Editor’s note, July 26, 8 am ET: We’re bringing you some of our best-loved Your Mileage May Vary columns while Sigal Samuel is on parental leave. The one below was originally published in December 2025.

This unconventional advice column offers you a unique framework for thinking through moral dilemmas. It’s based on value pluralism: the idea that each of us has multiple values that are equally valid but that often conflict with each other. Submit your own question here.

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I’ve worked in communications for the past decade helping get important ideas out to the public. I’m good at what I do, and I think it’s useful, but I don’t really feel like I’m having a grand impact on the world.

Meanwhile, some of my friends have built their entire careers around the goal of having the biggest positive impact possible. They’re busy pulling big levers — doing global health work that saves lives, shaping federal policy that protects the environment, etc. I feel like my contribution is tiny in comparison.

I know life’s not a competition, but I grew up being told I was smart and had so much potential to change the world, and I worry I’m not living up to that. On the other hand, I also value work-life balance and relationships and experiences outside of work. Should I consider switching careers to something more impactful? Do I need to have an extraordinary career, or is it okay to just do an average amount of good and live a small(ish) life?

Dear Impact-Minded,

How do you feel about the fact that you’re going to die one day?

That might sound like a weird place to start, but I ask because I think fear of our mortality is what drives a lot of our modern quest for extraordinary careers. 

In fact, the American anthropologist Ernest Becker argued in his 1974 Pulitzer Prize-winning book, The Denial of Death, that one of the main functions of culture is to offer effective ways to manage the terror of knowing that we’re going to die and eventually be forgotten. 

The prospect of absolute annihilation is so terror-inducing, Becker argues, that we come up with all sorts of ways to convince ourselves we can achieve immortality. In the pre-modern era, most people looked to religion for this. It promised us literal immortality, in the form of an eternal soul that could enjoy a happy afterlife in heaven or maybe a nice reincarnation here on Earth. 

In the modern era, as religion’s dominance waned, we’ve had to come up with new types of “symbolic immortality.” That can come in the form of publishing an autobiography, being part of a great nation, or — especially popular starting in the 18th century — achieving social progress “at scale.” As the Industrial Revolution propelled globalization, and it became possible to think about affecting people halfway around the world, utilitarian philosophers argued that our actions are good to the extent that they create “the greatest happiness for the greatest number.”

The idea that we could use our working lives to maximize the good gave people a new way to be extraordinary and thus achieve a lasting legacy — that is, a sense of immortality. By belonging to the grand project of social progress, we could live on well past our physical death.

On the one hand, the tacit promise is comforting. If we all chase these superlative lives, we can participate in the great forever! But on the other hand, it creates a crushing amount of pressure. There’s a sense that you need to be engaged in a maximally heroic quest; otherwise, your life is basically meaningless. 

Not everyone, however, sees things this way. 

For an alternative, consider Saint Thérèse of Lisieux. Born in France in 1873, she only lived to the age of 24, and the last nine years of her life were spent cloistered in a convent. She was an extremely pious young woman who prioritized kindness. But she was acutely aware of her own imperfections and limitations. She didn’t believe she was a great soul capable of great, heroic deeds. She definitely didn’t think her vocation was to have a positive impact “at scale.” 

Instead, she developed a very different approach to goodness, which she called her “Little Way.” It wasn’t about trying to reach a wide swath of people. It was about trying to go deep on little, daily actions, infusing every glance and word with the purest love. 

When the other nuns in the convent annoyingly interrupted her with chit-chat while she was trying to write, she made sure “to appear happy and especially to be so.” When one made exasperating clicking noises during prayers, she worked so hard to conquer her irritability that she broke into a sweat. She made lots of sacrifices lovingly, and trusted that through that, she could achieve holiness — and, yes, eternal life. 

