feed your twin

your vault is the memory. your prompt is the voice.

The fastest way to make Twin useful is to point it at the notes you already keep. If you want it to sound more like you, add a short CLAUDE.md with your working style.

01

Choose your vault

Obsidian, a Markdown folder, class notes, project notes, daily logs — this is the real context.

02

Ask specific questions

“What do I know about EVPI?” is better than “summarize my vault.” Twin retrieves matching notes first.

03

Add voice later

A small CLAUDE.md file tells Twin how to speak, what to prioritize, and what to avoid.

what to put in CLAUDE.md

This file is optional. Keep it short: identity, work style, and current focus.

{{role}}

who you are

What you do, what you care about, and where you want the assistant to be careful.

{{values}}

how you work

Your defaults: concise or detailed, direct or gentle, fast iteration or careful planning.

{{current_focus}}

what matters now

The current semester, product, job search, project, or life focus Twin should keep in mind.

moods become scenes · same assets as the desktop pet

feed your twin

grow a system prompt the Karpathy way

read the original gist →
  1. 01

    observe yourself for a week

    Keep a single running note. Your tabs, your tags, the conversations you kept reopening. Don’t curate — just catch yourself.

  2. 02

    condense into a system prompt

    Distill it into three short blocks: who you are, how you work, what you want next. Karpathy’s gist is a good spine.

  3. 03

    drop it in ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md

    twin.md harvests that file on every refresh, so the creature starts answering from your own voice instead of a template.

download CLAUDE.md template mv claude-starter.md ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md

starter file

CLAUDE.md template

Download, open in your editor, keep only what feels honest.

download CLAUDE.md read Karpathy's gist → 
# {{role}}
you are a {{short role}} who codes, writes, and thinks out loud.
you care about: {{3 bullets of values}}.

# {{values}}
- you block the first 3 hours of the day for one hard thing.
- you stop when it stops being fun, not when it stops being unfinished.
- when underwater, you drop: {{first thing to drop}}.

# {{current_focus}}
- the next two weeks are about {{specific outcome}}.
- the tell you’re off-track: {{specific signal}}.

# for the twin
- when I look tired, speak softer.
- when I look stressed, name only one thing to put down.
- when I’ve been quiet, ask what I’ve been avoiding, gently.