Gary Sheng & Travis Oliphant - Fatherhood, Marriage, and Truth Tech Incubator Potential

Date: August 23, 2025
Participants: Gary Sheng, Travis Oliphant
Location: Video call
Duration: Extended conversation

Executive Summary

This conversation represents a pivotal strategic and personal development session between Gary Sheng and Travis Oliphant, covering Gary's contemplation of fatherhood and marriage, critique of modern status-driven culture, Travis's incubator philosophy, and the development of a collaborative documentation project. The discussion evolved from personal reflections on family formation to concrete business collaboration around Gary's "truth tech incubator" concept and Travis's need for worldview documentation.

Key Themes

Fatherhood and Marriage Philosophy

Gary's Transformation in Perspective: Gary opened by sharing how thinking about fatherhood has fundamentally changed his consciousness:

Gary: "It's so crazy. When I feel like I've changed, my being has changed. The same people that I may see on the street. I feel completely different about."

He described walking through South Congress and observing what he characterized as "juvenile energy" focused on status symbols rather than meaningful purposes:

Gary: "Where it's like the main thing that you care about is. Your new yoga pants and your equinox... We've replaced. Timelessly valuable. Purposes. For status games. Status games. That are primarily. Played by. Non committal professionals."

Travis's Historical Perspective on Family Formation: Travis provided compelling historical context about financial barriers to starting families, sharing his grandfather's experience during the Depression:

Travis: "My father's father lost his job when my dad was, like, three. They lived in a tent. They lived in a chicken coop. They just made it work... the thing about kids is they're super resilient. And the thing you absolutely need is love. And attention. Right. It's far more important that than it is financial resources."

Travis's Personal Experience with Early Parenthood:

Travis: "I had three children while I was still a grad student... And I was making 18,000 a year back in 1990. Four. 95, right?"

Financial vs. Status-Driven Costs: Both participants distinguished between actual costs of children versus high-status expenses:

Gary: "Makes you wonder what costs a lot. It's the stuff that is high status that costs a lot." Travis: "Yes, it's high status stuff. Costs a lot. 100% agree."

Children as Organizing Principle and Stress Framework

Travis's Philosophy on Productive Stress:

Travis: "There's nothing more valuable. Than having children to organize. Orient why you're doing something... They deserved an income. They deserved me to make money for them. So I had to think about that... There's stress that hurts you, and there's stress that builds you... And children are anchoring stress."

Marriage as Essential Foundation:

Travis: "Fatherhood without marriage is a recipe for disaster."

Gary's Covenant Marriage Interest:

Gary: "So we're thinking a lot about the covenant of marriage. And how it's been bastardized."

LGBTQ Issues and Family Structure

Travis's Nuanced Position: Travis demonstrated sophisticated thinking about same-sex relationships while maintaining commitment to traditional family structures for children:

Travis: "Look, if people want to get together and have gay marriage, I want to be together. I'm not. I'm not there to judge them. But who gets hurt in that transaction is when we want to have children, come into that and, you know, sort of pretend that that's the same as having a husband and a wife to children. It's not the same."

Personal Family Challenge: Travis shared about his daughter's struggle with identity:

Travis: "One of my daughters is actually on the path of feeling like, okay, I don't want children, but I would have a child with a woman. She's struggling, right? She's struggling with me, with her identity. She's been caught up in this world of lies that are being told."

His pastoral response demonstrated unconditional love while maintaining truth:

Travis: "I love you and I want you to be happy... God will make that work. Whatever you choose, God will make it work and there'll be opportunity for growth. But it is not the ideal."

Elite Networks and Power Dynamics

Brock Pierce Analysis

The conversation included extensive discussion of Brock Pierce and DC power dynamics:

Gary: "He kind of gave up on building anything useful. And now... He's just like, how can I be powerful?" Travis: "That's what it feels like now. I think he still wants to. But he's so cut up in the status... to be powerful, you have to have status."