Saint Thérèse compared people to flowers. Although most people want to be a big, showy flower like a rose or lily, she wrote, she was content to be a little flower at the feet of Jesus:

If all the lowly flowers wished to be roses, nature would lose its springtide beauty, and the fields would no longer be enamelled with lovely hues. And so it is in the world of souls, Our Lord’s living garden. He has been pleased to create great Saints who may be compared to the lily and the rose, but He has also created lesser ones, who must be content to be daisies or simple violets flowering at His Feet.

Saint Thérèse became known as the Little Flower. After she died of tuberculosis, her spiritual memoir grew famous. People fell in love with her theology of the Little Way, and she ended up being one of the most popular saints in Catholic history.

I suspect she struck a chord with people because she offered them a strong counterpoint to the idea, which was gaining traction at the time, that it’s not enough to do good — we have to do the most good possible.

But, personally, I’m satisfied neither by the utilitarian perspective nor by Saint Thérèse’s perspective. Both are extremes: one says “you absolutely must do the most good,” and the other says “don’t even bother trying to help more people — just give the few people in your cloister the deepest love possible.” 

Yet, it’s a feature of our modern life that the fortunate among us have the capacity to go both wide and deep — to consider both scale and other dimensions of value. People who go all-in on just one of these tend to feel regret, whether it’s the effective altruist who’s so focused on helping at scale that he ignores everything else or the monk who spends decades in deep contemplation but doesn’t do a thing to help others.

So, when you consider your own potential, I’d encourage you to consider the full picture. I don’t think you should obsess over finding a career that’ll allow you to do “the most good.” But doing “more good”? Sure! If you can find a job like that, why not? 

But, as you look around to see whether there’s a job where you could have a bigger positive impact, you have to be mindful of a few things. For one, there are many different kinds of “good,” and you can’t always run an apples-to-apples comparison between them. (Is your current job doing more or less good than, say, being a journalist or an educator? Hard to say.) Also, there’s more to life than just “doing good” — a life well lived includes reveling in other precious things, like art or relationships, so you don’t want a job that’ll bar you from that. Plus, you don’t want a job that’ll be unsustainable for your physical or mental wellbeing or that’ll wreck your integrity by contravening other values you believe in. 

Ultimately, what’ll probably work best is settling on a career that lets you achieve a decent balance among multiple criteria: doing substantial good, allowing for a pluralistic enjoyment of all life’s riches, feeling sustainable, and fitting with your values. (And after scanning the landscape, you just might find that the best career for you overall is the one you’ve already got!)

You’ll notice that this doesn’t sound as “grand” as either the utilitarian recommendation or the Saint Thérèse recommendation. But that’s the point: Those are extreme visions of life, and if you ask me, they’re not even really about life at all. They’re about death and achieving a legacy that you think will earn you a kind of eternal life after death. The assumption is that you need to do something “grand” in order to make your time on Earth not worthless.  

There’s a radically different starting assumption available to you: What if life is just a gift, and the time you have on this mysterious, weird, wondrous Earth is inherently precious, even if it’s temporary? When you get a gift — like, say, a box of candy — the point is not to try to make it last forever. The point is to appreciate the candy! To savor it yourself, and also savor the pleasure of sharing it with others. 

If we embrace this view, then we don’t feel like we need to do something grand or extraordinary. Life is extraordinary, and living it well means relishing all the goods it offers us — and extending those goods to other beings so they can relish them too. Not out of fear that we’ll be worthless and forgettable otherwise, but simply because we realize we’ve been given talents and resources and, feeling grateful for them, we naturally want to share those gifts with others.

Bonus: What I’m reading

• Were people in the past just like us, with emotions just like ours? Or did sadness, say, feel very different to a medieval peasant than it does to us? In this article, Gal Beckerman explores the fascinating idea of “experiential relativity.”

• “How did choice become a proxy for freedom in so many domains in modern life?” asks this Aeon article. There might be better ways to make people freer than giving them a huge array of choices. 

• What a time to be alive! We all have access to the text that sculpted the personality of one of the world’s major AI chatbots. Behold, Claude’s “soul doc.”

