I strongly believe in fallibilism—the recognition that knowledge can be improved and beliefs can be wrong.
I was raised in a Christian household with strong Calvinist influences—traditions that emphasized hard work, moral clarity, and the idea that how you live your daily life reflects your deepest convictions. While my relationship with organized religion has evolved, those foundational values shaped my understanding of what it means to live with integrity.
The Calvinist emphasis on vocation as calling—the idea that all work, done well and in service of others, carries spiritual significance—profoundly influenced how I approach technology development. This conviction led me to understand programming as spiritual practice—a discipline where technical excellence and moral responsibility become inseparable.
Core Principles
Meet people where they are. Success in mental health, relationships, and work looks different for everyone. When someone needs different conditions to participate, meeting those needs creates better outcomes for everyone.
Intimacy requires honesty, performance prevents it. The deeper relationships happen when you stop trying to be impressive and start being real. People who can handle your truth are worth keeping.
Design for your worst day. I build things assuming people are stressed or struggling. If it works when you're having a hard time, it works for everyone. Simple interfaces, clear messages, obvious next steps.
Optimize for human outcomes, not metrics. When systems optimize for engagement over wellbeing, the algorithm eats virtue, then democracy, then language itself.
What I Aim For
Relationships that can handle reality. People who can disagree without threatening the relationship. Friends who show up during mental health episodes, not just celebrations. Communities that don't exclude their most authentic members.
Work that serves life. Tools that amplify human capability rather than replace it. Technology that makes people feel more capable, not more dependent. Business models where success aligns with human flourishing.
Sustainable practices. Mental health management that works long-term. Daily routines that prevent problems rather than just solving them. Creative work that emerges from wholeness rather than woundedness.
What Guides Me Daily
Health first. Take medication, drink water, sleep eight hours, say no to what depletes you. Everything else depends on this foundation.
Transparency over performance. Share reality rather than managing impressions. The people who can handle your truth are worth keeping.
Repair over punishment. When conflict happens, choose restoration over separation. Most problems come from misunderstanding, not malice.
Simplicity as service. Make things clear enough for people having bad days. If it's too complex when you're struggling, it's too complex.
This is how I've learned to live: taking care of the human being first, then figuring out how to make that human being useful to others. The work emerges from that foundation.