April 20th, 2024: Greetings from Austin. I hope everyone is having a beautiful week. This week’s issue is a grab bag of stuff I stumbled upon this week. Thanks to Chris James for hosting the Boston meetup this week and Thomas Hollands for the one in London.
Sometimes when I start worrying about whether my business is a good idea or not I try to remember the people that I've seen over the years who consistently put out interesting, thought-provoking, just generally GOOD work, and how few of them there really are. It makes me feel more confident that I'll be fine if I just keep at it. This was a great reminder of that; thank you!
Great issue Paul. I'm looking forward to watching this interview with David, especially after watching the opening trailer where you say, "If you haven't cried yet you haven't written enough." Thank you for being who you are in the world and leading conversations about work and communicating with such authenticity.
I agree that all of this competition is a great incentive to put out great work. I think for me the future has to do with exploring ideas that light me up both personally and professionally and then just hitting publish. At the very least I find that sorting through and summarizing my ideas is fulfilling and the best case scenario is that I will slowly build an engaged audience who will benefit from my work and perhaps even pay something for the value that they receive. This is a labor of love and I think focusing on the numbers too much takes away from the sheer love of creating. Sure the numbers are important, especially if we are trying to make living. But I try to focus on why I came out here to write in the first place which is for the love of writing and thinking more deeply about things.
Hi Paul! About schools, apparently the same thing is happening in Quebec, Canada although our numbers are way lower. 5-7% absenteeism before the pandemic, now 10%.
Potential causes: kids who simply don't want to go to school and parents are giving up, parents traveling with their child with grades in the 30%. School anxiety / Performance anxiety are also on the rise according to a researcher.
Paul - it looks like you and I were on parallel paths in our editions this week, thinking about how to twist and tweak the algorithm to serve us! Thank you for including that interview.
Hi Paul. Another great newsletter. Regarding getting our thoughts on where we are spending our time, what we are reading, I reflect on what is keeping my attention at the moment. I think we all go through phases of no social media for a bit, or different newsletters we enjoy and then unsubscribe. I always look at it as what do I need right now? What are my goals, where can I draw inspiration? I think many of us who have been loyal to you is that you are always honest, straightforward and transparent. You give us things to strive for with our writing and ambition, challenging how we want to live our lives. I also enjoy the community you have built and hearing from others in that space. It's not IG trying to sell me things or show me beautiful pictures. It's not a newsletter that is trying to sell me on their product. It's simply a place for me to be heard and also hear from others. Keep up the great work, we all so appreciate you!
"Once you are trying pajama day, you are fighting a losing battle." LOL "What comes next? I have no idea. I guarantee you’ll see campaigns to reverse this but I suspect it will only make matters worse." lol again.
I'm glad that legacy institutions are losing credibility and people are looking elsewhere and forging new ways. For my kids, when they turn twelve or thirteen, their main assignment will be to create a business. Create products and services. And that will be the medium for learning many things, and will select for what is useful to know. The "why" will be crystal clear. The prospect of making money, or actually making money, is an excellent motivator.
I don't see this happening in government-run schools.
Actually, one my favorite class at UConn Business School @davidnobletalent had that assignment: create a business and make some money. We went around campus tuning students' bicycle, like a mobile bike shop, and made some cash!
Sometimes when I start worrying about whether my business is a good idea or not I try to remember the people that I've seen over the years who consistently put out interesting, thought-provoking, just generally GOOD work, and how few of them there really are. It makes me feel more confident that I'll be fine if I just keep at it. This was a great reminder of that; thank you!
Playing to the algorithm feels like the creator’s version of the “default path.”
Great issue Paul. I'm looking forward to watching this interview with David, especially after watching the opening trailer where you say, "If you haven't cried yet you haven't written enough." Thank you for being who you are in the world and leading conversations about work and communicating with such authenticity.
I agree that all of this competition is a great incentive to put out great work. I think for me the future has to do with exploring ideas that light me up both personally and professionally and then just hitting publish. At the very least I find that sorting through and summarizing my ideas is fulfilling and the best case scenario is that I will slowly build an engaged audience who will benefit from my work and perhaps even pay something for the value that they receive. This is a labor of love and I think focusing on the numbers too much takes away from the sheer love of creating. Sure the numbers are important, especially if we are trying to make living. But I try to focus on why I came out here to write in the first place which is for the love of writing and thinking more deeply about things.
Hi Paul! About schools, apparently the same thing is happening in Quebec, Canada although our numbers are way lower. 5-7% absenteeism before the pandemic, now 10%.
Potential causes: kids who simply don't want to go to school and parents are giving up, parents traveling with their child with grades in the 30%. School anxiety / Performance anxiety are also on the rise according to a researcher.
Source (in French): https://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/education/2024-04-23/presque-10-d-absents-en-classe.php
Paul - it looks like you and I were on parallel paths in our editions this week, thinking about how to twist and tweak the algorithm to serve us! Thank you for including that interview.
https://tiltthefuture.substack.com/p/care-to-comment
Hi Paul. Another great newsletter. Regarding getting our thoughts on where we are spending our time, what we are reading, I reflect on what is keeping my attention at the moment. I think we all go through phases of no social media for a bit, or different newsletters we enjoy and then unsubscribe. I always look at it as what do I need right now? What are my goals, where can I draw inspiration? I think many of us who have been loyal to you is that you are always honest, straightforward and transparent. You give us things to strive for with our writing and ambition, challenging how we want to live our lives. I also enjoy the community you have built and hearing from others in that space. It's not IG trying to sell me things or show me beautiful pictures. It's not a newsletter that is trying to sell me on their product. It's simply a place for me to be heard and also hear from others. Keep up the great work, we all so appreciate you!
"Once you are trying pajama day, you are fighting a losing battle." LOL "What comes next? I have no idea. I guarantee you’ll see campaigns to reverse this but I suspect it will only make matters worse." lol again.
I'm glad that legacy institutions are losing credibility and people are looking elsewhere and forging new ways. For my kids, when they turn twelve or thirteen, their main assignment will be to create a business. Create products and services. And that will be the medium for learning many things, and will select for what is useful to know. The "why" will be crystal clear. The prospect of making money, or actually making money, is an excellent motivator.
I don't see this happening in government-run schools.
Actually, one my favorite class at UConn Business School @davidnobletalent had that assignment: create a business and make some money. We went around campus tuning students' bicycle, like a mobile bike shop, and made some cash!