I think the idea has a lot of potential. While I’ve done these with creatives, many times, we’ve learned the hard way, how to make them work.

If people are not committed to the same purpose – in our case stimulating our creativity - they turn into party times, bitch sessions, and what we call fuster clucks and jerkle circs which are a complete waste of time and money.

For us, these are intense mental and emotional efforts and reaching exhaustion is essential. Exhaustion lowers your defenses which leaves your brain open to fresh ideas and new ways of sorting out information and experience. A good night's rest and you wake up with a super energized creative brain.

A group of creatives doing the same kind of work we did was also a waste of time. To get really fresh, new ideas flowing, we needed as many creative disciplines as possible in the same room. Visual artists, writers, musicians, artisans, designers, architects, engineers, teachers, chefs, even public policy people etc. - anyone who does creative work will fuel creativity in other creatives.

And that leads to my third find this week. On Pushkin (Malcolm Gladwell’s podcast station), Michael Lewis, of Moneyball fame who demonstrated the power of thinking differently, is the host of a series of podcasts titled “Against the Rules”. Instead of Apple I listened via the NYTimes (3 articles a month free).

https://www.pushkin.fm/show/against-the-rules-with-michael-lewis/