Zenergy: Designing Taoist-Inspired Transformative Nature Imagery for Everyday Empowerment

Nature has long been valued for its restorative impact on emotion and well-being, motivating many HCI systems to incorporate nature as a calming design material. However, cultural traditions such as Taoism frame nature not as passive, but as an active, symbolic force for emotional transformation. We present Zenergy, a mobile application that uses a large language model to generate personalized guided meditations grounded in Taoist nature imagery. Based on users’ emotional and contextual input, Zenergy leads them through a symbolic journey using natural metaphors such as wind to release burdens, rivers to restore flow, and sunlight to renew strength. A mixed-method field study (N = 27) showed that Zenergy enhanced users’ self-efficacy, emotional clarity, and spiritual connection. We introduce transformative nature imagery as a design lens for everyday empowerment, and offer strategies for embedding culturally grounded symbolism into interactive well-being technologies.