In the early 1900s, a popular Parisian newspaper had a habit of dreaming up big questions and asking celebrities to chime in.
One question asked, “What do you think would be the ideal education to give your daughter?” Another asked, “Do you have any recommendations for improving traffic congestion in Paris?”
In the summer of 1922, the paper put out a big question:
An American scientist announces that the world will end, or at least that such a huge part of the continent will be destroyed, and in such a sudden way, that death will be the certain fate of hundreds of millions of people. If this prediction were confirmed, what do you think would be its effects on people between the time when they acquired the aforementioned certainty and the moment of cataclysm? Finally, as far as you’re concerned, what would you do in the last few hours?
The last person to send their reply was Marcel Proust — author of the monumental work In Search of Lost Time. His response is like a sword of wisdom, cutting through all lies, stories, and excuses we have for not living a wonderful life.
This Is Proust Typing
I think that life would suddenly seem wonderful to us if we were threatened to die as you say. Just think of how many projects, travels, love affairs, studies, it—our life—hides from us, made invisible by our laziness which, certain of a future delays them occasionally.
But let all this threaten to become impossible forever, how beautiful it would become again! Ah! If only the cataclysm doesn’t happen this time, we won’t miss visiting the new galleries of the Louvre, throwing ourselves at the feet of Miss X, making a trip to India.
The cataclysm doesn’t happen, we don’t do any of it, because we find ourselves back in the heart of normal life, where negligence deadens desire. And yet we shouldn’t have needed the cataclysm to love life today. It would have been enough to think that we are humans, and that death may come this evening.
Proust reminds us to ask ourselves real questions and get our priorities straight.
In today’s world, our mortality is a great source of fear when, truly, it should be the reason behind our joy, the fuel to our fire.
As this year nears its end, I encourage you to reflect on the projects, travels, love affairs, and studies “made invisible by your laziness,” and I invite you to shine a light on them and pursue them a reality like your life depends on it — because it does.
Since I graduated college — almost a decade ago — I’ve struggled to maintain a daily meditation practice. This month I’m challenging myself to meditate for 30 days straight as a way to build momentum as we head into the new year. If meditation (or prayer) is a habit you also want to cultivate, I invite you to join me over the next 30 days. And if you want to build a different habit, I say make a plan, start now, and step into 2025 with a mountain of evidence proving how badass you are.
Since I started building my online presence and creative business, my ideas have reached millions of people. I’ve worked with some pretty rad brands. And I’ve even made some cash simply by emailing my shower thoughts to strangers on the internet.
This is not a flex, but a reminder. If I did it, you can do it, too.
Unlike many creators who flaunt vanity metrics (which, most of the time, are fake numbers to sell you something), I’m here to let you in on a little secret.
There’s one thing I’ve learned after being in the digital marketplace for almost a year: People will lie and manipulate for a few follows, a couple likes, and a quick buck. I think I knew this intuitively before committing to sharing my ideas online, and it’s part of the reason I hesitated — I didn’t want to have to deceive others for my work to spread. Luckily, I figured it out
Maybe you’re in a similar boat — thinking it’s finally time to hop online and build your brand; maybe you’ve already started but aren’t seeing results; or, if you’re like most people, maybe you just don’t know where to start.
Let me tell you where not to start and what not to do so you can attract the right eyeballs without wasting your time, money, and resources.
The biggest lie floating around the creator space (other than fake vanity metrics) is that to grow online, you must engage with big accounts in your niche — a lot and often. When you comment on a big influencer’s post and “add value,” you expose your ideas to thousands of their followers. The hope is they’ll see your “valuable” comment, engage with it, and, if you’re lucky, give you a follow.
At first glance, the strategy seems pretty solid. It’s sound. Steal other people’s audience.
Makes sense.
However, it took me a while to realize this approach was actually a plot by big influencers to stay big, own the niche, and push small creators out.
Big accounts know exactly what you’re doing when you pose as a sage in their comment section trying to “add value.” They know you’re just using them to get your work in front of their audience, and they don’t care. In fact, they want you to. The more you engage, the more the algorithm pushes their content, helping them grow their audience even more, while you stay stuck where you are — another pawn in their strategy.
When you overestimate the attention of the influential few, it’s easy to underestimate the influence of the many.
The growth strategy above works well for creators with massive followings, but for smaller creators, it overlooks a key insight you must leverage if you want to build a cult-like following: the influence of the average person.
The truth is that everyone is an influencer. Sure, the degree of influence varies, but everyone has influence.
Community isn’t built because a few influencers followed you or commented on your post. Community is built when you see, respect, and appreciate the influence of the average person.
Big accounts can bring awareness to your work. No doubt. But it’s your ability to convert those eyes that determines the fate of your work.
How do you do that?
You stop focusing on trying to get a head nod from big influencers, and instead, you focus on gaining the trust and influence of the average person.
