Posts on Max notes

pigeon x heat x laughter

Max Chen — Thu, 28 May 2026 18:18:18 +0000

yesterday a pigeon bumped into my balcony, couldn’t found her way home.

actually her home is under my air conditioner, so that’s why I knew it.

I don’t know why but it sound absurd to me, why this happened?

and I was able to find a way for her to go out of my fence.

it’s almost end of spring, i still don’t know if there’s egg in her nest, but I still haven’t decided to remove them if they have new members yet.

maybe that’s too mercy for wild life, but this is natural to me.

at least let them go once the little bird grown up.

and recently Taipei is very very very hot, maybe the historical heat ever.

I think the earth is getting hotter year after year, the sun blocker are very crucial nowadays, compare to my childhood days.

in the past few weeks, I had my personal tax done, but still not the company one, every year I procrastinate this one, but actually it took like only 1-2 hrs for all the form.

But I just refuse to do it until the last minutes.

This year I want to do more on this, not only earn more but also utilize the leverage that AI gave everyone.

Making the website now take no effort compares to 3 years ago.

I believe there’s more business are the same, gotta take more risk and grasp the opportunity.

This year I did less posting than ever, keeping private to socials.

I think this is somehow I can protect myself from the noises

but maybe I was wrong, I might want to do more posting for myself

not acting as someone who seems to have a good life, but actually having a great time.

maybe a two-year gap for me to enjoy life privately.

time to post for myself and go get some public exposure lol.

oh almost forget to mention the concert, I bought two and went to both two concert.

sounds crazy but it’s not, the 12 years long wait is real.

the first day you enjoy the vibe and cry with yourself

the second day is enjoying and create the new memories

I guess this is the best concert I’ve ever heard. the sight got blurred immediately as the concert started till the end.

great memories and good old days are proved to be true, the feeling can’t lie.

it’s very hard to imagine you love a singer for 20 years, of course not all the time (it sounds weird and scary.)

but all those tough days and long nights, you got a exit to express your felling with you.

can’t remember the tough days but the process is beautiful.

it feels like weaving your life with beautiful threads across a gorgeous canvas.

end up being a nice art with delicate design on that and the autograph that you train for years.

I’m glad to live in this good era, very happy to be here with my love ones really.

Max

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claude x vibe running x peaky blinders

Max Chen — Sun, 10 May 2026 17:34:47 +0000

I just watched peaky blinders season1 this weekend, had wings for life run with bros

all good because my tailscale couldn’t connect my office laptop remotely

so I had a quite real and good weekend.

And I just found out that the connection is back as weekend almost come to an end.

I think this is the sign that I should live some real life instead of clauding too much.

I did the qa oracle project like a month ago and that’s pretty good, I found it has lots of potential and some tiny known issue which is out of scope

overall, I found that clean and reviewed data is the most important assets when you want to build a compounding system in house.

because you need to do decision, professional decision, not politically correct ones.

so there’s a clear goal for the issue: turn the blackbox into whitebox.

I sometimes wish that people work that way but turn out to be impossible.

the excessive returns often lies in information gap.

so if people found out the truth, they will decide to defend it or against it.

and you couldn’t validate the truth by peoples claims.

that’s the interesting part of working with ordinary people.

back to the running, this is my first time running wings for life event

pretty fun and I think I got good aerobic base built, a half marathon distance is OK for current me.

I’d love to have more challenge of this.

but, I think I need to do some speed / interval training in next few weeks

to prove that I can do these to garmin LOL

and I love that easy run mileage actually works for the base building part.

I had a great run with bro and enjoyed the red bulls.

for the claude and grok, I still love the claude being my coding master, and grok as my chatting buddy.

as spacex give claude those infra, doubling the token usage limit is cool, can’t wait to reach the limits and building good things!

as for May, I think I need to conquer my laziness to file the tax, already did for bi-monthly company part, still got annual one and personal one

stock market has perform pretty well recently, people start to borrow money to invest, that’s insane.

glad I got strategy made few years ago, and had pretty good discipline on that, the abundance is inevitable in the days to come.

I wrote the last article like a month ago, I think I can do more and upload my thinking more often.

oh I bought a wireless mic last week, recording my thoughts in phone, and transcript that into article.

thinking build an app for the best end to end experience.

but let’s just make it a habit just like reading first.

reduce the friction and knowing it’s hard but doing anyway is important.

just as running.

