Dear Reader, This is my monthly update email. Just like companies send updates to their investors, I send updates to you.
I am grateful for you.
Right now I am sitting in my room after a wild weekend of work and sports, blinking the sleep from my eyes and wandering my way through this reflection. There are flowers made of books in a jar on my desk, and a siren wailing on by.
The contents of this update are:
1. TLDR
2. The month in a story
3. Decisions I made
4. Actions Taken
5. Gratitudes and Reflections
6. Feedback Requests
7. A Poem
TLDR: Completed The Sonder Series, Decided What’s Next For Me
My Last Month In A Story
1 month ago I was in sitting in a leather bucket bar stool looking out my window into the green backyards of my neighborhood. The sun was trickling through the leaves of trees, and I felt free.
1 month ago I was at 60/100 people for The Sonder Series. I blew past that goal by changing the goalpost to 100 interviews and ended at 125 people.
I walked 180 miles total, much of it in the first weeks of this month. That’s the length of Manhattan 13 times.
As a cherry on top I did a potluck for everyone I interviewed and gave them cards with all 100 interviews and a poem on them. I spent the week leading up to the potluck editing every single one of the 100 videos.
This weekend I helped project the Knicks first NBA finals win in 53 years on the side of an apartment building.
Then watched people fight on the Front Lawn of the White House while I worked on the launch post for the series.
Decisions Made
Continue past 100 people to 100 interviews
To do a potluck for everyone I interviewed
What’s Next: A business in education
Actions Taken
- Interviewed 45 more people
- Transcribed all conversations with 125 people and created a report
- Edited all 100 interviews (uploading all to YT rn for launch later this week)
- Executed a potluck with invites to all 125 people.
- Decided what’s next and did preliminary research on Alpha.School
Reflections and Gratitudes
- The Stats from the Sonder Series
- “Our point of reference for beauty is nature” - Rick Rubin
- The Tree falls the way it leans. Be Careful which way you lean. - The Lorax
- Awkwardness is an under explored emotion
- “It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.”
—Theodore Roosevelt
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910
Feedback Requests
Who do you know who’s working in education?
What’s your favorite education innovation?
What else would you like to see in these updates?
What’s your favorite experiment you’ve run on your life?
A Poem - Great Trees and Greenspaces
Middle of Manhattan, sunny day buildings surround, windows look down Clouds abound above a spot of green Many people, much to say Dresses, shorts, hats, no-hair Smiles, frowns, boots, flats In a rush, on a walk, single, in a pair Tourists, Locals, all rare, cool dat Flower boxes, book carts This is a city full of art Tattoos, clothes, architecture, orchestra Horns honk, buses brakes squeal You cannot see it all in one very moment Too many things, too few senses but bit by bit it will build like the romans You see barriers are suggestions, and New Yorkers own this Resourceful, focused, diverse, sophisticated Cultured, un-coddled, Can-doers doing Anyone and everyone has been in NY You see, they have just done the dang work Groceries on subway, small room, Living ambitiously, less stuff More character, less doom More zoom, less gloom So off I go into the rough :)
^This is not perfect but I wrote it in one take, hope you enjoyed :")
From my heart,
James Floyd
P.S. I love seeing your responses and am so grateful your here!
P.P.S. I have been very busy with my series so I appreciate follow ups!
Past Updates:
The James Update #1
The James Update #2
The James Update #3
The James Update #4
The James Update #5
The James Update #6
The James Update #7
The James Update #8