Care about the person with no followers as much as you do about the one with 100,000, and watch your work spread like butter on warm toast.
In 1934, a young aspiring writer by the name of Arnold Samuelson hitchhiked from Minnesota to Florida, looking for a mentor to help him level up his writing. The author he chose was none other than Ernest Hemingway.
Although Hemingway was not impressed with Samuelson’s writing, he respected his dedication to improving his craft. Unfortunately, Hemingway had plans to leave Florida on his boat, Pilar. But as luck would have it, Hemingway invited Samuelson to join as part of the crew.
Samuelson was thrilled.
While at sea, Samuelson had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pick Hemingway’s brain. In one of their interactions, Samuelson asked, “How can a writer train himself?”
Hemingway replied, “Here’s a list of books any writer should have read as a part of his education… If you haven’t read these, you just aren’t educated. They represent different types of writing. Some may bore you, others might inspire you and others are so beautifully written they’ll make you feel it’s hopeless for you to try to write.”
This is the list of must-reads Hemingway handed to Samuelson:
The Blue Hotel by Stephen Crane
The Open Boat by Stephen Crane
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
Dubliners by James Joyce
The Red and the Black by Stendhal
Of Human Bondage by Somerset Maugham
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Buddenbrooks by Thomas Mann
Hail and Farewell by George Moore
The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Oxford Book of English Verse
The Enormous Room by E.E. Cummings
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
Far Away and Long Ago by W.H. Hudson
The American by Henry James
Hemingway’s must-reads for the aspiring writer
There you have it. Some great titles to add to your to-be-read list (TBR) that will make you a better writer, storyteller, and intellectual. But I’d be damned if I ignored the fact that Hemingway’s list lacks the touch of feminine genius, with Emily Bronte being the one and only woman author on his list.
So, I want to leave you with a few literary classics written by women to make sure you get a well-rounded education.
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
In 2019, Hinge launched an ad campaign that transformed the dating world.
This campaign was inspired by a simple yet profound observation: people were not happy with online dating.
Hinge’s research revealed a deep frustration with modern dating. People were sick of one-night stands and tired of swiping. They wanted real, long-lasting connection. Out of that insight, Hinge’s famous tag, “The dating app meant to be deleted,” was born.
This revelation and articulation of the insight led to a new dating experience, and Hinge, with over 28 million users and more than $400 million in revenue, became the fastest-growing dating app.
The key takeaway? Powerful insights inspire remarkable creative work, improve customer experience, and increase your odds of success.
What’s insight?
Insight = Information + Interpretation
An insight is a revelation hidden in plain sight. It expands and deepens our understanding of a problem by shining a new light on what’s familiar — what we thought might be common sense. It’s the gold that great creative entrepreneurial minds extract from company data and the world around them to make great work that looks and feels good and gets results.
Let’s play a game.
I tell you the insight. You tell me the brand.
Ready?
The insight: People don’t just buy sportswear; they buy a mindset. Fitness is more than a physical activity — it is about personal transformation, overcoming resistance, and striving for greatness.
What’s the brand?
If you thought Nike, you’re correct.
The Just Do It mindset is largely responsible for Nike’s rise as a global powerhouse.
Another good example is Mailchimp’s “Empower the Underdog.”
The insight: Small business owners don’t just need email marketing — they need someone who believes in them and helps them look professional. This insight transformed Mailchimp from an email service into a $12B marketing platform for small businesses.
Strong insights lead to strong concepts. Strong concepts lead to remarkable creative work. Remarkable creative work leads to a more profitable, fulfilling, and successful business.
Lucky for you, you’re only two steps away from better insights.
A Two-Step Process for Better Insights
Step 1: Gather information
To draw insights, you first need to talk to your target market. Insights come from observations, remember?
Direct (and indirect) conversations with your target market are crucial. You can use several methods for gathering important information:
Interviews: One-on-one interviews for an in-depth understanding of individual experiences and perspectives.
Focus groups: Facilitate group discussions to observe interactions and trends and gather diverse opinions.
Casual conversations: Don’t sleep on the informal, day-to-day conversations with friends, family, and coworkers who represent your target market.
Ask open-ended questions. Encourage people to share their thoughts, feelings, and behaviors related to your work.
And please, don’t let your lack of friends or introversion stop you from gathering information. You can expand your search by looking to other sources for information. To name a few:
Online reviews: Customer reviews on Yelp, Amazon, and Facebook offer honest feedback. Pay attention to the language used and look for patterns in compliments and complaints.
Social Media: Stalk your competitors. Assess the tone of posts, follower interactions, and post engagement. Search social media for similar products, brands, or topics to see how people talk about them.
Opinion pieces: Newspapers and magazines can present insightful perspectives on culture and society. The titles and opening sentences of these articles can be particularly revealing and lead to powerful insights.
These are all great ways to collect valuable data on your target audience. Data you’ll alchemize into valuable insights.
