My favorite childhood book was Titan - the biography of John D. Rockefeller, by Ron Chernow. I loved it because John’s parents reminded me of my own. My dream was to start my own business and be like him someday.

My very first business idea was selling collectible character art. I made my first website, and sold drawings to my 4th grade classmates. For 10 cents, I'd draw them a random character with a different rarity. (The most popular character was Ice Cube, which was just a cube.)

My second business idea was starting a tutoring company in Asia. I helped students prepare for the SSATs/SATs, and worked as a ghost writer. I invested my savings into Ethereum and hoped for the best.

I aimed to get full scores on all my standardized tests, but got one question wrong. Feeling like I was cursed to fail, I beat myself up relentlessly, spurring random public meltdowns that went on for months. It became clear that my mental health had been deteriorating for years.

I started college, majoring in computer science. To save money and graduate early, I fit as many classes and jobs as I could into my schedule. It was then that I built my first iOS app, Mac Daddy, and won my first app award on campus.

As I struggled with depression, I began to rely heavily on my imaginary characters from childhood. They said they came from a fictional franchise I created in the future. They wanted to help me with my mental health so that I’d eventually get around to creating them.

I did my first corporate internship at WePay. There, I fell in love with Silicon Valley, and wanted to start my own business ASAP.

The Forbes conference in Boston convinced me to drop out of college. I moved to Chicago to work on an app with my friend, and sublet a room for $400 a month. I had my heart set on raising venture capital, building a successful app, and making it onto Forbes Under 30 myself someday.

Depression got worse as failure and loneliness set in. I went back to school, squeezing 7 classes and two jobs into my last four months.

I managed a 4.0 that semester, and graduated early. Then, I moved to California to work on a new app with another friend. COVID hit, and I started experimenting with TikToks.

I worked on three different ideas with my friend in Berkeley. We built a hotel app, a delivery service, and a video-conferencing shopping game — all of which were a lot of fun, but never took off.

After a whole year of trying things, I was running out of ideas. While taking anti-depressants, I drew doodles of anxiety and sadness as little dragons. That month, I had my first ever viral TikTok with 500k views. 1000 people joined the Discord to follow the project — which was the most support I ever had.

With $200 a month on Patreon, It was good progress, but I still couldn't afford to live in California. Exhausted and running out of cash, I scrambled to grow my channel while building out the game designs.

Beacons found me on TikTok, and offered me my first full time job. I joined when the team was only 5 people, and learned a lot about working at a startup.

That summer, I met my cofounder, Ben, who was another creator on TikTok. He loved the monster drawings, and believed that they could make a great game someday.

After a good run at Beacons, I was itching to start my own company again. I moved to a small town in Tennessee where I could afford to work at my own pace, and resolved to keep going until something took off.

Ben came up with the name Voidpet, and helped me build a website to collect signups. He told me to keep posting my game art until I went viral, and everything would work out.

One of our TikToks went viral with 10 million views, leading to 150k people joining our Discord. 2 million people tried to sign up for the game, even though it was just an idea at the time.

Ben and I quickly built a scrappy concept of the game, where you could pick a Voidpet, check in on it, and explore a few screens in the Void.

We added trading, an auction house, random events, and multiplayer features inspired by childhood nostalgia. It was a fun experiment full of good times, but still didn't look like a sustainable business. Thanks to our fans and angel investors, we were able to keep chugging along for the rest of the year.

We launched Voidpet Garden, which was a new take on Voidpet as a journaling app. I could finally afford therapy, and built the app based on my own wellness practices.

By the end of 2023, it became clear that Voidpet had a future as a business. We were featured in Forbes 30 Under 30, won an App of the Year award from Google, and finally raised a venture capital round (after trying for 5 years)!

We worked with a team of 40 artists to launch a battle expansion in Voidpet Garden. We also sold out our first plush drop. It felt surreal to hold plushies of my own characters and see professional artists take them to the next level.

After a year of therapy (and using Voidpet Garden), I slowly cut out sugar, alcohol, caffeine, medication, and social media. I started going to church, and tried to make new friends. If I was serious about doing great work, I'd need to be mentally fit - not just mentally well.

There's a world of adventures to share with Voidpet. Players had so much fun with battle and plushies, we realized how crucial it was to build experiences that were available beyond the mental health app. While we love Voidpet Garden and are continuing to grow it, it's only the beginning of what we set out to do.

Stay tuned for new Voidpet stuff launching this fall :)