Why To Make Things

A collection for Paul Kirwin based on this prompt: “I’m a retired custom woodworker. I find community in the writings of others that have found satisfaction and comfort and value in the crafting of things. I’m not looking for ‘How-To Make Things’ books but more like ‘Why To Make Things’ books”

Alex Dobrenko

A chief gladness of gardening comes from its dual nature, from how it salves our longing for making order out of chaos but also frustrates it. There is elemental satisfaction in the reminder that we can never fully control nature — that, in fact, any sense of control is a childish fantasy, for we ourselves are children of nature, made by the... See more

The true expert does not perform in a state of effortless ‘flow’ | Aeon Essays

Barbara Gail Montero aeon.co

Working: People Talk About What They Do All Day and How They Feel About What They Do

Studs Terkel • 2 highlights

amazon.com

All I needed to hear when I was younger that the things I love were worth something. We live in the age of tooling and creation. There is no shortage of platforms and resources that make it easier for us to build, but there’s also a lack of cultural understanding around that turns young people off things they’re ridiculously good at and love, along... See more

Chia Amisola • In defense of disorder: on career, creativity, and professionalism - Chia's Blog

The Arc of the Practical Creator

Lawrence Yeo moretothat.com

The point of these lines is clear. In the old days, craftsmen did not cut corners. They worked carefully, and they took care with every aspect of their work. Every part of the product was considered, and each was designed and made to be exactly as it should be. These craftsmen did not relax their thoughtful self-discipline even with respect to... See more

Harry Frankfurt • On Bullshit

It is as if there were a natural law which ordained that to achieve this end, to refine the curve of a piece of furniture, or a ship’s keel, or the fuselage of an airplane, until gradually it partakes of the elementary purity of the curve of the human breast or shoulder, there must be experimentation of several generations of craftsmen.

Naomi Klein • Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman--Including 10 More Years of Business Unusual

Blending these two notions, carpentry entails making things that explain how things make their world.

Ian Bogost • Alien Phenomenology, or What It's Like to Be a Thing (Posthumanities)

People who experience flow describe it as “a state of effortless concentration so deep that they lose their sense of time, of themselves, of their problems,” and their descriptions of the joy of that state are so compelling that Csikszentmihalyi has called it an “optimal experience.” Many activities can induce a sense of flow, from painting to