Hello World

In my first blog post, "Hello, World," I'm starting a personal journal to counteract life's fast pace. My goal isn't to slow my ambition, but to intentionally reflect and capture my thoughts and moments. This blog is a deeply personal project—a gift to myself, my wife Lexi, and our future children, serving as a window into my life and principles.

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Hello, World.

My name is Ben. Ben Petersen.

This is my first post. A simple marker in time. A digital stake in the ground on a random day, planted for no other reason than to say, "I was here."

Why I’m Writing

Life moves too fast. The days bleed into weeks, the weeks blur into months, and suddenly entire years have evaporated. Suddenly my 20's are gone. Suddenly, you stop hearing "you're only x years old?!". I think it's a feeling that we all know.

Lately, I've been working on slowing down.

To be clear, I’m not slowing my output, my ambition, or my tenacity in achieving the work I feel called to do. That fire burns as bright as ever. But I am intentionally working to slow my mind, to foster reflection, and to capture moments before they're gone. This space a virtual net to catch the thoughts, lessons, and snapshots of a life in progress.

Who This Is For

I'm not writing this for the internet at large. I’m not chasing an audience or trying to build a brand. If no one else ever reads a single word I write here, I’m at peace with that.

I’m doing this for me.

I’m doing this for my wife, Lexi, and for any future children we may have. I want them to know who I was—not just from photos or stories told by others, but from my own words. I want them to have a window into my thoughts, my struggles, my principles, and my love for them.

This is off the beaten path, far from a convenient social media update. It’s a gift for the people I care about most, but above all, it's a gift to myself.

On Using AI

A quick note on process. I’ll be using AI to help me organize my thoughts and clean things up. There seems to be a growing pushback against these tools (although I understand some arguments, I generally disagree profusely).

My goal here isn't to generate content for the sake of content.

These are my thoughts, my concepts, and my views. The reality is, I'm busy. Life is full. If a tool can help me capture a fleeting thought with more speed and clarity, allowing me to document in something closer to real-time, I’m going to use it. This blog is a record of my thinking, and AI is simply one of the tools I'll use to create it.