Chances are good you live with another person. Over half of American adults cohabitate with their spouse or significant other. Older adults are increasingly living with roommates. Multigenerational households have more than quadrupled over the last decade. And about a third of adults under 35 live with a parent. 

If you’ve found yourself living communally at one point or another, you know that sharing space comes with its quirks and potential headaches. Who gets to use the only bathroom first in the morning? Who’s responsible for taking out the trash? Do you actually need to be friends with your roommates? 

Being a better roommate or family member isn’t just about minimizing daily annoyance — it’s about transforming your relationships and overall well-being. According to the 2025 World Happiness Report, a household of about four members is predictive of higher happiness levels and better relationships. Older adults who cohabitate are more satisfied living with others, and have higher well-being and happiness than those who live alone, research suggests.  

Whether you live with a romantic partner, roommates, parents, grandparents, or other family members, experts (including therapists, authors, friendship experts, and researchers) — who have firsthand experience of their own — have concrete tips for how to communicate, declutter, and split finances with the people you share space with. 

Responses have been edited and condensed for clarity. 

Communicate, communicate, communicate

“I will live and die on the hill of communication being the most important aspect of successfully living with other adults. That comes from my experience living with my parents in adulthood, and from working on my anthology about communal living and interdependence. If good communication can ultimately lead to progress, any challenges that come up around logistics, habits, preferences — the things people tend to think are most important to consider when sharing space with others — can be addressed. Understanding that living with other adults doesn’t require perfect compatibility, but rather a shared willingness to work at it, opens up so many doors.”

—Samantha Paige Rosen, editor of Living, Together: Reimagining Community in the Age of Disconnection

Accept everyone’s unique (and probably wrong) ways of doing chores

“How someone loads the dishwasher is the biggest differing personalities button-pusher ever. Know this. And accept it.”

—Lauren Palmer Jansen, communications coordinator for L’Arche GWDC, a community where people with and without intellectual disabilities live and work together

Get regular meetings on the calendar

“I always recommend having a designated time — weekly, monthly — for house meetings. It feels odd initially because we believe that everything with friends should happen organically. But when you’re sharing something as sacred as a home, you have to be aligned on what creates a safe and joyful experience. This also helps with any anxiety you might feel about bringing up hard topics, like washing the dishes or inviting guests over, because you have the security of knowing that there’s dedicated time to check in.”

—Danielle Bayard Jackson, friendship educator and author of Fighting For Our Friendships: The Science and Art of Conflict and Connection in Women’s Relationships

Mark your territory

“In a shared home, peace isn’t about square footage, but it’s often helped by each person having one space that’s truly their own. That single boundary, like a door you can close, is often what makes the togetherness feel like a choice you’re happy to continue making.”

—Juli Ford, multigenerational living expert and founder of Home After 50

Discuss decluttering

“Clutter is a common household stressor, and our research suggests one reason why is that people living together buy things independently but hesitate to get rid of things independently, often over-involving each other in disposal decisions. Our proposed fix: Set disposal rules up front, the same way you might set buying rules. Let each person freely toss items only they use, or create a ‘staging area’ where items sit briefly before leaving the house. People can weigh in if they want, without letting clutter linger indefinitely.”

—Peggy Liu, professor of marketing at the University of Pittsburgh School of Business, and Theresa Kwon, assistant professor of marketing at the University of Hong Kong Business School

Agree to the “uncomfortable rule”

“Roommates who want to get along will find a way to get along. The second you stop wanting to get along, the dynamics shift. Agree to the uncomfortable rule. The uncomfortable rule says that if anyone is uncomfortable, you all agree to talk about the problem and listen. This way no one needs to hide the truth when uncomfortable situations come up. This also makes it easier to have conversations instead of confrontations.”

