It’s Not a Revolution. It’s an Evolution.
From AI integration to cross-platform fluency—discover the must-have technical and soft skills for today’s most in-demand dev roles.
by Domenic Thomas
We didn’t write a business plan on a whiteboard. We didn’t start with a venture capital pitch deck. We didn’t have a vision of becoming “thought leaders” or influencers.
We started in a parking lot.
It was over a decade ago in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Two friends standing in the cold.
The wind was biting, but we barely felt it. We were too busy obsessing over a puzzle that had been nagging us for years.
Our brotherhood stretched close to twenty years, yet life had carved six hours of road between us.
We stayed in touch—calls, texts, emails—but something vital was missing. The connection existed, but it lacked weight. The signal wasn’t strong enough.
We were losing the real substance of the exchange—the posture, the eye contact, the pauses that say more than words. A voice alone couldn’t carry what mattered.
The revelation was simple: If we couldn’t be in the same room, we had to find the next best thing.
We turned to Skype. It sounds obvious today. But back then? It felt like a discovery. It worked. It was MUCH better than a phone call.
The Initial Vision
Seeing the face. Catching the micro-expressions. Feeling the presence of another human being across the wire. It changed the dynamic entirely.
What if we could bring together groups of like-minded people using this technology?
It was the question we had been asking for years. In a world where our local social networks felt empty, where could we go to find our people?
We had this idea back in 2012. We started pitching it to the few people in our lives who might get it. And it worked… to a degree.
We launched. We created the first TAC video group calls. We scraped together 3 or 4 sessions a week. The interest was there.
But it was exhausting.
We were grinding. We both had young families to provide for. We were at different places in our careers.
Nobody involved at the time wanted to lead; everyone just wanted to attend. Getting people to host meetings felt like pulling teeth.
The technology back then was a dinosaur compared to the tools we have today and most people had never participated in a video call before.
The connection was glitchy. The friction was high. It cost a fortune to host meaningful enterprise-grade video.
In the end, the engine stalled. We couldn’t get the traction we needed to justify the grind.
Looking back, it’s clear why. We simply weren’t ready.
We had to admit a hard truth. We needed to grow more, and so did the technology.
We had the concept, but we didn’t have the character. Not yet.
We still had to crash and burn a few more times before we could build a foundation strong enough to hold other people up.
The Myth of “Unique Suffering”
We realized a hard truth: Pain isolates you. It tells you a lie. It whispers,
“No one else feels this way. You are the only one who is this messed up.'”
We were “successful” by society’s standards—good jobs, families, houses. We weren’t down and out. But underneath the gratitude, we were seeking.
The standard playbook wasn’t enough. We were average men wanting a deeper fulfillment, but there was no roadmap.
We realized that unless you had immense resources to connect the dots between self-awareness, spirituality, and psychology yourself, the answers remained out of reach.
We also knew darkness. We had battled addiction, trauma, and the spiritual emptiness that stares at the ceiling at 3 AM.
We survived because we had resources and each other. But we wondered:
How does someone without those advantages even stand a chance?
The epiphany hit us: The answer isn’t external. It isn’t a lack of time or money holding people back. The shift is about Accountability.
We had to own our evolution.
We thought everyone would want to hear this. We were wrong.
Friends didn’t understand why we chose books over the game; they didn’t get the yearning. We felt isolated. But that isolation is a lie.
We call it The Myth of Unique Suffering.
This is the false belief that your suffering is special. That whatever you’re struggling with is a unique experience.
It’s the lie addiction tells you—that you are too messed up to be understood, so you might as well not try. It’s a trap.
The moment you stop hiding and start talking, you realize other people are currently fighting or have fought the same battle.
We are all grappling with the human condition. We are not unique in our suffering; we are united by it.
The Gap in the Market
“Evolution doesn’t fight the old reality. It simply builds a new one that renders the old one obsolete.”
A big part of our journey was getting honest about our behavior.
We realized that addiction, anxiety, anger—often, these aren’t just “medical issues” or “bad luck.”
They are Character Defects.
That sounds harsh. We know. But it’s actually liberating.
