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Setup GuideStep 2: Set Up Your Vault

Step 2: Set Up Your Vault

Your vault is where the system stores everything it knows — about you, your workflows, your goals, and everything it learns over time.

What you’ll need: Claude Code installed (Step 1 complete).

Time: About 15 minutes.

What’s a Vault?

Analogy: Think of your vault like a well-organized filing cabinet. It has specific drawers for different types of things:

  • Projects drawer — things you’re actively working on
  • Areas drawer — ongoing responsibilities (health, finance, career)
  • Resources drawer — reference material you might need later
  • Archive drawer — completed or paused items

This system is called PARA (Projects, Areas, Resources, Archives), and it keeps everything organized so the system can find what it needs instantly.

                  ┌──────────────┐
                  │  Your Vault  │
                  └──────────────┘
                         │
      ┌──────────┬───────┴───────┬──────────┐
      │          │               │          │
      ▼          ▼               ▼          ▼
 ┌──────────┐ ┌──────────┐ ┌──────────┐ ┌──────────┐
 │ Projects │ │  Areas   │ │Resources │ │ Archives │
 │  Active  │ │ Ongoing  │ │Reference │ │Completed │
 │   work   │ │   life   │ │ material │ │  items   │
 └──────────┘ └──────────┘ └──────────┘ └──────────┘

2.1 Create the Vault Structure

Open your terminal and type:

mkdir -p ~/Vault/{_System,0_InnerContext/Self_Context,1_Projects,2_Areas,3_Resources,4_Archive}

What you should see: No output (that’s normal — it means it worked).

Verify the structure was created:

ls ~/Vault

What you should see:

0_InnerContext  1_Projects  2_Areas  3_Resources  4_Archive  _System

2.2 Create the System Directories

These folders hold the tools and configurations the system uses:

mkdir -p ~/Vault/_System/{Commands,Agents,Hooks,Scripts,Skills,Settings}

Verify:

ls ~/Vault/_System

What you should see: Agents Commands Hooks Scripts Settings Skills

2.3 Set Up Claude Code’s Directory

Claude Code needs its own configuration directory. Create it and connect it to your vault:

mkdir -p ~/.claude/{commands,agents,hooks,scripts,skills}

2.4 Connect Your Vault to Claude Code

Create links so Claude Code can find your vault’s tools:

ln -sf ~/Vault/_System/Commands/* ~/.claude/commands/ 2>/dev/null
ln -sf ~/Vault/_System/Agents/* ~/.claude/agents/ 2>/dev/null

What are these “links”? Think of them like shortcuts on your desktop. They let Claude Code find files stored in your vault without moving them. If you add a new tool to your vault, Claude Code sees it automatically.

Obsidian is a beautiful app for viewing and editing your vault files. It’s free.

brew install --cask obsidian

After installation, open Obsidian and:

  1. Click “Open folder as vault”
  2. Navigate to your home folder and select the Vault folder
  3. Click “Open”

What you should see: Obsidian opens with your vault structure visible in the left sidebar.

You don’t need Obsidian to use the agent system — it works entirely from the terminal. But Obsidian makes it much easier to browse and edit your knowledge base.

Checkpoint

ls ~/Vault/0_InnerContext && ls ~/.claude/commands

What you should see: The vault’s inner context folder exists, and the Claude Code commands directory is set up.

All good? Move on to Step 3: Tell It About You.

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Step 1: Install Claude CodeStep 3: Tell It About You