Life with AI: The first week of building with Claude

Written By Resty Grey

There's a moment I keep coming back to. I'm on the balcony with a perfect cup of coffee. The mechanic still hasn't called. I'm talking to Claude — not about something urgent, just thinking out loud — and it occurs to me that this is already different from anything I've done before with technology.

Not because it's impressive. Because it's useful in a way that actually fits how I think.

What I built this week:

  • A personal operating system in Obsidian, connected to Claude via MCP

  • Castle Doom Academy — a self-designed semester with six classes, a timetable, and a two-desk rule

  • Daily open/close commands (!CheckIn / !CheckOut) that keep context alive between sessions

  • A resume rewrite, a LinkedIn overhaul, and the beginnings of an herb study

That's the list. But the list isn't the point.

The point is what happens when you stop using AI like a search engine and start using it like a collaborator. Most people pull one answer and move on. I've been building a structure that persists — a place where the work I do today is still present tomorrow.

I'm a type B person who's always admired type A systems. I've downloaded every productivity app. None of them stuck because the friction was always higher than the payoff. What's different here is that the conversation is the system. I don't manage a tool. I just talk, and the structure builds around me.

There are a few things about working with AI that I don't hear people say enough. You're never crazy with AI — ideas that would get a raised eyebrow in a normal conversation just become the next prompt. And the work doesn't stop because someone's having an off day. That's not nothing.

The honest thing: I still haven't fully figured out what this series is. I know it's documentation. I know it's personal. I know the Obsidian + Claude setup is the most functional system I've ever built. What I don't know yet is whether any of this translates — whether the specificity that makes it real for me makes it real for someone else.

That's what the next few weeks are for.

Specificity creates universality. That's what I learned in week one.

Resty Grey