Peter Thiel Critique:

Gary: "You have to be like Peter Thiel. Who?... Real politic... That's someone that officially knows how to spend his money to become king of America... He's our phenomenal financially... It's probably killing hundreds of thousands of people. Or tens of thousands. If he's actually powering a lot of the strikes. From the past. Israelis."

Travis's Response to Elite Corruption:

Travis: "That's just sickening, actually. It's sickening because of what it. Well, every. Everything like that has multiple ramifications and ripple effects on multiple people for generations. Definitely wrong."

Travis's Incubator Philosophy and Posse Program

Scaling Patterns vs. Organizations

Fundamental Philosophy:

Travis: "I don't think my thinking always gravitates. Towards, again, patterns that scale as opposed to organizations that scale... I want to see a good idea replicate. Right. I want to see a good idea replicate and infuse other ATP."

He used the biological metaphor of ATP (cellular energy currency) to explain his approach:

Travis: "ATP was a great idea that replicated and infused every cell. But App, there's no tax paid. Back to some ATP originator originary. The ATP production of every sale doesn't have to pay a tax to the original ATP creator."

Posse Program for Emerging Economies

Mission and Current Status: Travis described his work with emerging economies through church connections:

Travis: "Bring prosperity to emerging economies all over the world. As the church grows in other countries. There's lots of people that need truth. But they also need to make a living... We probably got a thousand employment at this point. Right after two years."

Apprenticeship Model Requirements:

Travis: "The only way I think it works is essentially an apprentice model. Where somebody comes in potentially with two people or three at a time... if I go to somebody and say, hey, you'll get some of my time. But I'm going to have these apprentices with me. They'll go, great. That's awesome."

Scaling Challenges:

Travis: "You can only do it so much. You can't commit to spending 10 hours a week with people. I mean, I've been able to commit maybe two hours a week reliably."

Leadership and Accountability Framework

Vision for Global Impact:

Travis: "To pull this off and employ 100,000 people and in the community of 20,000. Mentor leaders who want to do that. And are willing to be available."

Current Organizational Needs: Travis identified the need for more independent leadership:

Travis: "She's talented, but she's not an independent leader... She's a mother who's gone back in the workforce, and she's very good with the students. She works basically on this program as part of her spare time."

Truth Tech Incubator Collaboration

Tiffany Cianci Integration

Gary's DC Opportunity:

Gary: "Tiffany is going to be besides flying out for the things that. You've commissioned her. For. She's going to be mostly in D.C. in September. And she was like, If you don't really know where you want to be. Maybe hang out with some of my media people."

Travis's Enthusiasm:

Travis: "You could definitely have impact there. Definitely could have impact... Truth tech incubator is not a bad name."

Entrepreneur-in-Residence Framework

Travis's Proposal:

Travis: "What I would love to propose right? Is you becoming an associate and our incubator with a goal of building your own... Essentially almost like you're an entrepreneur. Residence at our incubator."

Dual-Track Support Model:

Travis: "You have those two threads of support. Like one. One is you're being paid to work for something else. The second is you're being invested in. To build something in the future."

Partnership vs. Individual Founding:

Travis: "We've realized. Which is actually to create partnerships. And this is just new because we used to put individuals on the founding elements of companies. But I think it works a lot better... to put a partnership as one of the founders in a studio company."

Relationship Development Philosophy

Three-to-Six Month Assessment Period:

Travis: "I like to see relationships that can don't live or die based on the trust connection between two people that's growing. Because I found that usually takes. I don't know, it could take three to six months. To really understand how people work together."

Learning from Bad Partnerships: Both participants shared experiences with challenging business relationships, with Travis noting:

Travis: "After taking money from people, it's not all the same. You get money from people that have become a pain or neck... There's some really bad ones now. There's some really good ones, too, though."

Documentation and Worldview Articulation Project

Gary's Faith Walk OS Demonstration

Gary demonstrated his personal documentation system, showing Travis his hyperlinked worldview repository:

Gary: "I wrapped a GitHub repository. Where I upload markdown documents. I made a rapper. That's very nice. And then it's easily forkable... I can help you pioneer. Mapping your brain. To hyperlinked... Repo."

