Going Independent: First Month of Freedom
The first month after leaving Meta - the quiet, the projects, and figuring out what independent work looks like.
The strangest part is the quiet. One month since leaving Meta, and years of constant input have simply stopped.
The Immediate Difference
No calendar, for the first time in years - my time is actually mine. No Slack either; the notification stream went silent, though it took a week before I quit checking reflexively. No hierarchy, which means decisions are mine alone: no approvals, no alignment, no waiting. And no resources, which are also mine alone. No cloud compute, no ML infrastructure, no team.
What I'm Doing
In June I was leaning toward independent plus building. One month out, that is the shape it took.
Consulting
A few companies reached out, and I'm taking selective engagements: spatial computing strategy, perception system architecture, AI product direction. It comes to roughly 20 hours a week, enough to stay sharp and connected without crowding out the building.
Building
I've started three small projects: an AI tool I wanted at Meta but couldn't build there, an experiment in synthetic data for a new domain, and a prototype exploring LLM plus spatial computing, the overlap I called underpopulated in March. None of them is a business yet. All of them are teaching me something.
Learning
I'm catching up on what I missed while heads-down: LLM developments (the field moved fast), multi-agent systems (the architectures are fascinating), and the new AI tooling - Claude Code, Cursor, the rest of it. Reading, building, experimenting.
What Surprised Me?
The quiet is productive. Without meetings I can think deeply again. But infinite possibility turns out to be paralyzing - ideas need constraints, and picking a few helps. The identity untangling is real too: "What do you do?" is a harder question than it used to be, and I'm working on being okay with that. And I miss the daily interaction with smart people, so I'm looking for community in new ways.
What's Next
I'm not rushing to decide anything; the experiment runs through at least Q4 2024, the reset quarter I gave myself on the way out.
Questions I'm exploring:
- What problems can I uniquely solve?
- What would I regret not trying?
- What work energizes me, and what drains me?
The freedom to ask them at all is the luxury of this moment.