If You're Curious
Welcome to my latest experiment.
The short version: lists of books/newsletters/publications/organizations/conferences/events/festivals/people/podcasts/think tanks/institutes/consultancies/research labs/communities to read/follow/subscribe to/listen to/join/learn from/attend for the purpose of learning, organized by oddly specific categories but generally relating to digital sociology+future of work+business+entrepreneurship+leadership+sociology+psychology+culture and society+technology+design+the arts+data.
The long version: I missed the readings and discussions and paper writing of my undergraduate media theory classes. I missed having a steady flow of high quality content that kept me thinking critically, learning new ideas and perspectives, and developing an interdisciplinary, global, and flexible mindset.
So I’ve been opening newsletters and clicking links and purposefully yet organically discovering content and sources of that content and writing it all down on a list.
But, in order for that list to be of any use, it needs to have categories or subjects around which to group the content. That's what I've done here, I've organized it.
It’s probably also important to note that I have not read all of these books, read every edition of every newsletter, listened to every podcast. They’re on my list, because I heard or learned about them somewhere or had them recommended to me.
Maybe they’ll make it onto your list too. I hope you find your things that you’d rather spend your time consuming than scrolling endlessly on social media.
If you want to really nerd out over language and its nuances
If you're interested in material that belongs on a syllabus for a college course on Television and Culture
If you want to better understand your emotions
- Explore The School of Life [organization]
- Read articles from The Book of Life by The School of Life and subscribe to their newsletter [digital publication + email]
If you want to read poetry that will make you think and feel
If you want to consider issues of gender at work from an academic perspective
If you want to read/watch/otherwise consume a fascinating story that actually happened
If you want to understand the psychology and big money business behind capturing your digital attention and the implications of that on your interactions with your screens
If you want to inspire your ambition
- Subscribe to Momentum from Next Gen [weekly Monday evening email]
If you want to read about reading
If you want to reflect on friendship from a psychology-sociology-business perspective
If you want collections of short essays that will make you feel more connected to a shared human experience
Writing for writers
Writing for everyone, regardless of whether or not you identify as a writer
Data, with regard to online dating
If you want to learn about human decision making from a science-psychology-behavioral economics perspective
How to actually rest
Critical analysis of the culture we live in, and how to build the society of the future
- Subscribe to Culture Study by Anne Helen Petersen [twice weekly email]
- Engage with offerings from the Aspen Institute, particularly the Aspen Ideas Festival [organization, conference]
Ways of organizing our society around the consideration of how intertwined business success, human livelihood, and the future of the planet truly are
- Explore the House of Beautiful Business [platform + community]
- Subscribe to Beauty Shot from the House of Beautiful Business [weekly Sunday email; click link and scroll down]
- Subscribe to the Conscious Learning Tribe newsletter [weekly email]
If you're really into walking
Fiction that will make you think about aspects of shared human experiences through specific lenses
If you actually really like your job but still want to set healthy boundaries and learn about work-life balance or blend or dance or whatever you want to call it
If you want to stay up to date on what intelligent voices of Gen Z are saying, so that you don't look down on people younger than you and wall yourself off from potentially learning from what they have to say
- Gen Yeet
- High Tea
Children's books
If you want to learn about resilience
If you want to think about and be inspired by the intersection of startups, creativity, and human-centered work
- Subscribe to Check Your Pulse by Sari Azout [weekly Sunday email]
- Explore Startupy, also by Sari Azout [project]
Ideas from the overlapping spaces of technology, design, media, culture, art, and the future
- Subscribe to Dense Discovery [weekly Monday email]
- Subscribe to For Your Senses from The Slowdown [weekly Saturday morning email]
If you want to be more intentional about designing gatherings and bringing people together in new ways
- Subscribe to The Art of Gathering by Priya Parker [monthly email]
- Read The Art of Gathering, also by Priya Parker [book]
- Listen to Together Apart, also by Priya Parker [podcast]
The intersection of work and psychology
- Subscribe to Granted by Adam Grant [monthly email]
- Subscribe to the Pink Newsletter by Daniel Pink [every other Tuesday email]
Inspiring ideas about personal growth
- Listen to Unlocking Us with Brené Brown [podcast]
- Read Untamed by Glennon Doyle [book]
- Subscribe to Raptitude [email]
- Subscribe to Seth's Blog [daily morning email]
- Subscribe to Zen Habits by Leo Babauta [email; click link and scroll down]
Inspiring ideas about what it means to be a human being [who is part of a society]
- Listen to On Being with Krista Tippett and the initiative's other radio shows/podcasts [audio/podcast]
- Explore On Being in general [organization/initiative]
- Subscribe to the Sunday Newsletter and the Midweek Newsletter from Brain Pickings by Maria Popova [email; click link and scroll down]
- Read Aeon Magazine and subscribe to the newsletter [digital magazine + email]
News at the intersection of business and technology
- Subscribe to The Hustle [daily email]
- Subscribe to Morning Brew [daily email]
- Explore additional content from Morning Brew [additional emails, podcasts]
Designing physical spaces for humans
- Read Dwell Magazine [print and digital magazine]
Philosophies on leadership of the future
- Subscribe to the Human Works Design newsletter [email]
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