I consider writing as a brain dump, I don’t often see my own article

these are more like an archive files from my head, I had a two weeks rule that I need to output tho, but I make it twice length this time.

don’t know if it’s my usage limit has double or my input is halve.

but anyway, thinking is always interesting.

make you feel alive.

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short ribs and back to running

Max Chen — Tue, 07 Apr 2026 01:55:26 +0000

recently I finally ramp up 30-ish km per week with my running mileage.

Long after I rested for a race season

interval and tempo become way harder

but the feel of back in the routine makes me really really happy.

with building back my aerobic, I also doing social media detox a little bit.

Which may be the modern people cold plunge lol

I feel like I can get back my attention and feel more focus on things I’m interested in.

Although I’ll watch drama and scrolling sometimes

But I do it like limited times like Friday night for 3-4 hours and I delete the apps again

The problem of the apps is too easy to access those cheap dopamine.

That’s also well-designed by the app developers

I guess that’s the biggest thing I benefit from the detox.

Limited 1 night per week is good for me, and it last for around three weeks

I still can catch up some of the updates from friends

But not too immediate

And I think that should be fine.

I think I need to write more

And cook more short ribs, enjoying food and life

Running really make your mind clearer

Maybe I think it boost your blood circulation

Of course in your brain, also your whole body

It feels really great

Keep going.

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two weeks rules

Max Chen — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 00:54:01 +0000

I found a cool routine of myself, that is: I need to journal every two weeks to dump my thoughts.

This is discovered through this blog that I setup for myself.

every time I feel there’s something to be written, it’s about two weeks.

it doesn’t mean to be a very long article here but just writing some random things to let the thoughts flow.

recently i’ve been thinking about learning some new things this year

maybe a class for trumpet or harmonica would be great.

and cutting off my social media time makes me having lot more time to get bored.

it feels like escaping the matrix, but in a very gentle way.

I slept better with better HRV score, and exercise more.

I start doing more stretching and running, back to my running routine

tried a new adidas evo sl shoes (it’s so great)

so I’m now sticking to my new year resolution, or let’s say goals.

sleep better, drink more water, rest more.

taking care of yourself naturally, I think it’s very important in this chaotic world.

having a clam mind is very difficult now

and that’s why it’s very valuable now.

the openclaw

the AI manic stuffs

you need to see through the logic behind the scene

and define your own perceived world.

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tainan trip & learn to relax

Max Chen — Sun, 01 Mar 2026 14:30:24 +0000

during my holiday in Tainan, enjoying my foodie trip with my love, the world is declaring wars.. (wtf)

which might be the saddest thing we can imagine in this era.

I feel pretty sad when the world fall apart and I couldn’t do anything about it, when reading about stoic, they mentioned about you’d better not trying to control what you cannot control.

so these kind of scope I cannot control, but I still feel sad.

aside from the world event, I found I really like cool weather in taipei instead of hot weather.

cool or cold weather keep my mind clear, the thoughts are lot more clear when I’m in a cool weather.

I think taipei cool is also better than japan cold, I just need some kind of cooling time but not as cold plunge lol

but I like the food in tainan still, enjoying the traditional food and sweets are the best thing in life in my opinion.

clearing my mind is also a big goal of mine this year.

I know myself quite well, if I don’t have break time enough, I’ll do whatever I can to do things that seems like it beneficial.

but not the rest.

I feel weird but I know that I need more rest when it comes to long term striving.

I want to do more and learn more if I can do it.

but sometimes I neglect the importance of resting.

And I think I’ll do more starting from this year.

maybe my biggest goal: learn to relax.

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cny x birthday x paradigm shift

Max Chen — Fri, 20 Feb 2026 16:15:07 +0000

this year my birthday is in cny holidays

and the biggest plan for myself is to clean my home and getting some good rest.

I think sometimes we’ll force ourselves to do more things to get more results, if you can do more, then you’ll get more things done.

in the past few years, I think this is right and i’m quite proud of myself can do it pretty well.

but I think in the past few months, I gradually shift my thoughts or let’s say the mindset to: I should get more rest.

because in the future, the direction will be more important than the effort you made.

your choice quality will highly impact your life.

so you must have high quality thinking, and great strategy for yourself.

I think it’s not mainly because of AI, but the productivity paradigm shift will push everyone to a new era.

and if you have good direction, you’ll be unstoppable.

and the direction will be found with your strategy, your strategy will be planned through calm mind.

And you need to have good rest to have calm mind.

so few things to have good rest:

a stable HRV and sleep trending (stress management)
the food you consume and stay hydrated (physical health, of course)
mental health (stay clam with all the noise in this world right now)

these are the three things I hope myself can do better in this new year and also me +1 year old. lol

and I think above thinking also need to stay awake in the matrix to remind yourself.

