Three years ago I read The Great Online Game. That piece inspired me. Thinking about the internet as a big game made me excited to build a character online. I remember asking myself: What am I doing if I’m not playing this game too? What’s stopping me?
I had good freelance contracts. I was making good money as a software engineer. But wasn’t the reward of building something for myself worth the risk?
I didn’t quit my clients. I simply created a Twitter account and made an announcement. It felt official. Around the same time I discovered the build in public community. People were sharing what they were building, their progress, their revenue, and everything in between. I loved the idea.
So I made another announcement.
I’m going to ship an MVP in 72 hours. Countdown starts now.
Four posts later, I stopped.
I honestly don’t remember exactly what happened next. I was working on a screenshot tool when I noticed people building products around machine learning. Stable Diffusion was taking off, and I convinced myself I needed to learn machine learning too. I spent some time on that, then left it as well. Life happened. My build-in-public journey ended up being just a few posts on X about a product that never came to life.
Fast forward to 2026. This year is very different for me.
I’ve decided I need a fundamental change in my philosophy of life. For most of my life, I’ve relied on talent more than discipline. I want to find out what happens if I try the opposite.
My theory is simple:
What happens if I just show up every day?
No clients.
No external pressure.
Just me, all the tools I need, and enough time to work on problems I genuinely find useful.
Will I build something meaningful?
Or will I end up looking for freelance work again?
I don’t know.
That’s the experiment.
Three months ago, I walked away from my last paying contract because I finally wanted to know what I’m made of.