✅ Liked — What I liked
This week, I ran 5 km on five days. Running clears a lot of thoughts from my head, and now that the weather has cooled down, I find myself running because I want to. I especially liked running with music. When I listen to songs I like while I run, other thoughts fall away and I can focus on that moment.
These days, I have been listening to a lot of jazz hip-hop and looking for older music by artists such as Daft Punk and Michael Jackson. After listening to all kinds of things, I think I like music with a certain vibe. As I spend more time listening while I run and looking for new music, music is taking up more space in my everyday life.
That interest led me to consider building a music-discovery service of my own. The web service I am building is not meant to stop at recommending similar music; I am thinking about how it could help me discover artists I like and understand their backgrounds and music more deeply. I also want to build an experience that lets me keep following related artists, music that influenced them, collaborators, and works with a similar character.
💡 Learned — What I learned
Turning the sensory, artistic product I can picture in my head into actual UI and UX was not easy. That difficulty also made the work more interesting.
There are many things I want to do well, and I often struggle to decide what to choose. This week, I tried to focus as much as possible on the things I considered important among development, branding, products, and content. I cannot do everything, so I need to keep looking at what to choose and what to leave aside.
I have also been using AI in everyday life instead of only at work. I use it for research, Instagram branding, making videos, investigating materials, and studying the products I want to build. The same applies when I dig for music and learn something new. I am less interested in using AI for its own sake than in how I can fold it into my life so I can do what I want to do better. Along with making everyday life more solid and creating new things, I also want to keep thinking about how I might connect them to income if possible.
Since last week, I have also kept thinking about enjoying the things I like with other people and making something together. I also want to keep inviting people I like to the space I'm putting together. Music, spaces, and the content I want to make all seem to lead back to connections with people. That may be one clue for finding what I want to build next.
🧩 Lacked — What I want to look into further
I am getting enough sleep, but the time I fall asleep has been getting later. I notice more than I used to how sleep, meals, and daily patterns affect my body, so I need to look at how to build a healthy routine rather than only adding more exercise.
I still need to find out how to bring the feeling of the service into actual UI and UX. Turning something I can picture in my head into a screen and connecting it to the flow of discovering music remain open questions.
I have not settled on how to gather people around things I like. I do not need to start with a large group. A small gathering by the Han River to listen to music, for example, could be a fun way to begin by enjoying something we like together.
🌱 Longed for — What I'll try next week
Next week, I am going on a business trip to Japan. I did not expect my first trip to Japan to be for work, but I am excited to work during the day and look around in the evenings.
Before I leave, I will finish the preparations I need to make, organize the things I have been developing, and raise the product's level of completion as much as I can.
In Japan, I do not want to come back having done only work. I want to see, hear, and experience as much as I can.