I’m quite convinced that we’re in the simulation now.

not kidding, just a hunch.

I’ll run more and feel more with my body.

I think that’s a great way to find the answer.

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The magic of just do it

Max Chen — Tue, 10 Feb 2026 04:18:25 +0000

I found a great formula of just start now but not procrastination:

“start small and just do very easy things.”

like for running, people imagine a 10k run or 21k run, which takes 1-3 hours to run.

often times I overthink too, and then I lay on the sofa and scrolling all the way for hours.

but I found that if you just doing the little steps and easy things, you can just start immediately.

the overthinking game is just a combination of perfectionism & everyone is checking me all the time.

the truth might be: a small group of ppl are checking you, yes, but it doesn’t matter.

or the ground truth: no one cares about you, they just care about themselves and care about what others think about them.

we’re trapped by the imagination thoughts of expectation from people based on your past experience or how they know you before

so you’ll either trapped by other’s imaginary character or just your imagination.

which is pretty sad.

The morning exercise today I said to myself:

it’s 7:30am now, so running will take lots of time, then I have no time for breakfast, I want a relax morning, don’t do it, do biking instead.

so I ride on the bike and cruise along the riverbank.

and then the interesting thing is: I ride for too long and I spend 2x of time (1hr) for the biking instead of just do a 30 mins run.

because the weather is good, chill breeze + morning sunshine are the best.

The sound in your mind might be the noise

just follow your body and heart

and sometime listen to noise isn’t bad

your body and heart still enjoy it

and I still got the relax morning biking without scrolling!

win-win morning

this is the magic of just do it

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snow kingdom x Pikmin x pre-CNY

Max Chen — Mon, 09 Feb 2026 02:04:50 +0000

Back from my yearly runaway snowboarding trip

It has been few years when I started snowboarding.

I think this is a expensive but fun hobby to keep

Every time I went to a new ski resort, it feels different to me.

It immediately shift my mind to a great state of abundance.

I don’t have much new ideas or insights from the trip

But I lived happily ever after, the feel of living the moment is why I love snowboarding.

Even now, I’m not pretty skilled, and I think 5 days are pretty nice.

You picked up every thing the first two days

Getting more familiar with the trick you need to train on, then go for new things.

Great things take time.

Also I did join Pikmin started from this trip before.

Pretty fun and took a lot of walk and leveling up with the best team lol

Lastly I bought lots of gifts for new year

I feel like I should gift more

And giving more love to others

Not because I want anything from others

Just because I can do it and I would love to.

So that’s another mindset shift of myself.

And I’ll treat myself better as well.

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friend x legacy x kindness

Max Chen — Thu, 15 Jan 2026 18:12:47 +0000

This might be my very first cliche thing in 2026:

“Having a good colleague is a blessing.”

Woke up this morning and had an apple,

Then took some random stroll under the sunshine

I like to reflect things, in a calm way.

I used to think workplace is very hard to have genuine friendship

Because people often in the different stage of their own life

People around you varies from age, background, thoughts and the way to think of this world

We are all kind of building our own reality through our thoughts and the environment we choose to live in.

it’s fking hard to find your circle that matches your energy.

That’s why we can feel the sorrow when the “what if” becomes the reality.

I did start the work like pretty frustrating, and we can talk like any other random things like there’s nothing to be concerned about.

from random stoics quotes to fking Alex Hormozi reels

like we’ve created our own legacy and try to explain this weird place

i don’t know why, but these little things, even a quick coffee chat

means someone is supporting you, means a lot to me.

in my past experience, we always showing love and care to others

not in every place, but most of the case we will do it if we can.

I guess that’s because the frequency is resonated, you’ll attract the things, the people, everything you wish for. The fking weird law.

showing kindness is for sure not necessary, but a choice.

A choice that great people will make.

I think to myself, why am I so emotional for the leave?

it’s like your best friend moving out the town you’re lived in since you’re child

either we do suffer the same things before, or our mindset and values are just very similar

I cherish the moments when there’s someone to sigh together with. LOL

it doesn’t mean we cannot see each other, chat and have coffee randomly.

but it just means we will not see each other in daily basis anymore.

we couldn’t sense “the last time” has finally come.

that’s because we often take those normal & boring working days “for granted”.

the day will come, and the separation is destined.

but we will move on, and we should move on.

and why am I writing all these shit as if my bro is going to heaven LOL

fuck this shit, may the force with you bro.

