Sample Edition

👋 Hi, hello. How are ya?

This week in Flourish we have some seriously delectable brain food for your nourishment and pleasure.

There are two great posts, some ‘aha’ worthy book snippets, and some practical things (yes, homework!) you can do — to build toward a significantly more satisfying life.

Enjoy!

☕️ Food for Thought

“Because the universe naturally slides toward disorder, you have to expend energy to create stability, structure, and simplicity.”

Read: Entropy: Why Life Always Seems to Get More Complicated

All great works require great editing...

Read: The Art of Creative Self-Editing: From Basic to Brilliant Content

💡 TLDR: Things that make you go hmmm

No time for whole books? Here are a few quick snippets instead.

All quotes were clipped from So Good They Can't Ignore You — by Cal Newport

"You need to get good in order to get good things in your working life, and the craftsman mindset is focused on achieving exactly this goal."

"Great work doesn't just require great courage, but also skills of great (and real) value."

"The traits that define great work are bought with career capital."

"Because of this, you don't have to worry about whether you've found your calling - most any work can become the foundation for a compelling career. But certain jobs are better suited for applying career-capital theory than others."

"Three Disqualifiers for Applying the Craftsman Mindset

1. The job presents few opportunities to distinguish yourself by developing relevant skills that are rare and valuable.

2. The job focuses on something you think is useless or perhaps even actively bad for the world.

3. The job forces you to work with people you really dislike."

"Most individuals who start as active professionals change their behavior and increase their performance for a limited time until they reach an acceptable level. Beyond this point, however, further improvements appear to be unpredictable."

"This learning is not done in isolation: You need to be constantly soliciting feedback from colleagues and professionals."

"Do projects where you'll be forced to show your work to others."

"You have to get good before you can expect good work."

"Do what people are willing to pay for."

Go’on, read ‘em again.

🧠 System Upgrade

Tech Stack

So...ya’ll love a good rec list, ey?

Well, here is my current tech stack and what each thing is for.

• Squarespace - Website (I do prefer WordPress, though)

• Google Workspace - Remote office

• Convertkit - Email marketing, payment processing, shopfront

• Typeform - Surveys and worksheets

• Zapier - Connecting tech tools

• Zoom - Communication, coaching, and workshops

• Circle - Community and gated content

• Loom - Video hosting and quick record/edits

• Canva - Graphic design

• GoDaddy - Domains and hosting

• iMovie/GarageBand - Editing and post-production

• Reflect - Writing and... research :)

• Notion - Digital organization

If you have any questions about any of them, my email is open.

Getting stuck on tech decisions is the worst.

So I’m happy to help.

🥇 Self-coaching: ask yourself this…

What technical upgrade can I undergo to make my life easier in some way?

All it takes is one small tweak to your current system — to transform the way you run your day, your week… your year.

So today, consider something you’ve been avoiding investing in. Then think about what’s been holding you back.

Whether it’s the time to cover the learning curve, money to pay for it, or energy to stick to using it — pinpoint the reason for your resistance.

Now, is the ultimate payoff — of more time, energy, or money in the future — worth being a little worse off right now?

If yes — it might be time to pay for the upgrade.

🎬 That’s a wrap

Hopefully, something resonated this week 😌

Thanks so much for reading. Let me know if you like a resource in particular or have anything to share.

And remember — you can. End of story.

Ps. I get a lot of questions about becoming a better writer.

(And rightly so! Given that writing well is a career-defining skill.)

So I thought I'd share one of the resources I *still* use every time I write a new article. It's a free downlaod from my old writing coach Jon Morrow:

​Headline Hacks: A "cheat" sheet for writing blog posts that go viral​

Headlines (whether it's for a blog post or an email subject line) need to be attention-grabbing.

And the only thing that makes you better at writing them—is practice.

I guarantee this cheat sheet will help with that.

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