Love & Work
A notebook about how we work, learn, love and live.

Futures Thinking
"We don’t have to passively wait for the future; we can actively shape it."



"Actively consider what future your organization is prepared for. Assumptions about the future are always being made, in everything from the products sold to the way an organization is structured. When you are designing anything, you are creating a fragment of the future.

"Three questions to ask about your organization's future:

• "What is your organisation’s ‘official’ future? How does your organization imagine the world in 5, 10, or 25 years?

• "For what conditions is your organisation optimised? In what future scenarios will your organization thrive?

• "For what possibilities or scenarios are you prepared? If the future looks different, how will your organization function?" - Stuart Candy

Article: How to Create Positive Futures


Mediation, Learning
"Who you are is not your fault, but it is your responsibility," and other insights learned on a mediation cushion

“This is Sayadaw U Pandiita. He was notorious for his unwavering belief that enlightenment is possible in this lifetime and his ruthless expectation that students get there. We slept 2-5 hours a night. No reading, writing or speaking. Lot’s of pain. Lot’s of insight. Let’s get into it.” - Cory Muscara

Twitter Thread: I Meditated 15 hours a day for 6 months straight with one of the toughest Buddhist monks on the planet. Here’s what I learned:

Art, Craft
"What if the Declaration of Independence had been written as an email?"



As a kid, as his friends relied on screens to both read and write, Jake Weidmann focused on writing with a pen on paper. Today he is the youngest “Master Penman” in the United States by three generations, and there are only twelve. His work is slow, careful and surprisingly fluid. For some of his work, his pen never leaves the paper. Some of his other work is so detailed that it takes more than a year to complete. On his Twitter feed he describes craft as preserving the past while forging the future. The first of these links is an inspiring short film about his life and discipline, and the second a longer TED talk about the legacy we leave behind.

Video: Master Penman Jake Weidmann | HUMAN

TED Talk: Jake Weidman: In a World of Instant Gratification, Don't Forget Your Legacy


AI, Writing, Teaching
"If an algorithm is the death of high school English, maybe that's an okay thing."



John Warner has been teaching writing at the college level for more than 20 years. During that time he has become an articulate critic of why most college kids can't write, pointing a finger at standardized tests at the middle and high-school levels.

"Rather than having students wrestle with the demands of trying to express themselves inside a genuine rhetorical situation (message/audience/purpose)," he writes, "they were instead producing writing-related simulations, utilizing prescriptive rules and templates (like the five-paragraph essay format), which passed muster on standardized tests, but did not prepare them for the demands of writing in college contexts."

So he sees technology like ChatGPT as an opportunity. "Many are wailing that this technology spells 'the end of high school English" meaning those classes where you read some books and then write some pro forma essays that show you sort of read the books, or at least the Spark Notes, or at least took the time to go to Chegg or Course Hero and grab someone else’s essay, where you changed a few words to dodge the plagiarism detector, or that you hired someone to write the essay for you. 

"I sincerely hope that this is the end of the high school English courses that the lamentations are describing because these courses deserve to die, because we can do better than these courses if the actual objective of the courses is to help students learn to write."

"...I’ve been thinking about these things for years, so I have a head start on others, but let me be clear ChatGPT has not created a problem that wasn’t already present."

Article: ChatGPT Can't Kill Anything Worth Preserving

Related Article: Now That ChatGPT is Here, Can We Please Let lorem ipsum Die?


Creativity
Productivity is not the same as creativity.



"If we asked you to name the ideal attributes of a creative person, laziness would rarely come up as a positive trait. But creative worth, and in turn personal worth, have too long been connected to productivity. Individuals are unfairly judged on the amount of work they produce (and how frequently), when in fact developing a creative idea requires stepping back for a moment. Sitting on it, opening up a new tab and browsing, taking a walk or kicking back while the idea simmers somewhere else – whatever it takes to come back with fresh eyes." - Lucy Bourton

Article: Is “Laziness” the Key to Creativity? The Lazy Report Argues for the Art of Kicking Back


Media
True fans write the best fanzines.