Long live and prosper,

Max

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Sunday random thoughts

Max Chen — Sun, 04 Jan 2026 05:44:59 +0000

First post try to post on my phone

the ux seems good to me but the auto correct makes me annoyed.

PWA feature looks good and the overall space is good

entering 2026, I reviewed my finance, my clothes, also cleaned up my garden yesterday

getting diamond on wildrift LOL

Slow down on small and medium goals, focus more on long term goal and strategy.

That’s my first priority in 2026.

I’ve heard of the line says:

Don’t use tactical busyness to cover up strategic laziness

I kinda know the meaning, but haven’t done any practical action to it.

And I think I need to face this reality this year.

by intentionally ignoring the small little wins

Focus on life time long term wins.

It’s very hard to have focus on yourself I. This era.

But it will be so valuable if I can do it.

I’ve also created so much on YouTube few years ago.

But I kinda lose momentum on that

Maybe I’m just thinking too much and trap myself about the optimal ways for it

The core formula should be just do it.

Also recently, my mind keeps pop out one thoughts:

You should do something related to gaming

I don’t know why, but it sounds legit to me.

I like gaming and I kinda have few times for it.

So I bought expedition 33 during steam winter sale.

Which I thought it will be fun game.

while streaming MHwilds, I found the pure happiness when I was child.

But at the meanwhile I also felt guilty for playing few hours straight.

I also don’t understand why, but it seems like relaxing isn’t the right things to do.

Gaming looks like a waste of time

You can do better things if you invest that time in other things

The thoughts pops out after the gaming session.

And I felt bad but also thinking why it that?

The cultural things and education makes us so trapped about the hinders

But not knowing where you want to go

We’re often prepared for some world which may not exist anymore when we’re prepared.

We’re kinda lose ourselves when we live under others thoughts.

Then we live totally like another ppl, which makes me sad.

Next week’s goal: post one more thought of mine.

Max

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new year x reflection x instinct

Max Chen — Thu, 01 Jan 2026 16:35:18 +0000

this year I didn’t went to firework with crowded places

I stay at home, cook hotpot and have some fresh fruits with loved one

I didn’t do too much reflection as I usually do in past few years

i’m kinda letting myself cool down a little bit

just feel the flow inside myself

try to hear the inner voice that pops out when you are alone

often times, I used lots of logic brain analyzing emotional things

this year I kinda want to develop my instinct

maybe I should not use the word “develop”, but that’s more direct lol

maybe cultivate is good, idk.

in 2025, i did so much things personally, I found out this world is so loud and each of us are so quite

that we let other people shouting at us, and we don’t fight back

letting yourself being sad, being wronged, being misunderstanding

but that’s actually a reflection of yourself thinking of others

One thing I’m assuming: others are also reflecting their reality to others

so if an environment makes you feel bad, it’s true.

if the people make you feel good, it’s also true.

If you try to convince yourself about anything by logic,

that’s probably wrong.

you can feel it, what’s right and what’s wrong.

if you need the explanation, then you are hiding something from yourself

not other, but yourself.

well, I just had some reflection now.

new year resolution still make sense to me

but maybe not a year, quarterly, monthly making more sense for this fast-changing world.

the first priority is to feel more but not think more

I think a lot in my early 30s, some of them works, but some of them make me feel more anxious, which isn’t the goal of mine.

we set goals for better life, but we often forget to live now and enjoy the moment.

I want to feel more of the voice from myself and body.

I did listen to my body about marathon training this year

and I think it’s a great choice, I’ll do more for myself.

this is the pangolin trail from night safari @ singapore

I stay up till almost 12am in a zoo, I must be crazy lol.

ok time to go to bed.

I need to make up my sleep back from the SG trip

but that’s really enjoyable trip.

tired but super super fun.

Max

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holiday x christmas x chill

Max Chen — Sun, 28 Dec 2025 17:21:24 +0000

this christmas I went to singapore for holiday trip (it’s also my first time to singapore)

the weather is like summer in taipei, air smells humid, wet and warm.

it’s actually pretty similar as taiwan but a little bit hotter.

try kaya toast, hainan chicken rice, kopi C, lots of local food

and bought few souvenirs, traditional weird oil and medicines.

insist went to morning run, stick to the few plans that we planned before only like a week or something

abandon some plan directly if it’s not practical, and stick to the plans that we already bought the ticket

which is pretty fun and tiring tbh

the trip is always unpredictable, that almost like the vibe of life

we planned lots of thing and wish they got there without any reasonable logic

but we hope it to happen as we thought for it.

