instrumental karma, emotional creatures, and why I've been channeling Jem since the early 90s

The vibe-coded app demo that broke me (in a good way)

I finished the first demo of my app last week—the local-business discovery thing I’ve been building to help people find the coffee roasters and vintage shops that algorithms bury.

Wait did I ever actually explain what I’m building? Probably not. Typical. Anyway, the demo is scrappy: minimal interface, basic flow, glimmers of what could be.

After screen-recording it (and trimming the parts that don’t yet work), I set it to music. I’ll be sharing it with business owners—the potential paying users—so why not set the vibe? I went with an instrumental version of Tay Tay’s Karma, because apparently I’m that person now.

And then I watched it back, and I fucking cried.

Not like dainty entrepreneurial tears of pride—more like full-body holy-shit-this-is-real crying. The kind where you have to pause and ask yourself what's actually happening here.

Here's what was happening: I was watching an idea become a thing.

I know I know, you’re probably thinking but babygirl it’s not even really a thing yet. Well, here’s my counter: life is hard and what do we have if we don’t celebrate the small-small things along the long-long way?

I mean for years, this app existed only in my head. In my notes. In my survey responses and Karen emails and chats with close friends. It was abstract, intangible, a concept I both understood and kept trying to warp my head around.

And then suddenly it was on my screen. Moving. Clickable. Real.

Even though it's just a demo—complete withe a rat’s nest of data tables and vibed code—it's the promise of potential made visible. It's proof that the thing I've been carrying around in my brain can actually exist in the world.

I sent it to my husband with a message:

Making something out of nothing is the most fundamentally human thing we do, and when you're in the middle of it, it hits different.

Pull the thread you keep finding

The more I go down this builder-founder path (I'm still workshopping what to call myself—entrepreneur feels too suited-up, startup founder feels too Silicon Valley, chaos generator feels too accurate), the more I recognize this same thread running through everything: I am energized by the process of making something out of nothing.

It’s in my decade+ of client work—taking vague briefs and turning them into tangible voices and campaigns.

It’s in my poetry, my essays, my book.

It’s in this newsletter—thoughts turned into something a few hundred people read each week.

It’s even in how I and we create ourselves—style, hair, home, life, identity.

Every creative project, every “what if I tried…” that turned into something real, even if that real translated to failure.

Humans have always made things out of nothing—cave paintings, cathedrals, startups, choreography, railroads, art. It’s our signature move.

And it’s the thing I love most, no matter the form.

Jem is truly outrageous (and so am I, apparently)

Which brings me to Jem.

In the demo app, she’s my avatar—pink hair, star earrings, full 80s glory. At first it was a nostalgic aesthetic choice. I grew up obsessed with her. Glued to the screen every Saturday morning, Entenmann’s chocolate donut in hand, I’d watch Jem and The Holograms exist as feminists ahead of their hemmed-in wave.

And now I keep thinking about why Jem.

She’s bold, unapologetic, outrageous. She literally transforms herself into who she wants to be. She makes things—music, performances, entire worlds—out of thin air.

And now I realize (remember?) that I absorbed all that as a kid. Of course my hair ended up pink. Of course my work mirrors her energy of creation and transformation. I’ve been channeling Jem since the early 90s—I just didn’t full acknowledge it until rn.

Most days I feel delusional. Like any other person trying to build something from scratch, I wonder if this is all in my head. If I’m making sense or just noise. If what I’m building matters or if I’m just another person with an idea, a Figma file, and some Airtable data.

But I keep going anyway.

Because that’s what you do. You go for the hole shot even though the odds are clearly stacked against you. You feel outrageous and a little unhinged, and you do it anyway. You cry at your own demo. You send emotional-creature texts to your partner. You pick up the mic and become your own version of an 80s cartoon pop star.

Links your algo won't surface:

Show Your Work by Austin Kleon — The definitive guide to creating in public and sharing your process. Essential reading for anyone building something and wondering how much to share along the way.

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield — On resistance, creativity, and why making something out of nothing is both the hardest and most important thing we do. Gets a bit woo-woo but hits when you need it.

Build in Public — A collection of founders and creators who are documenting their journey in real-time. Proof that we're all just figuring it out as we go. I’ve linked to the section I find most alluring, the interviews.

This Birding Documentary — It’s called Listers and it was just released for free on YouTube and it’s SO good. Funny, insightful, super creative, omg.

Jem and the Holograms (1985-1988) — The show that apparently programmed my entire personality. Stream it and tell me you don't immediately want to dye your hair pink and start a band.

PS: Subscribe now if you're into this messy build-in-public energy. Miss the last issue? It’s right here. Also literally none of this is ever advice. I’m sharing what I learn through Babe, and perhaps you’ll learn from my mistakes. Hopefully, maybe, who knows, ily. Also if you’re not already, come hang with Babe on insta, Farcaster, and TBA 🟦.