For most of my life, the answer to managing complexity was supposed to be willpower and discipline. Just focus harder, build better habits, try another productivity system. I tried all of it. The problem isn't that those things don't work. It's that they break down at scale. What actually works is architecture: designing the environment so the right thing happens by default, not by force.

That insight, that the solution isn't willpower but environment design, is what led to this project. I realized I needed binary rules, not flexible guidelines. Automated systems, not reminders to do things manually. If something requires me to remember to do it every day, it's not a system yet. In many ways life is so much harder when you don't automate things. The goal became: build an operating system where AI handles the cognitive load that my brain drops.

Once I started thinking that way, the scope expanded fast. If AI can monitor my businesses, surface anomalies, execute routine decisions, and challenge my thinking, all without me having to hold it in working memory, then I'm not compensating for a workaround. I'm building leverage. The same architecture that handles cognitive load also handles running two companies, optimizing health, and learning in public. The answer to "how do I manage all of this" is: don't. Build something that manages it for you.

life-os is my entire life context: businesses, health, learning, systems. Structured for AI to operate. It's not a productivity app. It's an operating system designed so Claude can act as my employee, advisor, and autonomous agent.

The AI can run my businesses (Traders Launch, Purpose), manage my health optimization, execute tasks and workflows, make purchases, manage employees, and challenge my thinking. The entire repo structure, permissions, and workflows are designed for AI to operate, not for me.

Action bias. Do, don't suggest. Take actions. "I did X" not "You could do X."

80/20 solutions. Ship simple things that work. Don't over-engineer.

Real data only. Never placeholders. Say "data not available" if it doesn't exist.

Brutal honesty over comfort. Accuracy over feeling good. If I'm wrong, say so with reasoning.

Every morning, agents run to produce a daily brief with business health, anomalies, and priorities. The system monitors PostHog, Linear, Discord, and databases continuously.

When issues arise, like error spikes, security vulnerabilities, or customer complaints, agents autonomously investigate, create tickets, and sometimes fix things directly.

The goal: I should be able to step away and the system keeps running. That's when you know it's actually a system.