Introducing: Wayfinder

A writer collective exploring questions that matter

Y’all,

I know it’s been a little while.

As you might have guessed, quite a lot has changed in my world: I’ve gotten back into the business of holding a job. I’m preparing to welcome a small human into the world come September. And we’ve made the decision to move from California to Montana at the end of this year.

And, it’s pretty clear that my writing habit has suffered as a result of all these changes.

All that said, I’m excited to share an update today related to my writing and this newsletter. In the hopes that some of this helps me save face for the lack-of-actual-writing that’s been happening lately.

The update — I launched a writer collective!

I’ve joined forces with Shivani Shah and Mark Koslow, two wonderful humans (and writers) who I met through the On Deck writer fellowship, to launch a writer collective called Wayfinder.

The basic idea: We think the world needs more humble voices writing about life’s biggest questions. And we think writing together is way better than doing that alone. We’re excited to create a space for us, and other folks, to do just that. We’re calling it Wayfinder -- a writer collective exploring questions that matter.

Here’s how this will work: The short of it is that not much will change. We’ll continue to write independently, each as part of our existing newsletters, but we’ll now be doing it with more community, support and collaboration as writers. Wayfinder will simply be the home for our newsletters. Moving forward though, you can expect to find a whole lot more at Wayfinder: new writers, publications and forms of content. We’ll also be the first to admit that this is all a work-in-progress, so we’re excited to surprise ourselves along this journey.

How does this impact you: Most importantly though, for you as a reader, you should know that absolutely nothing will change. You will continue to receive this newsletter in your inbox, if you choose.

For today’s piece, I’m sharing our announcement post below. There you’ll find much more detail on why we’re doing this, what we’re doing and what you can expect going forward. And I hope you’ll check out the other Wayfinder publications: Stories by Shiv and The Middle Path. I’m confident you’ll like what you find.

And if you think this is cool, we’d love it if you could spread the word or come say hello on Twitter.

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Introducing: Wayfinder

Hi there!

Mark, Shiv and Harris here. 

We've been writing on the internet for some time now — here, here and here. We've come to realize that the world needs more voices writing about life’s biggest questions.

Why? Because we’ve found it hard, like really hard, to navigate these questions ourselves.

And it’s through the act of writing that we’ve found we can both best address these questions and ensure we’re even asking ourselves the right ones to begin with. For example, rather than asking “what are our hopes and dreams?”, we may be better served asking “why do we have these hopes and dreams?”. In other words, pushing ourselves to ask why rather than how.

That's why we're joining forces and launching Wayfinder -- a writer collective exploring questions that matter.

We’ll get into what a writer collective means shortly, but first...

What do we mean by matter?

It’s the big questions that direct our lives, oftentimes unknowingly.

The touchy feely stuff. The hopes and dreams that you can’t tell your manager. The conversations that trigger your uncle to shift uncomfortably in his seat at family dinner. The “alright, let’s have some real talk” types of discussions.

Happiness, meaning and connection.
Belonging, ambition and wonder.
Authenticity, identity and becoming.

While these topics are universal, we haven’t been able to find a dedicated place to explore them with other people.

And that’s where Wayfinder comes in.

We’re a group of writers here to offer up humble perspectives on topics that matter to us -- and that we believe will matter to others as well.

By writing about the questions we ourselves are grappling with, we hope to strike the match for some much-needed conversation. And maybe, even make someone else’s path just a little bit easier.

We’re wayfinders -- here to navigate our own journeys and provide companionship to others along journeys of their own.

Writing, like wayfinding, is better together

As writers, we know the sheer act of writing is hard. And we’ve learned that writing is even more difficult when it is done alone, just like wayfinding. To combat that, we’ll be doing this together as a writer collective.

Writing as part of a collective provides the opportunity to call on multiple perspectives in tackling these complex, and often abstract, questions. It creates a space where we regularly review, refine and edit each other's work so the quality of our writing -- and the resulting conversations around these topics -- naturally improves. Most importantly, it allows us to build community in tackling some of life’s toughest topics.

What you can expect to find at Wayfinder

Here are the publications you'll find writing for Wayfinder today:

• The Middle Path: A biweekly download from Mark Koslow focused on books, meditation, personal growth, and wrestling with life’s big questions

• Stories by Shiv: Biweekly synthesis by Shivani Shah looking at patterns across seemingly unrelated narratives as a way to develop a deeper understanding of the world around us, and ultimately, the life we live

• Harris's Newsletter: Regular ramblings from Harris Brown about the process of becoming

Each of our publications sends out its own regular newsletter. As a reader, it’s totally up to you to decide which publication you’d like to subscribe to. This could be any one of them, or (we hope!) all of them. By housing our newsletters under Wayfinder’s collective model, we hope to add depth, nuance, and color to the topics we’re writing about. 

Moving forward you can expect to find a whole lot more at Wayfinder. New writers, publications and topics. Different forms of content, like interviews and podcasts. And collaborations amongst the Wayfinder team. We’ll also be the first to admit that this is all a work-in-progress, so we’re excited to surprise you, and ourselves, along the way.

Wayfinding alone is hard, so get involved

Wayfinding is harder alone, so if any of this resonates and you'd like to get involved, we would love to hear from you. 

Also, come say hello on: Twitter | Instagram

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🤘,
Harris