Journal Aug 17, 2026

A bit of journaling before I sleep. It's 11:30pm August 16th as I begin writing this.

I woke up late today, later than I thought I could even sleep, and the day passed me by because I filled it up with 8 hours of working on my company. Not a terrible day, but not waking up early enough always disappoints me.

I've been tracking my diet with the calorie tracking app I made, and I hit my protein goals, but I haven't been running, only doing 1 of 4 sessions this past week. I've stuck to the calisthenics part of my workout plan. Week 2 starts Monday (today) and I'm sad I have to go back to work Tuesday after a week of being off work. I was camping with my family for a few days. I find that at night, I have a little bit of anxiety if i go to bed too late, or if I'm not tired enough. Not sure why. It seems to stem from nothing but I know it has something to do with the fact I'm constantly moving during the day and staying still during the night feels unnatural.

I find that two things genuinely lower my quality of life:

1. Working my 9-5
2. Not sticking to my workout

People often attribute work or school to something in their lives they would have to do or they'd go insane, but I've always viewed them as a ball and chain holding me back. Draining my time and energy that I need for my true passions in life, which has (broadly) always been learning new skills, exploring hobbies, and developing myself. In this stage of my life now this broad spectrum encompasses working on my new company, working out, and learning to be present with myself: to be alone and think about how I feel, not relying on anyone else. It has been hard trying to do this. Like I said, I'm always moving, always thinking, and I often distract myself. But I don't think I'm dissimilar from most people in this regard. But I think alone time is necessary.

I find myself always coming back to what's familiar to me, which usually involves spending way too much time on online chats with friends or doing something random on my computer that takes hours to pass the time. Or sunbathing or reading. Usually it's something adjacent to something productive, but it is just procrastination and intrigue disguised as conscientiousness. In an effort to learn more about myself, particularly relating to achieving my goals, I've realized this and much more.

This form of journaling may help me become even better at it. Not only is this probably healthy to have some level of written introspection in my life, it gives me content to post on here for everyone-- but honestly, mostly for myself. I've also realized many of the things I do relate to my inherent fear of not being myself anymore (i.e. death). I do think it's far more nuanced than this single fear, but it warrants its own post for discussion.

Despite recognizing I should be alone, I find myself craving a romantic relationship again. I only ever had one actual relationship. We lasted 4 years. It's been about half a year since we've split in Florida and I moved back with my parents up north to get back on my feet. More content will be posted involving this, but I'm not sure how much I'll mention about her aside from the fact that I was deeply in love with her. As much as I revere the past relationship, and embody it as a part of who I am due to how it forged me, I do think this is also one of the best things to happen to me. I'm able to focus nearly 100% on myself. On my family also. I say this solemnly, as I genuinely respect the time I had with her. But the past months is really where I have been starting to become more diligent with the company, app, and working out. I started my running journey in Florida, but it's going to thrive where I am now. I've also begun many of the hobbies that interest me not necessarily for self improvement, including but definitely not limited to: reading, writing, programming (for fun), and playing guitar.

I have a best friend who I met online in 2018, who I am building the company and apps with. The other day in a casual chat he proposed the idea of using AI to search the internet for a partner that perfectly matches us. It was a joke. He wasn't serious. Perhaps slightly embarrassingly, however, a part of me held onto this idea. Maybe it was possible. I had AI try to analyze my personality, and though it did a pretty good job (I tended to journal to it on rare occasions) at picking out traits from what it knew, I quickly realized my folly and never actually went through with asking it to search for me. It would've been too embarrassing and my pride would have been violently shattered. But this got me thinking about a potential future where AI-powered dating apps were the norm. I think it might happen. In fact, I can almost guarantee it will exist with some relevance in the near future. This would have a multitude of hurdles to overcome on its own certainly not limited to the current monopolization of the online dating platform market. I spoke about it briefly with my friend and this was our conclusion. Probably not worth us building.

But I digress.

I also want to mention to close, that I feel genuine love and warmth inside of me when someone spreads the app I built word-of-mouth. Friends of mine or mutual friends who decide to tell their friends or family or others about the app, I genuinely just love them. I don't think there's another single word for it. It's like they respect the hard work I put into it, like I'm important enough to them that they'd do this for me. I'm not sure why the feeling is so strong, but it definitely is. Sometimes, though, I just love everyone for no particular reason. On some days when I'm particularly in a good mood or seemingly randomly I'll just love everyone and tell them that. It's seriously liberating and feels like I'm fulfilling the grander purpose of my being but I simply enjoy it on a visceral level, even if not everyone responds kindly. It doesn't bother me if they don't. I just note it for next time.

I'm honestly a bit nervous posting this to the internet for everyone to see. Not that most people care, but I'm putting everything out there for everyone for review. A part of me I'm sharing and I can't take back. Not that I'd want to. Like I said, it's liberating expressing oneself. I also want to spread what positivity I can in the world while doing some good for myself.

Thank you to anyone who took the time to read this. You'll hear more from me soon if it's not too far in the future. At least I hope so, because I enjoy doing this.

And I love you, too.