First off, I appreciate you reading this. I know you have plenty of other important things to be doing with your time. So to care even enough to read an update about my life/work is something I don’t take lightly.
This update is catching me during a good (manic?) week. The health is (knock on wood) being dialed in toward stable. The family time has been stellar (he’s growing up so fast). Work has been good (and getting better). And something clicked with my projects this week:
I was originally planning on (again) talking about the importance of focus and my realization that I wasn’t feeling like I was making a ton of progress because my efforts were too scattered:
And I still feel and appreciate this in many ways. But something happened this week that I think bucks this concept. I’m still figuring out the mental model to visualize it as well as the above, but essentially, a couple of the multiple projects I’ve been working on have started to show signs that they might actually be related (ie: the same project). Same (similar?) tools for different (yet similar?) target customers.
Still working through it, but for now, I’ve been re-energized because of this realization. Once I’ve fulfilled my commitments on these current projects, I should be able to free up some more time to really dig into and explore what could evolve from these seemingly disjointed, yet ultimately similar, projects.
Even if nothing comes of it, the energy I’ve gotten this week will have made it worth it.
And with that said, my soundtrack for most of the week:
What I’ve shipped since last month:
There’s been a bunch of background cleanup and improvements going on. Since launching a couple of mini tools last month, there’s been a lot of bug fixes and improvements to expand and adjust based on newly discovered needs. Also built some data importers for those tools and getting ready for the next evolutions and the new tools that’ll hook into the existing pieces.
What went poorly:
Writing: Yeah, still not prioritizing this. Building and finishing these projects is more important right now.
Health: Was out of commission for a bit, but we’re back on the right track. Fingers crossed we can keep the entire house healthy for the next couple of months.
What went well:
Work: Getting closer and closer to a big deadline for my fractional CTO client. I’ve been improving systems and gameplans and the team is starting to gel more. Demanding more from me, but it’s more enjoyable, so not mad about it.
Family: Selfishly, as hard as it can be sometimes, being a father is such a gift. I’m blessed to be able to spend as much time with the boy as I do. Makes it all worth it. Happy with how we are building our lives these days.
Focus: Doing really well on the “no new projects” front. I’m successfully keeping my focus from getting worse. Staying away from the temptations of building with AI. The hard part is that I’ve realized that I haven’t been the most focused with all the projects I currently have going on. But as I mentioned up top, I’m seeing how that might actually be beneficial. But we shall see.
Coding: I absolutely love how much I’ve been coding lately. It just feels rejuvenating and natural. It’s giving me energy. It reminds me why I learned in the first place: so I can solve problems and make my ideas a reality.
Asks:
What am I missing with these updates? What would you like to hear more about?
Wow this is so inspiring---like maybe all the scattered work was part of the process. That’s what I’m telling myself anyway!