Lisa Dunford Dickman

Creativity requires connecting the dots, and connecting the dots requires allowing time for my subconscious to consolidate my ideas and make associations. This means that, from time to time, I need to just stare out the window and do nothing.

This doesn’t feel productive, even though it is.

A large percentage of people’s problems in work, love and life are due to some combination of vagueness and passivity. You don’t know what you want to spend your time on; you don’t know what kind of person you really get along with; you don’t know what kind of clothing looks good to you; you don’t know what you value in a city; you don’t know how t... See more

I used ChatGPT to find role models who had tread this path before me. While I had feared that no one else had successfully combined being a writer with building a valuable business, I learned that I was wrong. Sam Harris, Bill Simmons, Kevin Espiritu, and several other creators had done exactly this—and well.

I hired Kate Lee as our editor in chief ... See more

Everyone who’s reading this has some kind of writing practice and most of us could benefit from putting more time into it. Starting this Substack has obviously changed my life and career, but the act of writing everyday for years has also changed me.

Steve Jobs energy transference was so strong it was labelled a Reality Distortion Field. He could bend other people's perception of reality with one interaction. I don't think this is some mystical woo-woo energy. It's a combination of intensity, frame, belief, body language, optimism and vocal tonality.