TLDR
- Lisbon hit different. Pure vacation. My best city of 2025.
- Built and shipped TaskCocoon, Birdie, ReadRecall.
- Built automations: AI receptionist, invoice reminder, social media posting.
- Tested DaVinci, D-ID, OBS—to teach, not just use.
- Got rejected by n8n. Heartbreaking. Taught me what actually matters.
- 2026: Global workshops, new partnerships, new automations. Trying again.
The Opening: Where My Heart Was
2025 took me to Accra, London, Oxford, Bournemouth, Kent, Dublin, Belfast, Amsterdam, and Lisbon. But Lisbon was my favorite of them all; the beaches, the food, the nightly outdoor live music, the energy there just felt right. I returned recharged. Sometimes that’s what you need between shipping cycles.
Building and launching automations and applications feels equally exciting, though in a different way. Not the same kind of happiness, but equally thrilling, especially when you ship something and it actually works.
Here’s what 2025 really taught me—and why 2026 looks completely different.
2025: Learning Over Perfection
Last year wasn’t about one big win. It was about learning consistently, traveling intentionally, and discovering that resilience matters more than perfection.
In 2025, I built and shipped three apps by vibe coding: TaskCocoon (task management), Birdie (bird identification game), and ReadRecall (spaced repetition learning). None of them are revolutionary, but they all taught me something valuable about building, iterating, and letting users shape the product. Each one proves you don’t need perfection—you need a spirit willing to learn, make mistakes, research, and be patient.
I also built several automations including an AI receptionist for booking photo sessions (for a fictional photo studio), an invoice reminder system , and a social media posting automation to maintain consistent presence without the daily grind. These aren’t flashy. They’re foundational. They’re the difference between sustainable and burnout.
I used Make.com and n8n primarily for these automations. When I learned about the n8n ambassador program, I applied. I got rejected though, but it was a soft rejection from genuinely lovely people. The rejection wasn’t the problem. My response to it was everything. I’m definitely going to build more automations on n8n, and somewhere down the line, I’ll apply again.
Building My Teaching Stack
2025 wasn’t just about shipping products. It was about building my teaching stack.
I tested DaVinci Resolve for video editing. I’m committed to mastering it because I want to create video content that teaches how to build and ship in engaging, fun ways. Not the polished corporate stuff—the real, honest journey.
I tested D-ID for AI avatar generation. The idea: create personalized video at scale. It’s unconventional, and it’s powerful. Most people don’t know it exists yet.
I tested OBS for screen recording and streaming. Because tutorials matter. Because showing, not just telling, is how people actually learn automation.
Here’s the difference between 2024 and 2025 for me: I’m not collecting tools. I’m learning tools so I can teach tools. That shift changed everything. It means the time I spend in DaVinci or D-ID or OBS isn’t wasted if I don’t use it personally—it becomes content, it becomes community value, it becomes something shareable.
That’s 2026’s content strategy in a nutshell.
2026: What’s Actually Coming
This is where it gets exciting.
Online workshops where people can show up, learn to build something, and prove that automation isn’t just for engineers but for anyone curious enough to try. Global, accessible, real.
New automations. My personal learning path has shifted toward agentic systems and predictive models. Expect to see more complex workflows shared publicly. Not because I’m an expert (I’m not), but because showing the learning journey is more valuable than hiding until I’m perfect.
New partnerships. There are conversations happening. Can’t say more yet, but the partnerships that make sense are the ones where we’re both building toward the same mission: making AI and automation accessible.
New ideas. Some will work. Some won’t. That’s the whole point of building in public.
The through-line for 2026? Consistency over perfection. Teaching over hiding. Community over credentials.
What Actually Matters
If you’ve been thinking about learning automation, building something, or starting your own thing? Stop waiting. The imperfect launches will happen. The doubt will show up.
But the people who ship anyway—the ones who keep learning, the ones who treat approach as more important than events—those are the ones prepared for the future and building the future.
I’ll see you in the workshops.
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