AI Integration:

Gary: "You know, perplexity, right?... So look at the perplexity. Query. Like I just told it to dive deep into every file. In my GitHub repo. And tell me who I am."

Travis's Immediate Enthusiasm

Recognition of Value:

Travis: "This is actually a nice tool. Yeah, this is a good tool. I like this. I like. This is great. This is actually a really good. Gary. This is very concrete."

Understanding the Application:

Travis: "You have a way of translating your belief in God. Into action... It's just not documented. It should be documented... And you can decide what topics you want to talk about. First."

Collaborative Framework Development

Time Commitment:

Travis: "For me, it would be challenging. It's like, okay, how much could I give a week to doing this?... I could probably do. Like half a day. Two to four hours a week."

Integration with Podcast Strategy:

Travis: "Especially if it's in conjunction with preparing podcast episodes, right? Because that's part of what come out of this, too, is I can see this is these are podcast topics."

Divine Engineering vs. Practical Documentation

Gary's Strategic Pivot

Moving Beyond Divine Engineering:

Gary: "I've kind of moved on from. Feeling like the Divine Engineering thing is, like, the top priority. I think you said that you have a lot of things that you want to express."

Ghost Writer/Extractor Role:

Gary: "You're kind of paying me for my time and ability to make sense. Of what you're saying. And... Help you create documents... It's most like a kind of Ghost Rider extractor role, right?"

Travis's Content Priorities

Three Main Areas:

Travis: "There's two things that need it, like open teams... Where I don't have it is with posse incubator. And then kind of like, why these my own story. Like, why do I do this? Like, what drives me?"

Worldview Documentation Philosophy

Biblical Hyperlink Model

Gary's Inspiration:

Gary: "I'm inspired by the Bible. Right, which... is a hyperlinked document. Right. The Bible is hyperlinked. Right. A lot. Of topics keep coming off back and forth. But okay. We have different technology now. To communicate a worldview in language that people can understand."

Anti-Fragmentation Strategy

Critique of Social Media Information Diet:

Gary: "The fragmentation of bullshit ideas. Well. The flood of bullshit factoids. That people if they're on social media all the time. They're just, like, consuming nonsense... people that are not even entrepreneurs. They're good at social media. They just say a bunch. This is how you do business?"

Scientific Method Application:

Gary: "This is why it's not. It really is the scientific method. Right. Where? You're careful about trusting other people's science... You've racked up all this life experience that you can evaluate. Propositions on."

Organizational Communication Benefits

Reducing Meetings and Miscommunication:

Gary: "In the age of AI. There's no excuse for not. Communicating something very, very clearly. So that people. Have to have. So people can have fewer meetings... You want to be meetings? Do you want to be saying the same thing? Over and over again."

Preventing Business Partnership Failures:

Gary: "Why business partnerships. Get divorced. All the time. Is because people assume they're on the same page, but they're not. Right. And they think that they're beyond communicating what the expectations are about how to do xyz."

Truth-Based Leadership vs. Status Games

Pattern Recognition Through Experience

Travis's Validation of Experience-Based Wisdom:

Travis: "This is the challenge. It's very easy, and until you failed a little bit, honestly. Or at least you've walked next to somebody succeeded, and you understand what the hell they did it... You have to have more experience in this."

Internet as Evil-Checking Mechanism

Gary's Optimistic Framework:

Gary: "What I love about this time that we're in one of the benefits. Is. The Internet. I think it does create this. Check. On evil. More. Though it's not easy to construct good. It's easier to check evil."

Religious Integration and Truth-Seeking

Travis's Approach to Faith in Professional Context

Non-Exclusionary Truth Focus:

Travis: "My interest right now, I don't think I need to appeal to. I'd like to appeal the truth. Because to me, that's the thing I have in common with People don't believe like I do. We can still believe in truth together."

Practical Faith Application:

Travis: "I don't think belief in God is only for the hereafter. I think belief in God is for making this life better. So that's my personal view."