"Nothing thrills me more than attending the NY Film Festival. I used to hitchhike from Provincetown, Mass. in the 1970s and sleep on the couch of the late, great Cookie Mueller (ironically featured on the Nan Goldin poster for this year’s festival). Each day I would head uptown to Lincoln Center and gorge myself on movies. I think the only year I missed the festival (besides during Covid) was when I was having surgery on a broken leg and even then I yearned to crawl on my hands and knees for my fall season movie fix. This year has an extraordinary line-up from favorite directors and new discoveries, and even a restoration of The Mother and the Whore, a movie that really represents the kind of cinematic daring I come to expect from this glorious festival." - Dennis Dermody

This week my friend Jude Armitage wrote me a note about one of his other friends. It is worth sharing.

"I have a favorite friend named Dennis Dermody. Dennis lives in NYC and is a best friend of John Waters and the most important drag queen of all time, Divine herself. In fact (real fact) Dennis and John will join Divine in her burial plot in Baltimore when the time comes - yes, all three together. 
 
"Peruse Dennis's website - you will find that he is a one-man review machine of amazing filmography - ghoulish, grotesque and totally legit alike. He is also a close friend of Willem Dafoe and was the nanny for his children. I predict that you will find fodder for your work here. Do Google Dennis extensively. He is full of surprises."

Website: Original Cinemaniac, Movie Reviews by Dennis Dermody


Visual Identity
A humorous interpretation of some common brand logos



"Although these illustrations are made digitally, they possess a similar feeling to a drawing made on old parchment paper. (Artist Ilya) Stallone maintains this vintage feel by using thick black lines around the subjects, and placing each logo against an old paper-like background. And in case the new motifs aren't clear, Stallone usually adds the name of the brand in a Medieval font to complete the effect.

"You can keep up to date with Stallone's latest work by following him on Instagram and Twitter." - Margherita Cole

Article: Famous Brand Logos Are Reimagined as Medieval Art Illustrations


One-liners

Article: ​Louvre Decides to Limit Daily Entries to Give Visitors a Better Experience.​

Article: California Floods: Aerial Images Show The Scale Of Damage Across The State.

Article: Why do we get our best ideas in the shower?

Article: Survey: The four-day workweek is new standard for 40% of companies.


Playlist



Two weeks ago I featured the signer/guitar player Anna Moss performing on the streets of New Orleans with her band, The Nightshades. She's got a great voice and is a soulful stylist. So this week I went hunting for more. I was thrilled to find her performing Son of a Preacher Man, a song made famous in 1968 by Dusty Springfield, with the equally groovy Rainbow Girls. 

Video: "Son of A Preacher Man" - Rainbow Girls ft. Anna Moss

Website: annamossmusic


Image of the Week

The image of the week is titled Singer, 2014, borosilicate glass, by Micah Evans.

He is one of 56 artists working in glass featured in the show, Fired Up: Glass Today, currently hung at the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art in Hartford until February 5. 

Debbie and I went to the show last weekend and were dumbfounded by the vision and craft curated there. This piece had special meaning as it is a rendering of the artist's mom's 1956 Singer straight stitch, a machine that Debbie relies on in her own work today. 

About the machine, Evans said: "I can track that back to this memory of Christmas when my mom opened this present and then started crying. I looked, and it was this old sewing machine and I'm going like, wow, man, she must be pissed dad bought her this old broken sewing machine. My dad, my mom, they were in some vintage shop and she noticed it and it was like this is the sewing machine like her mom and grandma learned to sew on. And my dad, being the amazing man he is, remembered that, found one, and got her this sewing machine, still the machine you uses to quilt today. So I made this thing."

What's Love & Work?
Love & Work is the weekly newsletter by me, Mitch Anthony. I help people use their brand - their purpose, values, and stories - as a pedagogy and toolbox for transformation.