Cait Oppermann

Better social nutrition

Social media feels like the “empty calories” of human connection. I’m filling my cup with connections, but they lack nutrition. They’re social donuts.

In its place, I’ve spent most of my social time in intimate and often vulnerable 1-1 conversations, usually while on walks in the woods.

I’ve been more present with my wife,... See more

also think we need to learn to enjoy locality. Culture emerges from the connections between people, and I believe these are always strongest in person. Face-to-face cultural engagement is necessarily participatory, online cultural engagement rarely is. Nearly all of my most fulfilling and exciting experiences, those that have made me feel part of a

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Write on the internet.

Find or create a

third place.

Pick up the phone.

Join niche interest groups.

Live, don't lurk.

Embrace candid culture.

Put people you care about on the calendar.

Don't play near black holes.

Meet people at farmers markets.

Learn to communicate.

Make wobbly things. Subscribe to local events calendars.

Learn to win friends.

Learn to feel.

Em... See more

Creativity: “I can’t get new ideas staring at a blank page. Creativity, for me, requires motion. When you go on a walk, you can turn your world into an idea-generating sensorium, and ideas will spring up from the most unlikely sources. There is one thing that’s absolutely certain about creativity: It’s an active process, not a passive one. The best... See more