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November 26, 2025 Personal Story

I Built a Product to Save My Own Life (Literally)

It wasn't about productivity. It was about waking up before it was too late.

I was 32, sitting in a glass-walled meeting room, earning six figures, and I had never wanted to jump out of a window more than I did in that moment. 🏢

It wasn't depression—or at least, that's what I told myself. It was "success." I had optimized my life for maximum efficiency. I was a machine that turned coffee into code and code into money. My calendar was a masterpiece of Tetris, packed with meetings, stand-ups, and "syncs."

But I was empty. I was climbing a ladder that was leaning against the wrong wall.

The Wake-Up Call

Then, my best friend got sick. Really sick. 🏥

Suddenly, "Q3 Objectives" didn't matter. The only metric that mattered was Time Remaining. And for the first time, I realized I had absolutely no idea how much I had left. I had been treating my life like I had infinite runway, but the startup of "Me, Inc." has a hard deadline that no amount of Series B funding can extend.

I realized I was spending my limited currency—time—on things that didn't even make the top 10 list of what I actually cared about.

Visualizing the Finite

I needed to see it. Not on a spreadsheet buried in Google Drive, but in a way that punched me in the gut every single morning. I needed a "Life Progress Bar."

That’s why I built BucketPal. I didn't build it for the market. I didn't build it to get rich. I built it because I needed to wake up.

I needed the Life Progress widget on my home screen to scream at me: "You have 54% left. Don't spend it in a meeting you hate."

I needed Live Activities to keep my real goals—like "See the Northern Lights" or "Write that book"—visible right on my lock screen, sitting there next to my Slack notifications, reminding me of who I actually am.

Now, when I check my phone, I don't just see emails demanding my attention. I see my Bucket List. I see the promise I made to myself to visit Iceland. I see the "Learn to Surf" goal that was gathering dust.

It turns the abstract anxiety of "someday" into a clear, actionable path for today.

"We treat our lives like we have infinite runway, but the most important deadline is the one we never put on our calendar."

If you feel like you're sleepwalking through your own life, maybe you need a visual reminder too.

Stop optimizing for efficiency and start optimizing for meaning. Check out BucketPal to visualize your own journey, or download it from the App Store. 🌟