⏸️ March: pausing, playing, and painful shoulders
Hi there,
March is a funny mix of a month. Super slow in some areas, but gathering pace and momentum in others. A bit too warm still, but starting to feel that familiar chill in the suddenly-rather-dark mornings.
It’s also been a month of celebrating birthdays, movies, hanging out, playing card games with friends’ kids, writing, having really fun podcast conversations, learning I’ve actually done my right rotator cuff some damage (and therefore can’t surf or climb for a couple of months), and just kind of finding the rhythm of the year.
Small news: I’m going to take a short pause of this newsletter. It’s one of my favourite things that I write, and I love sharing musings and music and movies and material for reading with you. However, the combination of;
a book project that needs some extra time and momentum, and
the fact I’m about to make a big house move (more on that another time)
mean that I need to channel my writing time and energy into those things.
However! I have started another Substack to accompany the book (hence needing more writing energy to get that started well).
It’s called How to Friend. I’m not automatically signing all of you up to it, because I don’t think that’s cool. But if you’re interested in case studies, experiments, conversations, and provocations about modern adult friendship, then I’d love to see you over there.
As a sneak peek (because I like you), a couple of upcoming topics of include; meeting the parents of friends, the role of romance in friendship, cross-generational friendships, new definitions of friendship, and some ‘conversations with…’.
The first piece is called Mind the Nap: Friendship Across the Parenting Divide, about what happens to friendships when all your friends start having kids and you are living a childfree life. It had a really wonderful response through public comments and a lot of DMs.
I’m planning to be back here in June. Please keep me posted on what you’re reading, listening to, thinking about. And hopefully I’ll see you over at How to Friend HQ in the meantime.
Disappearing into a writing bunker,
Steph
PS. To borrow from Austin Kleon, this newsletter is 'free but not cheap'. You can support their ongoing creation and keep me in books by buying me a coffee as a 'thank you', recommending it to a friend, or using any affiliate links in the email.
🔥 The it list 🔥
Current obsessions and things I’ve enjoyed over the summer.
Playlist - Side Project Sessions: A lot of writing time has resulted in a lot of listening to this throwback playlist, which six years on is STILL a go-to whenever I need to GSD.
Documentary - Baraka: As part of my quest to watch 50 films this year, but faced with a Saturday night where I wanted something that I didn’t have to concentrate on a narrative of, I watched this 33 year old beauty. It’s hard to describe, but despite it being a few decades old, and film production technology moving on, it’s as breathtaking and impactful now as it was in 1992.
Netflix - Adolescence: Along with 24million+ other people, I have devoured this British drama. The acting is incredible. The one-shot production of each episode is mind-bending and so tense. But most importantly, the subject matter is so incredibly necessary. In lots of ways it’s heartening to see the reaction to the subject matter. Essential watching for all parents, no matter how old your kids are.
Substack - On Things by Madeleine Dore: Madeleine always has a slightly creepy way of finding her way into my brain, and several of her latest newsletters have had me sending screenshots of quotes and ideas to friends with the caption ‘oof’. Read it
📚 What I’ve been reading
Evenings and Weekends by Oisin McKenna
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫
SO good. I loved the tension of the overlapping lives, the relatable millennial existential dread, the familiar senses of London in the summer, and the way that Oisin captured the inherently complexity of life. Great.
Reads in progress
🔜 Just Enough Evil by Emily Ross and Alistair Croll
So far there’s some cool examples of novel, creative, outlandish moves in marketing / advertising and product design, but just struggling with more business book type content at the moment.
🔜 This Other Eden by Ben Elton
Satirical / dystopian fiction covering topics like a climate apocalypse, inequality, corporate greed, and influencer culture. Despite being written in 1993, it’s terrifyingly relevant.
On the DNF pile
🚮 Clear Thinking by Shane Parrish
I really like Shane’s work and rate his thinking, but I just found the half of the book I read a bit… meh.
👋🏻 Some places I popped up recently
Podcast - The Future with Friends. The most fun podcast I’ve recorded, and such a treat to be the first guest on my friend Simon Waller’s brand new podcast, that has a very fun format. Listen on Spotify or Apple.
App - The People Spot: Each month I pop up in the audio tracks of the People Spot app sharing a few interesting signals about the future. These audio clips are included in the free download (iPhone only) and you can use the code STEPHC for an additional two months free access to the full content library in the app.
Learna - Learna is a new learning app for organisations to break the cycle of drudgery in their approach to learning. Organisations and teams I know who use it love it, and I’ve also got three modules on the platform. *Exciting news*: you can now download the app and sign up without needing your workplace to sign up for you! Apple | Android