Step 2: Analyze and Synthesize Information
Once you’ve collected your data, you need to analyze and synthesize your findings.
Look for patterns: Identify recurring themes, sentiments, and behaviors across the different sources. I noticed many creatives were frustrated with sleazy marketing tactics and overwhelmed by business jargon. So, I launched this series to help artists think like entrepreneurs.
Identify unusual observations: Pay attention to surprising or unexpected findings. These could be unique product uses, unconventional opinions, or contradictory behaviors. If I’m a ceramicist and notice customers buying my mugs not for drinking but as planters, I’m going to create a special line of planters with drainage holes and matching saucers.
Pay attention to strong emotions: Insights often emerge from strong feelings of joy, frustration, fear, or desire. Look for comments and behaviors that reveal these underlying emotional drivers.
Articulate the insight: Once you’ve identified a potential insight, articulate it as a clear, concise statement. This statement should capture the essence of your discovery and reveal a truth about our humanity. For example, the observation that people feel sad after finishing a delicious meal could be articulated as: “The last bite of a delicious meal is a sad moment.”
Final Thoughts
The best creative entrepreneurs are insightful, consistently drawing inspiration from the world around them.
Extracting valuable insights takes practice, but the more you dig, the better you’ll become at discovering the creative gold that leads to fulfilling and profitable work.
Justin Bieber has been heavy on my mind lately — how young he was when he got a taste of fame, his DUI, the company he kept around, his battle with depression, drug use, faith, his current state.
I’m worried about him — but that’s beyond the scope of today’s post.
Today isn’t about Justin. It’s about the creative process behind one of his hit singles —a song he didn’t even write — and the importance of leaving your ego outside your creative sanctuary.
You might not know this about me, but music is dear to my heart.
Most people fall in love with writing because of great novelists, essayists, and poets. For me, it was the great lyricists. It wasn’t Hemingway, Orwell, or Plath. It was Wayne, West, and Shakur who made me fall in love with the art of putting words together and telling stories.
Last week, I found a video documenting the creative process behind Justin Bieber’s hit single, Love Yourself, which essentially is a masterclass on the creative process taught by Ed Sheeran and Benny Blanco — two dudes who can manipulate and direct creative energy like goddamn air benders. I replayed it three times, and I’m not even a fan of Justin, Ed, or Benny.
What caught my eye was Ed’s openness to feedback, Benny’s musical intuition, and the fact they made the song in their pajamas, in the back of a bus, driving through Australia — a reminder that creativity thrives in unexpected spaces, especially when you’re willing to get out of your own way and leave your ego at the door.
This video is more than a behind-the-scenes of the making of a successful song. It’s a painting of what’s possible when you give yourself permission to make a mess, have fun, and, most importantly, be honest.
With his immersive storytelling, irreverent prose, and unflinching political criticism, Hunter S. Thompson transformed the world of journalism. His revolutionary approach, coupled with his need for chaos and a daily routine responsible for his success and self-destruction, immortalized him as one of the wildest ink-stained wretches in American history.
3:05 p.m. Chivas Regal (whiskey) with the morning papers, Dunhills (cigarettes).
3:45 p.m. Cocaine
3:50 p.m. Another glass of Chivas, Dunhills
4:05 p.m. First cup of coffee, Dunhills
4:15 p.m. Cocaine
4:16 p.m. Orange juice, Dunhills
4:30 p.m. Cocaine
4:54 p.m. Cocaine
5:05 p.m. Cocaine
5:11 p.m. Coffee, Dunhills
5:30 p.m. More ice in the Chivas
5:45 p.m. Cocaine, etc., etc.
6:00 p.m. Grass to take the edge off the day
7:05 p.m. Woody Creek Tavern for lunch-Heineken, two margaritas, coleslaw, a taco salad, a double order of fried onion rings, carrot cake, ice cream, a bean fritter, Dunhills, another Heineken, Cocaine, and for the ride home, a snow cone (a glass of shredded ice over which is poured three or four jiggers of Chivas.)
6:00 a.m. The hot tub-champagne, Dove Bars, fettuccine Alfredo
8:00 a.m. Halcyon (sedative used to sleep)
8:20 a.m. Sleep
E. Jean Carroll writes, “I have heard the biographers of Harry S. Truman, Catherine the Great, etc., etc., say they would give anything if their subjects were alive so they could ask them some questions. I, on the other hand, would give anything if my subject were dead. He should be. Look at his daily routine.”
E. Jean would get her wish about a few years later.
Cause of death: suicide.
Thompson’s chaotic routine was, without a doubt, a cry for help, but it was also the fuel for some of his most iconic work.
I’m not telling you to exchange self-development for self-destruction. But in a world obsessed with optimization and productivity — where gurus preach 5 AM alarm clocks, ice baths, and every trend — take a page out of Thompson’s book and do whatever the fuck works for you.
SANTI VILLANUEVA