BYU Talk Reference:

Travis: "There's a talk I gave at BYU that's actually quite. Exposing in terms of my views on why I did what I did. And the role God played in that. That's the first time I've ever given a public talk like that."

Educational Philosophy and Soul of Learning

Gary's Critique of Standardized Testing

Systemic Problems:

Gary: "The default is orienting around standardized test scores, which itself, by the way, those are Frankenstein's monsters as well. Right. All these standardized test regimes. The product of a lot of weird compromise. Not like grand master plans."

Missing Purpose:

Gary: "We're also leaving our kids to try to figure out. What is the ultimate purpose of their education? Why are they being formed?... Why are they learning this random subject?"

Science as Divine Source Code

Reframing STEM Education:

Gary: "Physics and all these sciences and math. The source code of God. Right. The source code of creation. What a beautiful thing. You totally see it differently. Otherwise. Versus like, oh, this teacher is not even that interested."

Personal Transformation and Cultural Critique

Gary's Narrow Path Philosophy

Radical Selectivity:

Gary: "The life I'm choosing is like saying no to everything. And that is the narrow path... I'm now evaluating all of my relationships. And information on. Does this keep me on the narrow path? Or does it get me off?"

Peter Thiel as Antichrist Commentary:

Gary: "You have some other people like Peter Thiel that are very eager to get their world be out there. Right. He's doing an Antichrist. Lecture. My joke is that... I'm glad he's talking more about himself. And glad he's opening up. About who he is. As the antichrist."

Worldview Formation Critique

Frankenstein's Monster Metaphor:

Gary: "The way that people. Are developing. Their worldviews. Is just like Frankenstein's monster. Right. It's just like, hey, anyone who I am? And it's just like, literally, machine guns. Of random. Memetic stuff. In your brain."

Default Worldview Problems:

Gary: "People are so comfortable. Accepting the default worldview that is... The worldview. That is just like the default. Almost greed and power and trend, focus, worldview. That's on twitter."

Next Steps and Implementation

Contract Development

Gary's Commitment:

Gary: "I'll put together... Google Doc."

Travis's Enthusiasm:

Travis: "I love this a lot, Gary, and I'd love to help this, and this has really helped me, too, so let's do it."

Documentation Outcomes

Two-Track Approach:

1. Open Source Worldview Hub: Living repository of Travis's leadership philosophy and life wisdom
2. Internal Documents: Memos and strategic communications as needed

Force Multiplication Vision:

Gary: "I think this is just purely a force multiplier." Travis: "This gives me things I can actually point people to, and it lets me filter away the things, because if I could use this to help others grow ecosystems faster."

Spiritual and Personal Context

Gary's Baptism Plans

DC Symbolism:

Gary: "I guess it's cool to do it in the capital. DC I owe my life to this country. If my parents had. My parents had to go back."

Travis's Support:

Travis: "Whatever makes it work for your symbolism is perfect, is cool. It just adds to the meaning."

Historical Context Integration

Tiananmen Square Legacy:

Gary: "People. Constructed statues of Statute Liberty. In the protests... A lot of American flags... But in 1989, America's reputation was pretty much. As good as it would be."

Divine Timing Recognition:

Gary: "Allowing. American minded Chinese people to stay in America. Was a huge move. It's also why I'm alive. Today."

Strategic Implications

This conversation represents a major strategic convergence for both participants:

For Gary: Clear path toward truth tech incubator development with experienced mentor support, structured documentation project providing immediate value, and validation of his worldview articulation approach.

For Travis: Solution to his documentation and communication challenges, partnership with skilled content creator, and framework for scaling his incubator philosophy and patterns.

For the Broader Movement: Model for how experienced leaders can systematically transfer wisdom while supporting emerging entrepreneurs in building aligned ventures.

The conversation demonstrates sophisticated integration of personal development, business strategy, spiritual formation, and cultural critique, positioning both participants for significant impact through their collaborative documentation and incubator development initiatives.