Monday Memo #18
Write yourself into a novel.
The Monday memo is food for thought to fuel your week.
Hi everyone,
This week I’d like to talk to you about situations.
We are not just human beings, we are beings in situations. We always exist in a context. Right now, you and I are both living in situations. To be in a situation is to be human.
Today I want you to think of a situation you are in, maybe something you’re struggling with. It might be that you see the situation as fixed, unchanging, unchangeable. Maybe you don’t know what to do about it.
A couple of weeks ago I challenged you to look at your life as scenes in a movie. This week I would like you to see yourself as a character, a protagonist, in a situation.
Exercise.
So here’s your exercise for the week. Write up your situation as if you were in a novel. The protagonist (that’s you) is facing a difficult situation. What does the character think about? How do they choose to act? What happens next?
This exercise is a way of looking at the situation by getting some distance from it. By writing a story about your situation, you can explore different ways of thinking about it, different kinds of actions, and different consequences.
Remember: you’re not doing any of these things. You’re just writing a story.
If you have time, write the story in three different ways. Three different choices, three different outcomes. See what happens.
Updates:
Collaboratories.
Our Collaboratories are like a conference, spread out over the course of a year. Twenty-four workshops, on the first and third Wednesday of every month.
This Wednesday we will join Mike Rohde in a Collaboratory about sketching projects. Mike is a designer, author and artist, and friend for many years. He wrote The Sketchnote Handbook and he’s a brilliant sketcher and teacher. It’s happening this Wednesday, April 17th, from 9 to 10:30 AM Pacific, (that’s Noon to 1:30 PM Eastern, 5 to 6:30 PM GMT).
Upcoming Collaboratories will feature guests like Dan Klyn, Ingrid Lill, and Jorge Arango.
Collaboratories are free for members. Members also get access to recordings and AI summaries. Become a member today.
Campfire calls.
Our Friday Campfire calls are free to join, anyone is welcome, and we talk about things that are fueling our creative energy and inspiring us. The energy is infectious. Even if you’re stuck, or don’t feel like you have anything interesting to add, if you have the time, join anyway. I promise you’ll enjoy it. Instructions to join the Friday Campfire and/or add it to your calendar.
We are running an AsiaPac Campfire experiment.
We are conducting a four-week experiment to see if there’s interest in an AsiaPac Campfire call. This will be held on Saturday mornings AsiaPac time, at 8 am IST, 10.30 am SGT, 1.30 PM AEST. This works out to Friday evenings at 7:30 PM Pacific, 10:30 PM Eastern. So a Friday late-night treat if you want to join from the US. More info here.
Collaboratories.
Collaboratories are held on the first and third Wednesdays of every month. They are free for members. Members also get access to recordings of previous collaboratories and the full email archive. You also get a warm and fuzzy feeling of being part of a community and supporting our work. It’s only $20/month or $200/year, kinda like Netflix for Possibilitarians. Become a member by upgrading your subscription.
The Collaboratories are a great way to connect on a regular basis and sample ideas of interest to our members in a fun, interactive, mini-conference format. We are planning upcoming Collaboratories with Mike Rohde, Dan Klyn, Ingrid Lill, Jorge Arango, and Mike Parker.
As of this week we have 59 members. The first 100 members will lock in the $20/month, $200/year rate.
If you’re already a member, thank you. You’re making this possible.
More information for members is below.