My best writing happens when I don’t give a damn about the outcome. Most readers don’t give a damn either, so why should I? And when I get to that precious, devil-may-care, creative state of mind, the work I produce gets noticeably better—still not great, but...
People read stories because they want to feel. That’s good because writers write stories because they want to make people feel. Sometimes, however, they want it too badly, and so they start telling their readers what they should be feeling. See, this character’s...
So, my life has been a bit much lately. Between changing careers, moving to Berlin right before the pandemic, not knowing anyone here, and my wife’s cancer returning just in time for the second wave, there haven’t been many opportunities to live a good life. But the...
Marcus Aurelius opens his Meditations by reflecting on the qualities he admires in others. It’s a Stoic technique for understanding your core values and cultivating behavior that will help you become the kind of person you aspire to be. I wanted to share this with you...
I recently developed a habit of taking cold showers in the morning. It didn’t seem that strange until I realized that cold showers make no sense as far as the science of habit formation goes. Typically, a habit forms when there’s a repeat cycle of cue, want, behavior,...