—Harlan Cohen, author of Win or Learn: The Naked Truth About Turning Every Rejection Into Your Ultimate Success

Divide chores equitably, not equally

“Don’t divide housework equally, divide it explicitly and equitably. In an intergenerational home, people have different amounts of time, energy, and physical capacity, so the goal isn’t identical workloads but a shared agreement everyone considers fair. Use a shared system to make the work visible. Track what gets done and by whom, then check in regularly before invisible labor turns into resentment.”

—Peter Askjær Drejer, founder of Tody, a chore managing app

Get clear about money up front

“From a financial therapist perspective, one of the biggest sources of conflict in shared living situations is the meaning people attach to money, fairness, and responsibility. Talk about expectations from the very beginning. You want to reduce the possibility of resentment forming, which can often happen if there were no conversations early on discussing what is or is not acceptable behavior and what is expected of everyone within the shared space. Most often people will wait until they’re already frustrated to discuss sharing finances or household responsibilities. But it is highly unproductive to engage in a conversation when it starts emotionally charged. Instead, schedule regular check-in conversations where you discuss not only who pays for what, but also whether the current arrangement still feels fair.” 

—Kiki Jacobson, licensed mental health counselor specializing in financial therapy

Find the good in tough situations

“My best advice is to see good intentions everywhere, even if you’re experiencing bad outcomes. For the most part, no one wants to be a bad roommate, so if someone is acting in a way that’s driving you insane, you want to approach the situation as if both of you want to fix the situation. Offer help rather than accusations. And, importantly, sometimes you can help teach others how to show up to a conversation by modeling good behavior. Sometimes people just don’t know how to have a mature, helpful conversation because they’ve never done it before. Staying regulated goes a long way.”

—Katie Rose, licensed clinical social worker

Don’t compromise, get creative

“Every recurring argument is an invitation to redesign the system rather than blame the person. Stop asking who’s right and start asking, How could we make this easier? The happiest households aren’t conflict-free — they’re creative. They develop rhythms, rituals, and agreements that work for the people actually living there rather than trying to squeeze themselves into someone else’s idea of how a household should function. One person cooks while the other cleans. Mornings become a quiet zone. Everyone gets an hour alone before reconnecting. Creativity is often a far better relationship skill than compromise.”

—Jane Garnett, licensed marriage and family therapist

Invest in a white noise machine

“Get an industrial strength white noise-maker. The app on your phone won’t cut it. It needs to be the kind you find in therapy offices so you can drown out at least some of the annoying sounds around you. Keep it on all day, not just for sleeping. Buy two if needed.”

—Mary McLaughlin, licensed clinical social worker

There was an unintentionally revealing moment in acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s confirmation hearing last week. After Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) asked Blanche whether he and President Donald Trump are friends, the leader of the United States Department of Justice replied, “I’m his lawyer,” before correcting himself and saying he “was his lawyer.”

Blanche previously defended Trump in three criminal cases brought while the president was out of office, but he is emphatically not supposed to be Trump’s lawyer right now. As acting attorney general — Blanche currently leads the DOJ because the attorney general’s job is vacant and Blanche is the Senate-confirmed deputy attorney general (DAG) — Blanche’s client is the United States, not the person who happens to occupy the White House. 

But it’s easy to see why he misspoke: Blanche has largely acted as Trump’s hammer since he was confirmed as the DOJ’s No. 2 official, overseeing numerous prosecutions of Trump’s perceived enemies. Now Trump wants to promote him to the DOJ’s top job — a sign of Trump’s confidence in his former criminal defense lawyer turned personal enforcer.

It’s unusual for a president to put his own defense lawyer in such a powerful position — indeed, it’s unusual for a president to have a criminal defense lawyer at all. But Trump has a long string of attorneys who’ve defended him and his companies against an equally long string of criminal allegations ranging from tax fraud, to falsifying business records, to illegally taking classified documents, to charges arising from his failed attempt to steal the 2020 presidential election. 

And he’s put at least five of those criminal defense lawyers in top federal jobs. 

