15/05/2026
I figured out why Claude was burning through my tokens so fast.
And it was costing me a lot.
At one point, I spent over $100 in a single week.
Top up after top up.
Prompt after prompt.
Watching tokens disappear while Claude kept scanning my codebase, trying to understand what I was building.
It was frustrating.
I thought the problem was Claude.
It wasn’t.
The real problem was that I was asking an AI to work on a project with no map.
Imagine hiring a senior developer and dropping them into your codebase with no documentation, no architecture notes, and no explanation of your business logic.
They would spend hours reading files and making assumptions before writing a single line of code.
That’s exactly what AI does when your project lacks structure.
Then I made one simple change.
I documented my project.
I added a `README.md`.
📄 README.md tells the AI:
• What the project does
• Folder structure
• Business logic
• Setup instructions
• Core architecture
Then I added a `CLAUDE.md`.
🧠 CLAUDE.md tells Claude:
• Coding standards
• Commands to run
• Architecture patterns
• Things to avoid
• Preferred workflow
Everything changed.
Claude stopped guessing.
It understood my project almost immediately.
It created clear task lists.
Executed features step by step.
Followed my architecture.
Made fewer mistakes.
And most importantly:
My token usage dropped significantly.
That’s when I realized something powerful.
These files are not just documentation.
They are training manuals for your AI coding assistant.
Without documentation, AI is guessing.
With documentation, AI works like a senior developer who already knows your system.
If you’re a developer or vibe coder building with Laravel, React, Next.js, Django, Node.js, or any large project, this one habit can save you time, money, and frustration.
Document your project once.
Let AI build with confidence forever.
