Welcome to "Nobody's talking about this"
Issue 001: Let's talk about what nobody's talking about.
There’s not a person in the world I’m not curious about.
What do they believe? Why do they believe that? What do they spend their days working on? What keeps them up at night? Who and what do they love? What’s the best bite of food they’ve ever taken? How do they really feel about their work? About politics? Best show they’ve been to? What do they think they know?
People are so interesting. Even and especially the people who think they know and/or disagree with me.
I’m not going to give you my whole bio here but I’m a pastor’s kid, I grew up Southern Baptist; when people learn that they think they know me. I’ve been involved in politics and government for a while now; when people learn that they think they know me. I got married at 22 and now I’m divorced; when people learn that they think they know me. I toured as a drummer for a while, starting at the age of 16; when people learn that they think they know me. I’m a two-time CEO and I’ve been involved in and around tech for much of my career; when people learn that they think they know me.
We think we know each other based on facts we learn about each other. I think I know a lot of people. And that’s ok—it’s not a bad thing. But that’s not how people work.
People are not simple. People are walking, ever-changing universes of contradiction.
Each of us, myself included, tell ourselves stories all the time. As one of my favorite comedians, Pete Holmes, likes to say, your brain is an asshole.
Listen, I believe you are a great person, but most of us are not even honest with ourselves. It’s biologically impossible, in fact, to be entirely honest with yourself—it’s super hard to be truly “authentic.”
We all lie to ourselves, all the time, as a means to an end, for better or worse.
It’s fascinating and partly why we get so much done. Our ability to be irrational and willingness to never take “no” for an answer is why we’ve made so much progress as a species and society in such a (relatively) short amount of time. We’ve used this biological defiance as a cheat code to create so many of our own problems, and to right so many wrongs.
ANYWAY, you are now subscribed to this thing called “Nobody’s Talking About This,” which is, itself, a contradiction. The second you open this newsletter the title ceases to be true because suddenly—poof!—we’re talking about it.
This idea came from the fact that I travel, meet, and talk with a lot of people who do work in so many different worlds. Over the last few months I cannot tell you how many times, whether one-on-one or in a group, somebody would start a sentence with “nobody’s talking about this” while we were talking about it.
I heard it so often I couldn’t get it out of my head. Especially because the topic nobody was supposedly talking about was usually a thing a lot of people were talking about.
Interest rates and how unaffordable the world is. Mental health. How hard starting or running a company is. How their boss sucks. How dating is a drag sometimes. Why they hate the two party system. How hard it can be to eat well and exercise often. Misinformation. Artificial intelligence.
These are things that everybody’s talking about that we convince ourselves nobody’s talking about. And what hit me as I heard this phrase come up over and over was, I don’t think people are unaware that these things are being talked about—I think “nobody’s talking about this” is a phrase that can be used when people feel like they are not being listened to.
So this Substack, “Nobody’s Talking About This,” is about listening. It’s about staying curious, slowing down to read between the lines and identify what people and culture are trying to say about work, politics, business, relationships, art, and anything else under the sun.
I hope it always feels like we’re having a conversation here. I’d suggest pairing this Substack with your weekend coffee or a beer at happy hour to get the full effect and you can, of course, email me directly to have an actual conversation at nthnryn@gmail.com, whenever you’d like.
Since this is the first issue I’m not going to get in to a specific topic right away. I just wanted to make sure you knew what you signed up for. We’ll kick things off for real next week.
This is going to be fun. I am so grateful you’re along for the ride.
Cheers,
Nate
Everybody's talking about this
Did you hear that Joe Biden stepped aside and endorsed Kamala Harris for president? They’ve got a lot of momentum and they’re selling a lot of hats.
Did you hear that the U.S. economy has had the strongest post-COVID recovery in the world, and we achieved what they call a “soft landing,” but it still really sucked for a lot of people because the job market and and cost of goods has been insane, and the U.S. Federal Reserve is finally for the love of god, going to start cutting interest rates?
Did you hear that fake luxury watches are so hot right now? Be careful out there, fellow watch enthusiasts.
Did you hear Post Malone’s new album? I’ve never really listened to Posty or, honestly, to much Nashville country, but somehow I’m addicted to F-1 Trillion (Apple Music • Spotify)
Did you hear that Cheez-It’s are America’s great unifier? Sharing so you know what to bring next time you’re showing up to a party and want to be everybody’s favorite person. (I learned about this from my buddy Phil’s great weekly newsletter, Lunch Reads. You should subscribe to that one, too.)
You should go to this
Under construction for today, but stay tuned for info about events I’ll be putting on with my friends at Rivian, Justworks, and more.
This first edition proves immediately why I’m happy to be a subscriber. Nobody’s talking about this, BUT now you are, keep talking and keep publishing!