In this takeaways post, I'm tempted to keep it practical: what were the technical learnings from building Hearth for the past few years? Coding models have indeed replaced engineering hires, continuing to push context to the foundation model (few shot selectors, tool calling) is powerful, our problem space had a deep interconnectedness between UX and intelligence that uniquely drove up complexity. And then of course there are critical moments - good and bad - to learn from; things I'd do differently on distribution, hiring, and fundraising.

But what feels more honest is to speak to the internal shifts that I've pulled from sitting with the experience, from trying to observe raw feelings of discomfort without being swallowed by them. My life is a dynamic system in motion, and these emerging themes feel like they're changing me and the way I move through the world.

We have a finite amount of time on this earth. Our capacity to build something meaningful comes from how we live. We are not just creating the art; we are the art. Building is not just asking, “Is this what I want to make?” It's also asking, “Who am I while I'm making it?”

The founder's journey is balancing the uncertainty and incompleteness of not yet having become, while finding some semblance of safety and contentment in knowing you are headed to a state of completion. Creating, especially through the lens of starting a company, is mental. It's chess. It's tennis. It's a marathon. Your strategy and team and tools - they all matter. But we rarely examine the headspace that's required to create well and create sustainably.

Everything we lose becomes something to be profoundly greatly for - the foundation for building something new. The true nature of life is constant movement and constant evolution. And that's how the wind down over these past few months has felt - not static or still, but a kinetic activation of metabolizing the old into something else. If I feel like Sisyphus, then I choose to believe he was happy pushing that boulder up that hill. And I think that's because there is a north star in acting on purpose, in having conviction in what I want to create. Purpose is at the intersection of what I'm interested in, what I'm good at, and what the world needs - and the alignment of running a creative process with this is the point.

It's so easy to live life blaming other people for tension in the mind. But these are my reactions to rewire. There's been a lot of hidden grief in this transition. It didn't appear right away, I had all of these distractions. A past version of me knew enough to remove all the distractions: I went to a new place alone and sat with myself. It was heavy. Turbulent emotions of sadness and self inadequacy were surfacing and they felt like old emotions.

I think really changing and moving forward needs a subconscious purification. The point of reaction is at the subconscious level. When we react to any situation, we embed that way of being into our subconscious. Coming into contact with one's ability to feel lets you deal with the subconscious mind in a direct way. Healing is most effective when I'm focused on feeling instead of thinking.

I think it's really tempting to call yourself a teacher. I remember I gave a talk and one of my answers was "I don't know"; a friend who meant well gave feedback that I should just find an answer, it's better than saying I don't know.

I don't think this momentum to define ourselves as knowing experts serves me. I think I'm best served - and create work I feel really good about - when I view myself as a student. And there is this cult of personality around a founder, which I think has valuable incentives for galvanizing a team and accumulating resources. But moving forward, I learned that what is key for me, is that I crave freedom and this comes from internally burning up my own ego and prioritizing these steep learning curves of growth and change.