Hi friends,

We're exactly halfway through our biggest Write of Passage cohort yet, and something's seriously different this time around. We're focusing even more on helping students publish their articles and the focus has led to a quantum leap in student engagement.

These stats stand out:

1. As a cohort, we've published 340 articles in the first two weeks.
2. Over 70% of the beginner writers in this cohort have published a piece for the first time in their life.
3. Every draft has received feedback from a trained editor with an average turn-around time of 19 hours. 500 drafts.

Journaling isn't enough. Note-taking isn't enough. Reading isn't enough. The Internet only goes to work for you once you start publishing your ideas.

If you spend a lot of time reading newsletters like this one and find yourself wanting to finally share something yourself, we're running a Writing Sprint on November 3rd.

You'll write and publish something in one day. The only prep you need is to think of an idea you want to write about. We'll help you write it, refine it, and share it with the world.

How I Write

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Riva is one of the freest writers I know.

It’s as if the boundaries of conventional thinking don’t apply to her. She’s allergic to dogma and passionate about questioning the taboos of our time, and her obsessive research gene has given her a knack for stumbling upon forgotten and under-explored ideas.

If you feel constrained in your writing or thinking, this episode is for you.

I hope this conversation frees you from the trappings of your mind, unleashes your creative spirit, and lifts your head up to a divine calling.

(Listen here: Apple | Overcast | Spotify)

Today's Finds

​Rilke's Poetry: Promise me that you won't listen to this lecture in a daze. It needs quiet, stillness, and solitude. I like the idea that any sufficiently enlightened person is immediately poetic. Poetry is a byproduct of wisdom, not a Thesaurus, and poetry exists at the frontier of language where words reach out into wordlessness. Rilke's advice to aspiring writers is to seriously consider if they want to pursue the craft, and if the answer is yes, he admonishes them to spill their soul onto the page no matter the consequences. Turn inward, he says. Embrace solitude. When the pain inevitably comes, endure it. Doing so requires an inner sense of sturdiness, and if you don't have one, you'll have to depend on publishers for advice and validation, which is a road to nowhere. If you're itching for more Rilke, pick up this Stephen Mitchell translation of his poetry. If you're really feeling ambitious, listen to Rilke's poetry in the original German to get a feel for the timbre of it.

​How French Art & Decor Inspired Walt Disney: The book I go to whenever I need design inspiration. Walt Disney famously made multiple trips to Europe and pulled from French aesthetics while animating movies and architecting Disneyland. Gothic Revival architecture shows up in Cinderella, medieval influences show up in Sleeping Beauty, and Rococo styles show up in Beauty and the Beast. The Met Museum in New York also did an exhibition on this topic and made the core writings free for public consumption, and it also produced a 26-minute video overview of the exhibition.

​Jordan Peterson, on Music: One of the most beautiful descriptions of music I’ve ever heard. Peterson argues that music is multiple patterns layered on top of each other, just like the structure of reality — which is made of patterns as much as objects. Thus, music is an analog of the structure of existence itself. Music also represents life by putting you on the border of chaos and order because good music is predictable enough to be coherent but unpredictable enough to surprise you.

Interlinear Bible: I've started doing my New Testament Bible studies with an interlinear text so I can see the original Greek translation. The benefit of having so many translations is that you can see how Scripture is interpreted for different audiences; the drawback is that the original meanings can be tainted by culture. Scripture shouldn't be read through the lens of culture; culture should be read through the lens of scripture. I use the NASB translation because the authors try to stay faithful to the original text. This habit has also introduced me to some fascinating Greek words. My favorite is Archegos, which means three things: (1) author, (2) ruler, and (3) founder. How could the same word mean all three things? An Archegos is the head or beginning of something. To live like one is to lead change and bring new ideas into the world. The American founding fathers come to mind. With a pen in hand, they set the frame for what the United States would become.

​Pace Layers: How fast should change happen? Stewart Brand makes a compelling case that it depends on what "layer" you're talking about. A well-functioning society has stable layers and unstable ones. Each one should be able to evolve at its own pace. Nature should be more stable than culture, which should be more stable than governance, which should be more stable than infrastructure, which should be more stable than commerce, which should be more stable than fashion. The idea of Pace Layers was born out of architecture theory. A home follows the same general pattern. The site of a home is more stable than the foundation, which is more stable than the room arrangements, which is more stable than the furniture, which is more stable than the stuff on the kitchen counter.