Hey, I’m Chad Moore. You’re getting this email because you signed up for Where Light Gathers, a campfire you can sit at to talk about creativity, and the highs and lows of being someone who makes things. If this isn’t working for you, simply unsubscribe.

I appreciate you reading this.

A quick note before we begin

I’m not tracking you in any way, other than seeing your email address when you subscribed. I’m starting this newsletter to get things out of my head and into the world, not to monetize you. If I can build relationships with readers, that would be great. Because relationships are what inspire and challenge us all. I’d like to know more about you, so hit reply and let me know if anything in this email resonates with you.

Campfires, Streams, and Gardens

I came across this article on how to think about all the digital things in one’s life. It really resonated with me, and I decided to format my newsletter with these concepts.

Campfires

Some of the things I’ve sat around the digital campfire and talked about with folks.

Your Stories

How to start a website and/or blog without code, at reasonable costs.

Ive shipped the Your stories project. For a long time I’ve been thinking on how can I share what I know about building websites with people. I’m not a programmer, and these days most simple sites and blogs don’t need the services of a programmer. Programmers are creative and love to solve hard problems but we live in a time where there are good, relatively cheap tools available for folks who aren’t super technical.

With the closure of public performance venues, people are left without a place to connect. With all the things in my head about websites and blogs, I thought I’d share to see if anyone could find these tools helpful. To help them build something online in place of, or to augment what they would usually do.

Humans require connection, expression, and empathy. Without places to gather to share a story or tune, we are cut off from what we need most, at a fundamental level. We need people’s stories in their voices, now more than ever. I wrote a series of blog posts that may help folks share and connect.

The first problem is finding these tools, then, secondly learning how to use them. I cover both topics in this series. I don’t get a cut if you use these tools I recommend, and I’m not charging you or profiting off your data in any way.

Your Stories

1. Part one, We need your stories
2. Part two, Design
3. Part three, your website
4. Part four, your blog
5. Part five, Pointing, reading, and robots

I hope these articles can inspire people to do cool things online. If you make something, or have questions, let me know.

Streams

Some of the things that I’ve found when dipping my toes into the digital streams.

Problems

I’m reading Mark Mason’s book The Subtle Art of not Giving a F*ck:

To paraphrase him: Happiness isn’t a state. It’s action. Identifying, evaluating, solving, mitigation, or trading up of problems. Problems will always exist. How you deal with them is the work and reward.

My leg has been bothering me, so I started running again. I’ll trade the pain of shin splints over the potential pain and trauma of another blood clot in my leg. That’s an easy trade. Real, temporary pain over potentially harmful medical issues.

Gardens

Planting seeds, and helping them grow into ideas.

Doodles

I’ve read that humans process images 60,000 faster they they do text. And that people who doodle while learning tend to recall more information than those who do not. So I picked up the habit again about a year ago.

I follow the sketchnoters mantra of “Ideas not Art”.

Recently I participated in a post a quote a day challenge over on micro.blog. For two of the days, I did a doodle to accompany the quote. Here they are.

The above quote is attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt.

That’s it for now. Thanks for reading. Id love to know what you’re up to. Send me a reply, and let’s talk.

Until next time, take care.

Chad