// solo founder · builder · maker of too many things
SORAKALDEN
I build apps and businesses, write worlds, run games, and learn hard things in 30-day sprints — and I'm looking for talented, curious people to make the next ones with.
Here are a few of mine. Turn the pages, and let's build the next one together.
Shipped
WEAVE
A minimalist weight-and-habit tracker, built so the graph does the nagging. My mom lost 17 lbs with it.
SUPER ZEN
A focus / calm tool — the small, well-made kind of app I like to ship.
Small tools
THE LITTLE ONES
A metronome that actually feels good; a tool to find the episode where a show finally gets good. More apps live at kalden.me.
DON!
The lead · Flua
The fastest honest path to a new language: one expertly-ordered deck, real native audio, and spaced repetition that does the thinking for you. I taught myself Japanese to A1 in ~20 focused hours with the method, then spent a year building the app that strips out every ounce of the friction that makes people quit.
SEE FLUA →
SEE FLUA →
"The domains change. The method doesn't."— from the notes
Worlds & Stories
The Eight Sides · 02
WORLDS &
STORIES
STORIES
I've built worlds since I was 11 — a fantasy novel I faked my way into finishing and published at 14, a 150k-word dark epic in progress (The Swords of Darkness), a homebrew D&D world with its own playbook, and a manga I still want to make.
"Because I had to fake progress, I accidentally built a real habit. It makes me wonder how many things we could actually finish if we just tricked ourselves into starting."— on the teen novel
A page-corner aside · The quiet line
And some things I do purely for myself — painting like no one will ever see it, building and painting Gundam kits, singing in the mornings, the occasional cosplay. No goal. Just the doing.
Learning & the Table
LEARN!
The Eight Sides · 03
LEARNING &
TEACHING
TEACHING
How I learn anything fast, and why I'm building the courses I wish someone had taught me — math, statistical and computational thinking, built for real understanding instead of the exam. Japanese to A1 in ~20 focused hours; tone-deaf to singing from memory in a month. Sleep does the heavy lifting.
"Being called smart my whole childhood made it part of my identity — and I was more afraid to lose that title than I was to fail a class."— About Me
The Eight Sides · 04
GAMES &
THE TABLE
THE TABLE
Take a system apart, find the fun, build it back better — a Balatro-inspired dice roguelike in design, a board game in progress, and D&D run as systems.
"Any time the best strategy isn't the most fun strategy is, I believe, a failure of the game's design."— from my consumables essay
The Bard, the Eye, the Mind
The Eight Sides · 05
THE MODERN BARD
Singing, standup, improv, voice acting, speaking — the half of myself I rebuilt on purpose, charisma treated as a built skill.
"I could not sing. I could not dress well. I was not particularly fit or especially charismatic. I was a very well-compensated specialist with a B-minus in everything else."— how I became superhuman in 2 years
The Eight Sides · 07
THE ATHLETE
The same engine I point at apps, pointed at my own body — and the sports (soccer, badminton, volleyball) that are how I make friends in a new city.
"Prioritize control and intention over speed."— soccer training notes
?!
The Eight Sides · 08
THE MIND
A reading life run like a syllabus — philosophy, history, business — all read through one lens: read to build, not to collect.
"Everything is interconnected. Singing makes you a better speaker; games train you to perform under pressure. Each skill feeds the next. If you want to be truly unstoppable, learn everything."— from the notes
Dreams & Author's Notes
Things I haven't drawn yet
DREAMS
Write a TV show — I've watched thousands of hours of film and anime, only the best, mostly to take apart why they work.
Finish the manga — the "next Death Note or Game of Thrones": a complex plot that's somehow easy to follow.
Make Westworld real, as a game you can actually live inside.
Open a café that's a third place for serious makers — writers, artists, builders, one room.
Connect
TAG!
Let's build something
I'M LOOKING FOR PEOPLE
EXCELLENT AT ONE THING,
CURIOUS ABOUT EVERYTHING
EXCELLENT AT ONE THING,
CURIOUS ABOUT EVERYTHING
Collaborators, co-conspirators, friends. If any of these worlds is also yours — or you just want to scheme — say hi. The best things in my life started as a five-hour first conversation with a stranger.
"One day I'll draw the manga. Until then — I'm collecting people worth drawing."— Sora
創 end of volume. Sora Kalden is the name I go by. Legally, Swarnim Kalbande.