A character defect is simply an act of escape. It’s a wall you build to avoid feeling reality.
It is an escape behavior because the reality of the present moment feels too heavy to bear.
We looked for a way to fix these defects. We looked for answers to many things we worked on over the years and found few, if any.
Eventually, we started discussing questions like:
- Why isn’t there a manual for being human?
- Why do we learn algebra but not how to process resentment?
- Why do we have to crash and burn before we learn life’s lessons?
We had looked far and wide for answers over the years.
12-Step programs focused on repair, not evolution. Seminars prioritized the wallet over the spirit.
Retreats offered a temporary escape, not a sustainable reality.
There was no “Third Way.”
There was no place that combined the spiritual depth of a monastery with the practical tools of a modern business.
There was no place that offered an unbiased perspective without any dogma.
So, we decided to build it.
The Missing Ingredient
For years, we operated on a flawed assumption:
That if we just ground harder, summoned enough willpower, or hacked our way to the perfect technique, we could “fix” ourselves.
We were wrong.
We eventually realized that willpower and tactics are finite resources. They burn out.
They fail to provide the comprehensive architecture needed for a long-term, balanced existence.
What was missing was a Spiritual Connection.
Let’s be clear: We both grew up Catholic. But this isn’t about religion. It isn’t about dogma, Sunday rituals, or specific beliefs.
It is about a universal understanding of—and connection to—a power greater than your ego.
At first, we treated “spirituality” like a minefield. We hesitated. We didn’t want to be misunderstood or alienate the room.
But when you strip away the labels, you are left with exactly two ways to operate your life:
RESISTANCE: This is fear-based living. It fixates on the problem. It lives in Worry, Hate, and Fear. It is a constant, exhausting war against reality as it is.
FLOW: This is gratitude-based living. It focuses on the solution. It lives in Love, Peace, and Acceptance. It does not argue with the moment.
That second option—FLOW—is simply the spiritual dimension of what the business world calls the “Growth Mindset.”
We weren’t using that terminology when we were forging these concepts in the fire of our daily lives.
But as we encountered the data on growth mindsets, the pieces clicked. We had arrived at the same coordinates.
Truth has a way of finding you in the end, no matter which road you take to get there.
Here is the hard reality: Without a deep spiritual practice, consistent joy and peace will remain abstract concepts.
Life will continue as the ongoing struggle you have become accustomed to.
You might acquire better insights. You might optimize your psychological toolkit. You might even heal past traumas and let go of old resentments.
But you will still feel it.
That familiar restlessness. That gnawing emptiness. The quiet, terrifying sense that, despite all the work, you are not where you hoped to be.
You will remain unable to trust your instincts or have faith in the natural order of things.
This spiritual component was the missing ingredient.
By failing to explore it ourselves—and failing to address it in our initial vision for TAC—we did a disservice to you and the problems we set out to solve.
The Trap of the Mental Realm
We wanted to connect with people who were willing to grow.
But we learned that without that spiritual connection, you can’t get all the way to where you want to be.
If you live strictly in your Mind, that might feel like an evolution.
It feels like a step up from the physical realm of the body—the animal instincts. And it is.
But it is merely one step.
Living in the mental realm is still fraught with the minefield that human life brings.
Ego.
Greed.
Restlessness.
Discontent.
It is often described as “Emptiness.”
No matter what you achieve, no matter how smart you are, it still feels like you’re missing something.
To operate strictly from the mind requires the discipline of an emotionless machine.
You have to almost dissociate to maintain the healthy habits that lead to physical well-being or a balanced mental state.
It is exhausting to constantly police your own brain.
However, once you embrace a true spiritual practice—whether that is an organized religion or your own deep, authentic practice—everything shifts.
You will still find yourself in a battle with your mind that seems endless.
But this time, you are not fighting alone.
You are fighting with a power greater than your own ego.
And that is where the freedom lies.
The Evolution of Technology
For 20 years, we dreamed of this. But the world wasn’t ready. And the tech wasn’t ready.
The tech stack required to build a global community used to cost millions of dollars.
It was gatekept by massive corporations.
