Claude is great, and Gemini isn’t bad. I use them daily. Gemini has replaced Google as my default search engine and Claude is my workhorse for pet projects and deep research. This blog, however, is different.
I started blogging in 2004. I wanted a way to think out loud and Blogger was an easy way to do that. Eventually, I snagged my (now defunct) domain SetHigherStandards.com and moved to self-hosted WordPress in 2006. Now, as of this week, I’ve moved off WordPress to a new tech stack that is AI ready and faster, more secure and cheaper.
Claude has played a key part in the migration, parsing through hundreds of my blog posts across various websites and pulling everything together. Along the way it fixed hundreds of broken links and formatting issues. It took my web design and modernized it to match my aesthetic taste. A lot of bloat has been stripped away. Going through this AI-assisted web transition forced a few decisions, including whether to allow Claude to craft web copy and change any of the blog post text for readability and discoverability (you know, SEO and all). The answer wasn’t obvious. I meditated on it for a bit, then went for a walk and cleared my head.
When I returned to Claude, my choice was clear. I want this blog to be of my own doing. I am fine with it writing backend code and giving me step-by-step guidance on how to move my DNS settings without breaking things. I’m fine with it redesigning my site to work better on mobile devices or handle the messy work of categorizing hundreds of posts. However, I want the words to be mine.
So I asked Claude to do exactly that, and ensure that all text was my own. Every button, header and piece of copy must be sourced from my direct words. Where possible, Claude just directly copied the old handwritten text from my previous site (like what is on my coaching page) while making it easier to read through smart design.
In other cases, it stripped away fluffy content and called out opportunities to simplify, fix blatant errors or reorder things. Still, I found that Claude was so overeager to help that it wanted to rewrite stuff (especially headings and titles!), so I became more explicit. I told it to only use my original words and call out where I should rewrite things by hand when my original words don’t fit with the refreshed design.
I’m mostly done with the update, and you can see it now by reading this blog on the web. The final tweaks and fixes (mostly rendering issues for old blog posts) will be done in the weeks ahead.
I realized through this process that I want this blog to be a capsule of my thinking, as it evolves. A journey of my personal growth, with occasional advice but also a way to retrospectively see where I’ve updated my priors. I want it to be what it has always been since 2004, a way to think out loud, share ideas and go through the often messy and difficult process of clarifying what I think. I want to cringe at what my past self did and feel proud about how I’ve grown but inspired by the work left to do.
I imagine this blog will be a time capsule that my kids might choose to read as they get older and are navigating the big questions of life and work, and the various trials and tribulations that come about. They will definitely laugh at a lot of the stuff I did and thought. Perhaps they will see it and find solace in the fact that I’ve struggled just as much as they have.
Maybe a total stranger will stumble upon it, as some have in the past, and while bearing with my poor grammar, frequent typos and annoying listicles; will find something that helps them suffer less and live better. Through it all, I hope readers can connect with the spirit behind these words and find greater peace of mind and trust in themselves.
I’m not kidding myself. AI is way better at writing than I am. I’ve experimented with pasting some of my handwritten blogs into Claude and what I get back is far superior any way you measure it. However, it’s also undeniable that it strips something essential from the writing process. Even when I ask it to make edits while keeping my voice and providing a reference of many writing samples, it misses the essence of what it means to be me. A big part of this is imperfection, and not trying to pretend to be any better at writing than I am as I type these words.
Yes, if I were writing impersonal and transactional emails, or somehow feeling a sense of desperation that I needed to pump out content like a factory, I would absolutely use AI to do that. However, the purpose of this blog is different. I view it as a way to hone my thinking while sharing something that’s genuine and real.
It’s the reason why we love our mom’s cooking. It’s not that mom is a better cook than a quality restaurant, it’s that there is a love and care that goes into it, even if the food needs more spice and was made in haste! You can taste the love. I hope in reading this, you can taste the genuine feeling of my words. They might not be Opus or Fable level, but they are mine.