Why
We already have all the parts. We are not hungry for information—we are starved for synthesis, for the perspective to connect what we know.
Backstory
Mitch Anthony, photo by First Last.
I'm Mitch Anthony. Born in 1953, I came of age during a brief period in American history when being a hippie felt like a legitimate career option.
Mass media outlets like Life Magazine featured communes on their covers. People wore buttons that said, "Turn On. Tune In. Drop Out." Books like The Greening of America examined the failures of the "Corporate State" and the systemic causes behind them. According to a growing alternative media movement, cultural renewal wouldn’t come from institutional reform or violent revolution—it would emerge through profound shifts in individual and collective consciousness.
When I was 17, I had two experiences that would shape the course of my life.
I took LSD. From that moment on, I saw that everything—ecosystems, people, economies, organizations, cells, molecules—was interconnected. I began to understand life not as a series of isolated events or linear chains of cause and effect, but as a dynamic web of relationships, patterns, and systems.
I also discovered The Whole Earth Catalog. In the words of its founder, Stewart Brand, the oversized quarterly “aimed to provide education and inspiration in the form of curated tools, ideas, and books that could help people take control of their lives and participate in shaping the future.”
Between then and now, I’ve lived a lot of stories. My friends often urge me to write them down, and I will. But this page is about a particular project: The Love & Work Catalog. What’s relevant here is that for most of my life, I’ve worked as a communications and organizational development consultant.
I began writing a weekly newsletter in [month] of [year] as a way to stay connected with my own community. The catalyst was a reader who once asked Austin Kleon why he didn’t write a post about self-promotion. His answer was a single sentence: “Write something that you yourself would want to read.”
Well, I know what I want to read. I want to read about tools, ideas, and books that help people take control of their lives and actively shape the future.
Over time, I realized that the newsletter format had its limitations. As a medium, it lacks staying power—most ideas vanish from memory just days after publication.
So, I built this website as a 21st-century catalog: a curated, evolving resource of tools, ideas, and books that endure.
Radical Hope
I'm Mitch Anthony. Born in 1953, I came of age during a brief period in American history when being a hippie felt like a legitimate career option.
Mass media outlets like Life Magazine featured communes on their covers. People wore buttons that said, "Turn On. Tune In. Drop Out." Books like The Greening of America examined the failures of the "Corporate State" and the systemic causes behind them. According to a growing alternative media movement, cultural renewal wouldn’t come from institutional reform or violent revolution—it would emerge through profound shifts in individual and collective consciousness.
When I was 17, I had two experiences that would shape the course of my life.
I took LSD. From that moment on, I saw that everything—ecosystems, people, economies, organizations, cells, molecules—was interconnected. I began to understand life not as a series of isolated events or linear chains of cause and effect, but as a dynamic web of relationships, patterns, and systems.
I also discovered The Whole Earth Catalog. In the words of its founder, Stewart Brand, the oversized quarterly “aimed to provide education and inspiration in the form of curated tools, ideas, and books that could help people take control of their lives and participate in shaping the future.”
"It is only for the sake of those without hope that hope is given to us." - Walter Benjamin
Search and Discovery
I hope the navigation is intuitive. The landing page features the most recent issue of the newsletter. As you scroll down, you'll find earlier letters in the order they were published.
I’ve done my best to group these ideas into main categories. Clicking on any of them will take you to a dedicated page featuring stories from that category alone.
Before publishing the catalog, I organized the content into subcategories. These are used to define individual posts on each category page.
Since launch, I’ve introduced a new layer of search: tags. These provide a finer level of detail and granularity, which I hope you’ll find useful.
The experience I’ve been aiming for is something like wandering through a great second-hand bookstore. My hope is that, by browsing the ideas collected here, you’ll stumble across discoveries you weren’t even looking for.
Information Wants to be Free
I hope the navigation is intuitive. The landing page features the most recent issue of the newsletter. As you scroll down, you'll find earlier letters in the order they were published.
I’ve done my best to group these ideas into main categories. Clicking on any of them will take you to a dedicated page featuring stories from that category alone.
Before publishing the catalog, I organized the content into subcategories. These are used to define individual posts on each category page.
Since launch, I’ve introduced a new layer of search: tags. These provide a finer level of detail and granularity, which I hope you’ll find useful.
"It is only for the sake of those without hope that hope is given to us." - Walter Benjamin
Who
Mitch Anthony
I work as a strategist, coach, facilitator, and idea whisperer. You can learn more about me here.
Emily Miles
Emily Miles designed, built and maintains the site. Emily started out as a mentee. She was running the one-person marketing department for a friend’s teaching and community-building business, (link) and he asked me to help with branding. Emily is a very quick study, and she quickly became a key collaborator and co-creator with me. Her skills span web design, content strategy, and information architecture—but what sets her apart is her eagle eye. She sees big ideas, helps name what’s emerging, and can then manage the execution with thoughtfulness and care. Learn more.
Rich Roth
Rich Roth is our data monkey. There are lots of people you can call when you want to start a website. But if you’re launching something complex—an ISP, a sprawling digital archive—Rich is the person to call. In my case, I had more than 3,000 news stories spread across 350 email newsletters living on MailChimp. I say “had,” because now they’re on our own server and can be repurposed automatically as individual posts. That’s thanks to Rich. It was a big job but he did it without breaking a sweat. Learn more.
The Journey is the Destination
I welcome your feedback. What’s working? What’s not? What would make this site more useful to you?
Let me know.