I’ve never been to a trip for a foreign festive

but I think that’s a good reason the let yourself rest, even if the reason is nonsense, the resting is the most important thing

basically you only got one pair of yourself, and you cannot renew a new one with others.

so what I think is treat yourself better, do more exploration of this world.

even if we’re in a simulation of higher civilization, you just enjoy the whole things.

wasting some time and unnecessary spends make life so much fun and meaningful actually.

back in the idea of relax and chill in the holidays

treat yourself better.

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focus x dopamine x morning

Max Chen — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 15:50:47 +0000

recently I’m obsessed with dopamine detox

which I think I know for a very long time from minimalist youtubers

and I do try some but haven’t try seriously

I’m actually awake but sometimes I crawl back to my comfort cave

but recently I found that my ability to focus doing something hard become less and less effective

actually one of my biggest strength is I can be super focus for no reason

but the dopamine consumption makes me weak

and there’s nothing good or bad, it’s just the way you try to live your life

so there’s two things for myself:

delete social media app from my phone 1 by 1

originally I’ve had very few apps installed on my phone

but I will sometimes scrolling social media and spend hours just scrolling

which isn’t bad, you kinda think this is very common things to do as a modern leisure time

but, if almost all the people are doing it, doesn’t mean it’s right

is just means lots of ppl doing it.

so i delete social media periodically, making sure I don’t miss important stuff

try to exercise more

I mainly do morning run recently like within a month

I did make myself rest more this year by not attending taipei marathon

loose the nerve for years, I like to get better than myself

so the pressure came from myself

I don’t want myself become very stressful when I need to chase lots of goals and lose focus on the most important things

I made myself a gap year lol

and probably I’ll have more energy on more things next year

more goals and more action and building

that would be great.

so the chess thing also become my daily routine

train my thinking, some days are good, some days are bad

but by doing everyday

I feel better everyday

so as wake up early and do morning runs and getting more focused.

I always wish that I can do more

but actually I need to do less

less is more.

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marathon x chess x peace of mind

Max Chen — Sun, 21 Dec 2025 16:56:49 +0000

for the past few months, i’ve been doing things that make me happy.

not the fancy things, just trying to cook, water and grow some random plants.

read some e-books, playing PC games, build my game room etc etc.

I didn’t went to taipei marathon this year, which I do it every year

one of the strategic reason is that I can get age cut-off for boston marathon next year

and the other thing is that the running is actually the way that I used for relax, not the pressure that I gave myself.

of course I want to do better and have my goal as a sub-3 runner

and I’m pretty sure that I can do it (lol)

but I also wanted to learn more things in this AI era, build more things with my business

or just enjoy life without any reason.

all the things take time, I couldn’t do intensive training if the priority isn’t the first one.

It will become very painful and meaningless.

when it comes to utilize more time, I think I’m start getting used to “waste” time on the things I loved.

which I think is very lucky.

Because not everyone can find things that can excite them, and I can always find things that can make me obsessed.

aside from reading, it’s chess this year.

for the rapid, I go from elo 400, down to 300, and went back to 800 recently.

not a very impressive elo but I like the feeling of getting better at something every day.

that makes me feel like I’m doing the training of brain.

and I can do almost anywhere as long as I have a phone and some time.

I like the classic things that can last for a very long time.

chess is a good thinking game.

Most of the time, this world tell us: don’t waste time, do something valuable, earn more money and get a better job.

but we’re not happy if you aren’t doing things that makes you happy.

Happy is the remedy.

I learn this from my beloved one.

And i’m practicing this as my first priority task.

you don’t need to impress even yourself all the time.

just do something that you like or want.

the right moment will come.

the right thing will come to you.

it’s almost inevitable to happen.

you’re the main character of this world.

other people are like NPC.

2025 is like a magical year to myself

I think i’ve been doing great things throughout the year,

and cut off things that I don’t like, seldom used like a huge cleanup of life

the time that I enjoyed, is the day that I do things with my willpower

the action that you decide by yourself, is the things that you won’t ever regret.

the gratefulness and the beautiful terms are like common old sayings

simple and clear.

I’ll probably keep doing things that I love

and enjoy the life that I have right now

I think in this modern society, we overestimate the glory achievement that others made

and we underestimate the potential that we can made by ourselves in every day life.

I think that’s not the reason I try to quit social media

but because I want to take back of my time

doing things that I love, enjoy the times that I wasted.

and probably, I want to spend more time with my family in general

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