SG

'We wrote long and published short and by doing that Joan learned to write,' Talmey told the New York Times. ... 'It was at Vogue that I learned a kind of ease with words, a way of regarding words not as mirrors of my own inadequacy but as tools, toys, weapons to be deployed strategically on a page.'"

Choose joy. Choose it like a child chooses the shoe to put on the right foot, the crayon to paint a sky. Choose it at first consciously, effortfully, pressing against the weight of a world heavy with reasons for sorrow, restless with need for action. Feel the sorrow, take the action, but keep pressing the weight of joy against it all, until it beco... See more

"You are better equipped to deal with stress when you are moving.

When you feel tense or frustrated or worried, it is difficult to think your way into feeling better. The more you think about the situation, the larger it becomes in your mind. Trying to think your way out of it often leads to a spiral of overthinking and rumination.

The first step i... See more

Every page was once a blank page, just as every word that appears on it now was not always there, but instead reflects the final result of countless large and small deliberations. All the elements of good writing depend on the writer’s skill in choosing one word instead of another. And what grabs and keeps our interest has everything to do with tho... See more

Mental Model of the Week

V2 | Chemistry | Alloying

Alloying is the art of mixing elements to create something greater than the sum of its parts. While our intuition tells us that pure substances are best, alloying shows this is not always true. One plus one can equal ten. By blending ingredients in precise proportions, metallurgists can create mate... See more

That existence is scarcely to be termed life, which does not bring us into intimate connexion with our fellow-creatures.

Words have more power than any one can guess; it is by words that the world’s great fight, now in these civilized times, is carried on; I never hesitated to use them, when I fought any battle for the miserable and oppressed. People are so afraid to speak, it would seem as if half our fellow-creatures were born with deficient organs; like parrots th... See more