with a compose step. Needs operational depth (tone feedback, saved messages, share link) to graduate.
