sparks

A lot of people believe they’re “principled” when they’re actually just rigid. And the rigidity is making them boring as fuck .

And I don’t mean boring in the harmless way, like “prefers routine” or “goes to bed early” boring. I mean boring in the spiritually stale way, where talking to them feels like interacting with a pull-string doll from the... See more

In 1984, every sneaker brand was competing to sign 21-year-old Michael Jordan. The front-runners were Converse and Adidas. Jordan wore Converse in college and during the 1984 Olympics. And in high school, he said, “My favorite shoes were Adidas.” George Raveling, an assistant coach for the 1984 U.S. Olympic basketball team, had a long-standing... See more

Knowing What Motivates You

Have you ever heard the expression “That really pushes my buttons”? The notion that there is a particular set of things that uniquely motivates a person has always been a very powerful one with me. I don’t always have the best handle on what I want in life, but I have enough introspection to know where my buttons are. A... See more

Bodies are Eating the World

Up from the ground comes a great swell of bodies. Running, lifting, bathing, shaking down, thinning out and waking up, bodies have taken over popular culture. Huberman is the biggest podcaster in the nation. One in eight Americans have tried GLP-1s. Seed oil discourse has created a new physical purity drive. Van der... See more

What’s Missing Says More: The Semiotics of Omission

We spend our lives surrounded by signals. Most of them are obvious—what someone says, what they wear, the metrics a company puts in a slide deck. But some of the most telling information comes not from what’s there, but from what’s missing.

A woman on a dating app with only headshots is probably... See more

don’t know how else to explain it except to say that when I make time to read, my capacity to deal with my own life — and my own bullshit — expands . My natural tendency to be tightly wound loosens its grip.