<aside> 🕰️ Archived newsletter
This is a past issue of the newsletter, and therefore may have references and commentary that are no longer accurate. This website is iterative and evolves week on week, so just keep that in mind. The latest newsletter is at the top of the homepage, here. Happy reading!
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That's almost a wrap on 2020, folks! And here we are, the last newsletter for the year.
Starting a weekly newsletter is a highlight decision for me in 2020, as it's been a wonderful exercise in writing and creative expression, the process of which I've intrinsically enjoyed.
Aside from the main aim to 'keep it up' every week, one of my other criterion here has been to create pieces of writing that I'm proud of. I'm happy to report that thus far I am indeed proud of what I've done here this year and, to cap off the year, I thought I'd feature a selection of my favourite newsletters in 2020 for those of you who either missed them, or for those of you who might be inclined to revisit them.
Alongside each choice I'll include an excerpt from within, as well as some notes as to why I chose that particular one.
OK, here we go. In no particular order:
Strap yourselves in for a seriously larger-than-life, stranger-than-fiction, true-story you either haven't heard of, or might only know the vague details of from headlines from decades past.
This is a story of supervillains, assassinations, chemical weaponry and terrorism that seriously reads like a James Bond film.
This is the longest newsletter and by far the highest amount of effort I've put into any one newsletter. I think this is probably the most broadly interesting newsletter I've done this year as well. I really enjoyed getting sucked into the writing process of this one, and looking back it's a little insane to me that I wrote this in a day.
It's also the only newsletter that has it's own Complete list of sources at the end. 🤪
Much as the body can be trained in a way to incite change, so can the mind.
These days, meditation is becoming increasingly 'mainstream' in the West, so this idea isn't as far-fetched as perhaps it once was. And while there are less people scoffing and saying "well what's the point of sitting there and doing nothing", those that do practice meditation overwhelmingly don't treat it like a discipline like they would with physical fitness.
With great diligence, the right training regime, one can totally transform their body.
Likewise, with great diligence, and right training, one can totally transform the mind.
(OK this excerpt is actually from Stage 1 - Getting Interested, but the newsletter is really just a primer for the work-in-progress Meditation feature category).