If you wanted to build a media company, you needed a tower.
If you wanted to build a school, you needed a campus.
Now? The gates are open.
The acceleration of AI and technology has leveled the playing field.
Today, we can launch a platform in hours that used to take years. This enables efficiency.
It enables us to create content and tools that are affordable for everyone.
We are using technology not to trap you in a scroll-hole, but to set you free.
We are building the tools—the apps, the courses, the networks—that usually cost thousands of dollars and making them accessible.
We see money differently, too.
Money is not the goal. Money is stewardship.
It is a resource, just like energy or time.
Our job is to be good stewards of that resource, reinvesting it to provide tools and opportunities for the community.
We aren’t building a castle; we’re building a network.
The Philosophy of Freedom
We call this new network: The Alive Community (TAC).
But let’s be clear about the philosophy that drives us. It starts with Inclusion. Inclusion is a core word for us.
- We believe that true healing leads to greater empathy.
- When you heal yourself, your capacity for compassion expands.
- You stop judging and start understanding.
To get there, you need Witness Consciousness.
It is the ability to observe yourself objectively.
It is the realization: “I am not my thoughts.”
I am not my emotions.
When you operate from Witness Consciousness, you stop reacting and start responding.
You move from fear-based thinking to gratitude-based living.
We also believe in Contagion.
Not the viral kind. The spiritual kind.
Positive change is contagious.
When you get better, your family gets better.
Your team gets better.
Your community gets better.
Servant Leadership: The New Standard
We are not here to save you.
We don’t want your worship.
We don’t want to be ‘Founders’ on a pedestal.
We are works in progress.
This brings us to leadership. We believe in Servant Leadership.
But people get this wrong. They think Servant Leadership means being soft.
They think it means being a doormat for other people’s problems.
It is not soft.
Real Servant Leadership is gritty. It requires three specific things:
- Accountability: We own our mess. If the ship goes off course, we don’t blame the wind; we look at how we steered the ship.
- Partnership: We walk beside you, not ahead of you. We are in the trenches together.
- Commitment: We stay when it gets hard. We don’t check out when the excitement fades.
It is not about avoiding problems to keep the peace. It is about addressing them head-on with curiosity and love.
It is about realizing that true leadership is service, not power or ego.
There is a massive difference between Managing and Leading.
Managing is about execution, strategy, and logistics.
Leading is about influence and inspiration.
Stop waiting for the government to save you.
Stop waiting for the economy to turn around.
Stop waiting for your boss to give you permission.
You have to lead yourself first.
The End of Zero-Sum Games
We are done with the “Zero-Sum Game.”
The old world tells you that for me to win, you have to lose. That is the scarcity mindset. That is the way of competition.
Competition has its uses, but it inevitably leads to winners and losers, first and second place.
We believe in the power of Cooperation.
The whole IS greater than the sum of the parts when people work together toward a common goal.
It’s the story of human beings since the dawn of time.
We survived the ice age not because we fought each other, but because we huddled together.
We are building an alternative economy based on abundance and shared growth.
The Invitation: Your Superpower
So, here is the truth. You have a choice.
->You can stay in the “Old Paradigm.”
->You can keep wrestling with systems that don’t serve you.
->You can continue to see yourself as a victim of your circumstances.
Or, you can make the shift.
Maybe you had a terrible childhood, suffered an assault, or lost everything.
We are not minimizing that pain. It is real. But you decide whether that pain defines you as a victim or propels you as a victor.
Your trauma can be your Superpower.
If you choose to use it, your darkest moments give you a depth of empathy and strength that other people simply don’t have.
You have survived the fire, which means you are fireproof.
You can build a life based on the qualities of a spiritual warrior:
Accountability. Honesty. Trustworthiness. Loyalty.
We are building the playground, the toolkit, and the community.
But we need you to bring the fire.
The desire to take things into your own hands and make them better.
We have agency. We have the ability to express ourselves freely.
Why not use these things to make things better?
We could moan about how life is difficult, unfair, and unforgiving.
Or… We can create an option. We can actually DO something about it.
Why not us?
Welcome to The Alive Community. It’s time to wake up.
