This is the only behavioural rule in the community, and it's worth understanding why. A lot of what happens online — in communities, on social media, in podcasts — is people arguing for positions they already hold, often without having seriously considered the alternative. The result is a lot of strong opinions and not much understanding . I want this community to be for everyone to share and feel safe doing it. I know everyone won't always agree on everything, so this is a space for deeper topics and to practice shifting perspective. So if you really have something strong to say on a particular subject, this is what 'the other side' is for. The rule for the other side category is simple. If you want to argue for a position — on parenting, on building, on careers, on technology, on anything — you have to present it as the strongest version of the opposite view. Not a strawman. Not a token nod to "the other side has a point." The actual best argument someone smart and informed would make against you. The point isn't to be neutral or to refuse to take sides. The point is to make sure you've actually engaged with what you're disagreeing with. In practice, this does two things. It makes the conversations sharper, because the strongest version of each position is in the room. And it changes what you believe — because once you've genuinely argued the opposite side, you sometimes realise you were wrong, or that the disagreement is smaller than you thought, or that the question is different from the one you were answering, or that both sides have a place for each person. This isn't a debating exercise. It's how I want this community to think. A few examples of how this might look in practice: - If you want to argue against sleep training, first make the strongest case for it. The exhausted parent. The marriage under strain. The science as some interpret it. The cultural context. Then make your case against it. - If you want to argue against full-time childcare, first make the strongest case for it. The career continuity. The child's social development. The financial realities. The mental health of the primary caregiver. Then make your case.

The community has four main spaces: 📁 What I'm working on — the home for builders. Share what you're working on, what's hard, what's working. This is also where the monthly prompt thread lives. 😵‍💫 The leap — for anyone considering, mid-way through, or recently past a major life choice. This is where the on-ramp lives. If you're not sure whether you "qualify" for the community yet — you do, and this is where to start. 🫯 The other side — a structured space for strong views. The rule: if you want to argue for a position, you have to present it from the opposite side first. This isn't about being neutral or non-committal. It's about making sure we've actually understood the other view before defending our own. Most communities don't do this. Ours does. 💬 Off-topic — for the human stuff. Parenting wins, sleepless nights, things that made you laugh, things that broke your heart. Communities die when they're too on-topic. A few practical notes: 📞 The monthly call First Tuesday of every month at 12:30pm UK. Calendar invite goes out in the community. Recordings will be posted afterwards. Format is light — what people are working on, what's hard, what would help. Posts from me. Roughly twice a month. Not a newsletter, not coaching. Working notes from what I'm building and learning. 🗨️DMs Members can message each other. Use this when conversations want to go deeper than a public post. 👤 Profiles Fill yours out. It's how other members find you. That's it. The structure is light because the community is small. As we grow, this post will evolve.

I wanted to share a bit more of my story than the front page allows. About a year ago, I left a career in banking that I'd spent over a decade building. It bought me a nice life but the expectations were high — not unexpected of my role or industry — and the pace and culture had started to diverge from my values. The bigger change happened when my first son was born. Life wasn't quite the same (shock horror), and a while after, I realised that the version of myself I wanted to be — the example I wanted to set for my son, being actually present for my family, trying to live a life I'd chosen — wasn't aligned with the career I'd built. So I left. It was a complicated decision, with a second child on the way and plenty of reasons not to. The first time I considered it, I dismissed it outright. But the more time went on, the more I could see the career was pulling me away from everything I wanted to be — and for what? The thing I kept coming back to was this: I was being pulled away from my family when they needed me, planning to outsource all the best times with them now so I could spend time with them when I was retired — by which point they'd have their own lives, probably doing the same thing I was, or I'd be too old to enjoy it. When I finally buy the bullet I left quietly, on good terms with my employer. I expected panic. Instead I felt free. There was no plan. I thought I'd take on full-time parenting and eventually find a new path — or something. Instead I found myself somewhere in between: building something new in the gaps between playing in the garden, going on adventures, working during naps, holding a vision for what I'm building while also being the person who makes lunch and reads the bedtime story. It's a wonderful shape of life, and most days it doesn't fit any conventional template. What I've found is that the loneliest part isn't the work or the parenting — it's not having anyone in my daily life who fully gets the combination. I have really good friends I've known for years, some for decades, but they can't quite meet me here. The other founders I've come across mostly don't have very young children, or they have full-time childcare, or they've structured their lives in ways I haven't. The other present-parent friends I have aren't building.