Feeling lost
I'm bullish on AI, but I also feel this pull to leave tech behind entirely, and I've been struggling to figure out why. This is my attempt to crystallize my feelings.
Alex Caza
I'm a product engineer with over 15 years experience. I'm currently exploring building sustainable product processes, businesses and what it means to be a user-centred engineer.
Latest posts
My Apple Watch was making my anxiety worse
Eight years of daily Apple Watch wear taught me to trust data over my own body. Switching to mechanical watches showed me how much that was costing my mental health.
The Dream of Physical Work
Why do so many of us dream about giving up desk jobs for something tangible? I look at where that pull comes from, why the dream erodes just like the job does, and what's making it feel more urgent lately.
The Age of Product Engineering Is Here
I spent years dismissing LLMs. Two months of daily use changed that. Here's where I think Product Engineers fit in a world where prompting is becoming the job.
Your Questions About Firstbloom, Answered.
I've been receiving a surprising amount of inbound questions about Firstbloom lately. This year, there seems to be more interest in starting a project like Firstbloom than before. So, I figured I'd take the time to write an FAQ to direct people to and to put out there as a condensed post about trying to build this company.
Top Down Strategy, Bottom Up Efficiency
In my experience, choosing between top-down or bottom-up org structures isn't enough. I think the sweet spot is one where leadership sets the direction, but we empower everyone to figure out the best way to get there, making the org fast and focused.
2024 End of year review
I wanted to take a step back at the end of 2024 and go over my wins, and think about how I'd like to change in 2025. I figured I'd write and publish my thinking to help myself refine my thoughts, and also keep myself accountable.
What's next?
A reflection on what the next type of business I'm going to attempt is, and what guardrails I'll put in place to save my mental health.
There's no money in open source
An essay that explores the future of monetizing open source, why I think venture capital should get into the space more, and how I believe the future will be led by open source-first companies.
Getting left behind
The AI movement is an interesting one. Especially as a product engineer. It feels like every month there's a new LLM or AI-based tool that's positioning itself as the software engineer killer—at least according to HN. Every time I see one of these tools, I get a tingle in my stomach that I'm being left-behind and that the industry is shifting below my feet. The weirdest part is: I'm not even sure…
Releasing Weztermocil
After switching to Wezterm from iTerm2, I greatly missed iTermocil. So, I built Weztermocil to fill that void!
You Only Need 60%
A reflection on what it means to be attached to your work, and how being 100% attached to things can actually be detrimental to the outcomes you seek and the person you want to be.
Daily Postmortems
I've journalled on and off for ~8 years, and nothing has been as sticky as the format I call Daily Postmortems.
The Rise of Product Engineering
The concept of a Product Engineer is new, emerging in the last 2-4 years. In my view, the role is vaguely defined. When talking with other developers or product folks, there is this understanding of the power this hybrid role brings, but getting a clear answer on what defines a Product Engineer can be challenging.
Mental Health Foundations & Toolkit
I've written about my struggles with mental health a few times, and I've posted on Threads about how my anxiety and panic disorder has been way more manageable the last few months. From those posts, I've had a few conversations with folks about what I've done to overcome and manage my disorders. I figured it was time that I wrote something that grouped the foundations of my recovery and the bag of…
Updating a Neglected Repository
A short tale about moving my small but minorly popular javascript library called export-to-csv to Bun and heavily refactoring it after many years.
Own your screenshots
Use Dropshare, Backblaze and Cloudflare to host your own screenshot and screen recording setup, with custom URL.
Emotions as a sine wave
My mental model for thinking about emotional states, and the effects of medication and mindfulness on them.
Don't Forget to Eat
The past two weeks have been about me reconnecting with my body in various ways. I started a new workout routine and have been trying to intentionally build lean mass for the first time in my life. Most of my exercise and diet has been about losing weight or building up cardio, not really strength training of any kind. So, while I have experience watching what I eat, I don’t have any experience…
What is Meditation?
For the last 472 days, I’ve meditated on average for 15 minutes. I’m not saying this to proclaim expertise. In fact, I’m using that number to speak to the fact that I’m still *very, very new* to meditation. I suspect there is no such thing as general expertise in meditation, either. Since it’s such a personal experience, you can maybe only gain expertise in your own way of being.
3 Reactions To Thought
Over the last few days, I’ve been thinking about thinking. During a meditation session, it dawned on me that there are 3 main reactions to thoughts. Which reaction is chosen will likely dictate the physiological response to it. Because of this, I’ve been trying to unpack the lead-up to those reactions, and understand how, if possible, to harness or influence the selection process.
Recognizing my triggers
I've been recovering from a bad burnout. One that led me to developing a panic disorder, and has left me with a good amount of physical response trauma to the feelings of anxiety. But, I've finally started to understand some of my mental triggers.
Forget Linear
Give yourself permission to do things out of order. Especially when it comes to learning something new. Even though it's more comfortable to follow a linear pattern, is it really the best way?
Understanding Flow
After a day of productivity guilt and anxiety, I tried to understand how Flow works for me.
Choosing what to read
Finding the right non-fiction is a challenge for me, and with my backlog of books overflowing, it's a little overwhelming.
I suck at inbound
I’m not someone who’s great at dealing with a lot of inbound communication. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about myself the past few years, it’s that I really like to control where my time goes and what occupies my brain space. This became really apparent when we pivoted Firstbloom to be a service-based business. The fact that I was responding to questions as people were brewing their coffee…
Curiosity vs Confusion
During our user observations, I started noticing a pattern between the build up to curiosity and confusion. I noticed how they often share the same beginnings, but it's the combination of the expectations going into the situation and the immediate path afterwards that determines whether or not they'll feel curious or confused.
Eating Shit
We’ve been doing a lot of user observations and testing at Fluent this past month and it's reminded us of an important lesson in product. You need to eat shit. Every. Day.
How I use Notion to manage my life
I set out to create something simple that works well enough for me, without over complicating my life with layers of processes I won’t stick to. It started with me trying to clearly define my intentions, and the guardrails I need in place for myself to succeed.
On Creating and Catastrophizing
A personal journal entry turned public. Filled with musings on creating, the paradox of not doing and dealing with an anxious mind catastrophizing before starting to make.
4 Categories of improvement
After a tough year, I'm finally finding a sense of clarity for what I want to do, who I want to become and how I want to do it.
52 Weeks of Creation
Part of my resolutions for the new year is to nourish my spirit by creating more, and consuming less.
The future of coffee
More than ever before, people care about where their food is coming from and who was behind producing it.
Going long
With the end of the decade quickly approaching, I’ve spent some time reflecting on the last 10 years. It stunned me just how transformative and important it’s been on a personal level.
Can you really think for yourself?
Reading Paul Graham’s essay on accidental moderates made me wonder: can anyone truly think for themselves?