👋 Hello! I'm Nate Kadlac, and this is #55 of Plan Your Next. It’s a newsletter that connects design, creativity, and how you prepare for your next thing.
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Good morning from Los Angeles!
As you’re reading this, I’m right in the middle of launching my first cohort-based workshop, called Approachable Design.
It’s been taking shape over the past 6 months, ever so slowly. It first started while holding open office hours to talk about design, then continued through conversations about how to best harness my own skills.
But then it stalled.
The creative mindset is a blessing and a curse. If you’re open to new ideas and naturally curious, it’s inevitably going to lead you in a lot of directions. Creative thinking blossoms through play, practice, and experience.
Before I knew it, I had 5-6 ideas I wanted to chase. That I still want to chase.
I came across yet another online course called, The Minimalist Entrepreneur by Sahil Lavingia. Sahil is the founder of Gumroad and an early designer at Pinterest.
One night, he designed a pencil icon and tried to sell it online.
But, in 2011, he had difficulty finding a place to sell a digital asset like an icon, so he built Gumroad in a weekend to do just that.
A mantra Sahil often repeats is, “Just start. Learn later.” He pushed us to break down ideas into their simplest form and to find ways to charge customers immediately to test if something is worth paying for.
Armed with early validation, the other ideas started to fade away temporarily while I devoted more time and energy to what Approachable Design could be.
Accumulating ideas can feel like you’re making progress, but until you start charging talking with potential customers, you might be spinning your wheels.
By starting now, and learning later, you skip all of the excuses that might be holding you back from taking action on something sitting right in front of you.
Even if Approachable Design leads nowhere, it won’t ever be bouncing around in my head screaming, “What if?”
And remember, my calendar is always open to talk about your crazy ideas.
Just start. Learn later.
⚡️ Inspiration for this week
🎨 The second renaissance of creators
Jack Conte, CEO, and co-founder of Patreon, says the stigma of being a starving artist will disappear over the next 10 years. (H/T Jesse Desjardins)
“Creators are about to have leverage. They are about to have a choice. Global creativity is about to be financed and celebrated to a degree that’s going to make the first renaissance, a blip in the history book.”
🌈 90% of decision making comes from emotion, not logic
Adam Hayes describes ways to integrate emotional design into your experiences, using the AIDA method.
🛠 The Weekend Woodworker
Someday, when I have more time and money, I will be devoting some of it to this course on woodworking. I know my buddy Pete could teach this in his sleep, but maybe he should instead create a course around it?
👋 See you next Sunday
If you’ve forgotten who I am, here’s a little bit about me. As always, my calendar is always open to chat about your crazy ideas or if you’re creatively stuck.
And if you’re creatively stuck because you ran out of coffee, save 10% on Flow State coffee. Flow State uses l-theanine and raw cacao to lower anxiety and support creativity. (Affiliate link)
Have a great week,
Twitter: @kadlac
Web: kadlac.com
[PYN #55] Just start; learn later