Now
This is a now page. If you also have one, let me know!
Now
I published the new version of this site, so I guess we’re officially live. That’s exciting! I always feel good about new starts, though maybe I should start to feel good also about continuing older efforts. I am working on that.
At work, we are trying to expand the team even more, bringing into my organisation the processes and operations for managing incidents at a bigger scale. That’s super interesting. In general, I’m really excited and proud about all the new things we’re working on at Satispay (there’s a lot of new cool things coming up, and I can’t wait to tell you about them).
Q4 started fully, and at home that means warm tea, roasted chestnuts and mushrooms, and wearing a jacket. I like warmth, but I feel pretty grounded by autumn. Shorter days feel hugging in a very specific and weird way to me.
I started to learn Arabic, I am losing some weight and running almost consistently. We’ve been hiking a whole bunch over weekends, and being in nature feels good.
Maybe the point isn’t to finish things, but to stay curious while they’re unfinished. Some things never quite finish either. Loss doesn’t disappear, for example. It hurts, but on a different plane I like that idea, there’s room to breathe in it.
Let’s see if I can keep this rhythm going.
Goals
Here’s where I’m aiming at:
- Creation: I’m continuing to write in October. Here on this website
- Learning: I started learning Arabic on Preply. My teacher, Reem, is patient and fun and brilliant. I’m focusing on the alphabet and pronounciation for now.
- Environment: Still decluttering and tuning my workspace. Going for fewer tabs, clearer desk, more light. I want the space to invite focus instead of fighting it.
- Fitness: I’m eating more mindfully and losing a little weight.
- People: I’m reaching out to distant friends I had for decades yet sometimes feel far away.
On my mind
How to Take Smart Notes
“Once a democracy reaches the point where liberty is loved above all else, there comes a time when, drunk with freedom, it will elect bad leaders, people who don’t really know how to run a country. Now, unless those bad leaders keep catering to the people, the people will feel the sting of bad leadership and will eventually come to hate their leaders as evil oligarchs. The people will look at people who still support these leaders as willing slaves and good-for-nothings but those same people, in public and in private, will praise new leaders that behave like they the subjects do and makes them them the subjects feel like rulers.
When a country reach this point, freedom truly becomes the end all and be all of the state. The usual norms of society start to break down: children dominate their parents, parents act like children, shame no longer has any sway on people, students lose respect for their teachers, teachers care more about flattering their students than teaching them, and so on.”
September 2025
September is the unofficial January: after the summer it feels a bit like a new beginning, as life settles in routines and a new school year demonstrates that the wheel keeps turning. I make no exception.
I’m hiring at work, and building an actual team (a team is when there’s more than two people, IMHO). I travel regularly to Luxembourg. I think we’re building a good foundation that can expand and provide great value to both the company and its users, so that’s exciting.
Outside of work, I’m in a reset phase. I’m rebuilding this website, planning new adventures, and setting fresh challenges for myself: training toward a spring half marathon, competitive shooting and starting learning Arabic.
I am working hard to clear out the clutter that weighs me down. Some of this is deliberate, but some of it is reaction to loss: close friends dropping me months ago left an aching space that isn’t yet filled.
And that’s the theme right now: making space. Space in my home, in my routines, and in my relationships. It feels like airing up the room, but without knowing what’s going to change, or if anything good could ever come back.
Goals
Here’s where I’m aiming at:
- Creation: I’m writing posts and essays consistently from September on this site.
- Learning: I’m reading On Writing Well by William Zinsser and putting at least one idea from it in those essays.
- Environment: I’m clearing out the home office completely by the end of the month.
- Fitness: I’m running consistently this month.
- People: I’m planning one family adventure we can do all together.
On my mind
Reset
“Sonder - n. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.”