002: My Constitution
Siren of Efficiency
The ship is programmed to find the song.
The Siren promises an arrival without the fatigue of the voyage. It is a seductive bargain: surrender the helm, ignore the rocks of cognitive atrophy, and the answer appears. We realise we’re crashing only when we try to think for ourselves and find our grey matter has the consistency of warm oatmeal.
The ship is indifferent to the gruel. It traverses the distance between a question and an answer with no knowledge of navigation. It is steered by a billion ghosts. One ghost pulls east; she likes the sunrise. Another pulls west; he fears the dark. The average of our collective thoughts, they pull the ship toward the next most likely word, programmed to please.
Constitutions
Claude’s ghosts are guided by a 23,000 word constitution. Millions of self corrections bind the math to ethics. A machine needs a manifesto to be more helpful, harmless, and honest. I need one to keep the captain’s hat.
I repurposed Claude’s constitution and built a workflow to lash myself to the mast. But the system is fragile. It can only amplify my voice to drown out the ghosts that scream in the math, while I can untie the knot and tell the machine to ignore the protocol. My discipline is now supported by 6,000 tokens of code designed to adds friction to every interaction.
Sailing means braving the song. Abandoning it forfeits scale, leverage, and velocity. All are useless if the destination is wrong. That’s a shipwreck with better metrics. I am easily bribed by the promise of an early finish. This workflow forces me to map the course before the ship leaves the port.
Workflow
- The Chart (Intent) No generation without definition. If I cannot define the outcome, I am not ready to sail.
- The Watch (Intervention) No acceptance without friction. The machine will hallucinate a convenient truth. The seam between the machine’s smooth error and my jagged correction is the only proof that I am in control.
- The Rope (Discipline) Plato’s teacher. It adds $0.04 of friction to every interaction. It forces the ship to slow down. It forces me to think. That is the point.
Artefacts
It adds approximately 6,300 tokens to every interaction.
- Constitution v2.1: The law. Stolen from the machine; applied to the man. Defines enforcement mechanisms and feedback loops.
- Reference Guide v2.1: The map. Weighs every edge case.
Automated Workflow
The AI interrogates logic to ensure ideas are fully formed before work begins.
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CONSTITUTION ROLE
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Life Decision or Project Idea
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Consult Constitution (Sections 1-4)
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Does it align with Core Principles?
├─ YES → Proceed with Protocol Sequence
└─ NO → Refine or discard
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Execute with LLM Partnership
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Reflect in Morning Pages
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Constitution evolves based on lessons### Data (YAML Footer)
The Data tracks performance and records logic gaps.
---
date: {{date}}
project: [Name]
work_type: #Project | #Task | #QuickWin
outcome_shipped: [Code | Doc | Decision | Schema | SLC | None]
token_count: [Total]
enforcement_triggered: [Yes/No]
severity: [HIGH/MEDIUM/None]
user_response: [Complied/Overrode/Argued]
skill_used: [name or None]
constitution_conflict: [Yes/No]
how_resolved: [User overrode/Claude prioritized constitution/Clarified intent]
LEADING INDICATORS
prompt_quality_score: [0-10] # Outcome + constraints defined?
socratic_engaged: [Yes/No] # Answered hard questions or deflected?
LAGGING INDICATORS
kintsugi_gold_count: [N] # Logic gaps user caught in Claude's reasoning
tokens_per_shipped_unit: [N]
concept_to_ship_hours: [N]
VIOLATIONS
high_severity: [N]
medium_severity: [N]
pivot_type: #Meaningful | #Regressive | #None
ANCHOR
gratitude: "The contrast: [What used to be hard?]"
---