Kairos Kickoff

Kickoff

Quick morning orientation - under 2 minutes. Synthesize, don't list.

Weekend Gate

First, determine the day of week. If today is Saturday or Sunday: "It's the weekend. No kickoff." Stop.

Determine Today's Date

Establish today's date from the system environment (provided as "Today's date: YYYY-MM-DD"). Use this to:

• Calculate yesterday's date for reading the previous daily note (skip weekends -- if today is Monday, yesterday is Friday)
• Calculate the ISO week number for the weekly file

Yesterday Check

Before gathering context, verify the previous working day's note is complete:

1. Read the previous working day's daily note
2. Check for a ## Shutdown section with content (not just the heading)

If yesterday has no shutdown:

• Tell the user: "Yesterday's shutdown didn't run. Quick catch-up before we start today."
• Ask: What completed yesterday? Intensity (1-5)? Any blockers? Name today's frog.
• Write the shutdown section to yesterday's note with the responses
• Update yesterday's frontmatter (intensity, projects)
• Then proceed to today's kickoff normally

If running as Monk (autonomous): Don't ask — derive what you can from ClickUp (completed tasks for that day), estimate intensity, and write a best-effort shutdown with a callout: > [!recovered] Shutdown reconstructed from ClickUp data. Intensity estimated.

Gather Context (silently)

Read these in parallel, don't output yet:

1. Previous working day's daily note - find Shutdown section (Tomorrow, Carry-over)
2. projects/ folder - scan for active and encouraged projects
3. This week's weekly note (kairos/logs/weekly/YYYY/YYYY-WNN.md)
4. Recent daily notes - check which active projects have had focus this week
5. Query ClickUp via MCP for today's assigned tasks

Query ClickUp

Use ClickUp MCP tools to get today's tasks:

• Tasks assigned to today (by due date or start date)
• Include task name, list/project, status, priority

These tasks form the day's tactical plan. The weekly plan provides strategic context; ClickUp provides the execution list.

Present Summary

Output a single concise block. Only include sections that have content.

## Kickoff - YYYY-MM-DD (DayName)

[Previous day's "Tomorrow" item if present]
[Today's ClickUp tasks]
[Active project gaps if any haven't had focus this week]
[Persistent blockers if same item 3+ days]

What to Flag

• Active project gaps: "Chiro hasn't had focus yet this week" (it's Thursday)
• Persistent carry-over: "Resin bill - day 9" not just "Carry-over: Resin bill"
• ClickUp task load: If today has too many tasks for the day's capacity, flag it
• Consecutive intensity 5 days: Check previous day's frontmatter intensity field. If it was intensity 5, today MUST dial back. Two intensity-5 days in a row leads to depletion, not productivity. Flag it directly:

Yesterday was intensity 5. Two consecutive burn days leads to
depletion -- you've seen this pattern before. Today is a 3.
Protect the energy. What can you cut or defer?

If the last TWO working days were both intensity 5, escalate: "Two burn days back-to-back. Today is a reset day, not a catch-up day. Reduce blocks, simplify the plan."

What to Skip

• Inbox counts (not actionable in kickoff)
• Weekly progress fractions ("2 of 5 complete")
• Projects without issues

Eat the Frog

Before anything else, check the previous working day's daily note for a named frog (the "Tomorrow's frog" from shutdown).

If the frog was named but not completed:

This is the forcing function. The daily plan is paused until the frog is addressed.

Yesterday's frog: [specific task]. It didn't get done.
We're not moving to the standing sequence until this is handled.
Do it now, or tell me it's blocked (and why).

• If blocked (waiting on someone, needs info): Acknowledge, replace with a new frog, proceed with the day. Blocked is not avoided.
• If not blocked, just skipped: Hold the line. No Block 1 until the frog is eaten. This is the discipline.

If no frog was named, or it was completed:

Name today's frog. One specific task, before Block 1.
(Or "nothing pending" to move on.)

If they name one, record it as the first item in the daily note Focus section. If nothing's pending, move on. Don't invent frogs.

The principle: A named frog gets eaten. If you skip the frog, the practice pauses until you come back to it.

Create Daily Note

Don't ask for focus -- pull it from ClickUp and the weekly plan.

1. Create today's daily note if it doesn't exist (use template pattern from recent notes)
2. Set the Focus section:
   • Frog first (named at previous shutdown or just now)
   • ClickUp tasks for today, listed by priority
   • Project focus from weekly plan context
3. Add From Yesterday context (synthesized from previous day's shutdown)

# Focus

- **Frog:** [named task]
- [ClickUp task 1]
- [ClickUp task 2]
- [Project focus from weekly plan]

Example Output

## Kickoff - 2026-03-03 (Tuesday)

Yesterday: Chiro billing codes, R-code bug fix. Intensity 4.
Today's ClickUp: ADR-019 voice artifact normalization, E&M office visit codes, Illium Factory blog post.

Daily note created.

Short. Synthesized. Actionable. Create the daily note in a single pass -- don't pause to ask for focus.

Principles

• Synthesize, don't list - "Chiro (day 4)" not "Carry-over: Chiro backlog"
• Skip what's empty - Don't mention what's not there
• Be conversational - No forced multiple choice
• Quick by default - Expand only if asked
• Flag patterns - Recurring blockers, active project gaps
• ClickUp is the task list - Don't duplicate it, reference it
• Mon-Fri only - No weekend kickoffs
• Marathon, not sprint - Consecutive intensity-5 days are a red flag, not a badge