Brian Thomas Clark

But there’s a whole universe that exists outside of your phone. All you need to do is turn away from the screen—even for just a short while—to understand that the culture of now is embedded in something much, much larger.

When we do that, we start seeing that our legacy from the past is an inherited treasure—and both offers us riches and imposes... See more

As anything scales too effectively - from fashion to restaurants to music - the market opens for more non-scalable alternatives. Once Starbucks opens on every block, many of us crave the artisanal coffee shop. Once our favorite Italian restaurant becomes a chain of three, we grow tired of it. Why? First, so much of what we buy and do is tied up in... See more

Complexity increases because adding is easy and removing is dangerous.

Whenever there's a problem, we add: a new person, requirement, or process. We never subtract.

Why?

Because everything that already exists has a champion. That clause in the tax code, that step in the process, that feature in the product ... someone fought for it, and they'll... See more

Educated people feel a duty to know these trends as part of cultural literacy. They don't buy Labubus, yet they join the "we" and descend into introspective angst about what Labubus mean for the state of "our" collective psychology.

As a general strategy for cultural consumption, omnivorism was very smart: Erecting artificial barriers against “low”... See more

There is apparently an epidemic of loneliness in the United States. Everyone from Kristen Radtke to Hillary Clinton has written about it. Explanations are far-ranging but mostly come down to the same things: our communities have splintered, work has consumed our lives, our social contract has broken down, the internet has destroyed our ability to... See more

Second, by not letting algorithms decide what deserves your attention. If you want to feel creatively and intellectually alive, stop mindlessly consuming the internet and start mindfully curating it. You need a space away from social media's compulsive rhythm, where your ideas can grow at their own pace.

Some companies have sought to alleviate the strain by offering sessions in mindfulness. But the problem with scheduling meditation as part of that working day is that it becomes yet another task at which you can succeed or fail. Those who can’t clear out their mind need to try harder – and the very exercises intended to ease anxiety can end up

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3. Maintain a standard

Jalen yelled at me a few times for not getting my eyes on coach Jay Wright. We used to have this thing at Villanova: When the coach was talking, we would yell “eyes” so everybody would quiet down and look at him.

I was a freshman, so I didn’t really understand how important it was. Jalen really got on me one time. “Eyes, eyes,... See more