Trump’s decision to turn much of his criminal legal team into powerful government officials matters for two big reasons. The first is that two members of that team, Blanche and Solicitor General John Sauer, are leaders within the Justice Department. Next to the military, there is no more fearsome government institution than the DOJ, which has the power to arrest people and try them for federal crimes. 

The DOJ is supposed to exercise this authority with restraint — and often with restraints imposed by the Constitution itself — but Blanche has used the Justice Department’s power against Trump’s political enemies who appear to have committed no crime and removed constraints on Trump and his Justice Department, all while Sauer has worked consistently to convince the Supreme Court to remove other constraints on Trump.

Meanwhile, three of Trump’s former criminal lawyers, Emil Bove, Justin Smith, and Matthew Schwartz, now have lifetime appointments as US Court of Appeals judges, placing them one rung on the judicial ladder down from the Supreme Court. The judiciary, of course, is the branch of government that is supposed to prevent the president from breaking the law, so every Trump loyalist appointed to this branch weakens the remaining legal constraints on Trump and his administration.

Trump, of course, isn’t the only president to place close confidants in the Justice Department or the federal bench. President John F. Kennedy famously named his brother attorney general. President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Abe Fortas, who represented him in a 1948 election dispute, to the Supreme Court in 1965.

But Trump’s decision to place someone willing to pursue his personal vendettas in charge of the Justice Department is, at the very least, a break with post-Watergate norms established to prevent the DOJ from becoming a political weapon. And Fortas, who resigned in disgrace after fewer than four years on the bench, is more of a cautionary tale than a model of good governance.

Although the current Supreme Court is dominated by conservative Republicans, some of these justices do break with Trump on questions that divide the Republican Party — such as whether Trump should unilaterally impose high tariffs on many nations. But if Trump gets to turn his personal cronies into justices, that could change quickly. A judiciary controlled by MAGA loyalists means that all remaining checks on Trump’s authority could end. Many of his former-lawyers-turned-appointees are already working to make an unchecked Trump administration a reality.

How are Trump’s former personal lawyers already reshaping American legal norms?

Smith, who worked on the Trump v. United States immunity case, was confirmed last month. And Schwartz, who worked on the false documents case that led to Trump’s conviction, joined the bench last week. So there’s not much to say about these two men’s record in federal office — yet.

But Blanche, Bove, and Sauer have all displayed ruthless cunning in their efforts to advance Trump and his causes.

Blanche has been DAG since March 2025, a role that oversees the federal government’s criminal prosecutions and its 93 regional US attorneys’ offices. He’s led the entire Justice Department since April, after former Attorney General Pam Bondi — another of Trump’s former personal lawyers — left office.

So Blanche oversaw several dubious federal prosecutions targeting people Trump perceives as enemies, including criminal proceedings targeting former FBI Director James Comey and current New York Attorney General Letitia James. There’s also evidence that Blanche has played an unusually direct role in the Justice Department’s decision to bring meritless charges against prominent Democrats.

In May 2025, for example, Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, a Democrat, showed up at an ICE detention facility in his New Jersey city and asked to tour it. He was briefly let inside the gate, where he was confronted by about a dozen law enforcement officers and asked to leave, which he did.

But then one of these officers received a phone call. A video, later submitted to a federal court, shows the officer turning to his colleagues after the call and announcing, “We are arresting the mayor right now, per the deputy attorney general of the United States.” That deputy attorney general, of course, was Blanche. (In a September court filing, DOJ confirmed that officers arrested Baraka “after consulting with the Deputy Attorney General.”)

Yet, despite Blanche’s apparent decision to personally order Baraka’s arrest, the DAG forgot to check whether Baraka had actually done something that could support criminal charges. The mayor was only charged with misdemeanor trespassing, and those charges were dismissed two weeks later. At the court hearing formally dropping these charges, a federal magistrate judge admonished prosecutors for “using the immense power of the government to pursue weak cases or to make examples without sufficient cause.”

Blanche also unsuccessfully attempted to establish Trump’s $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund,” which would have been used to distribute money to Trump’s allies — including, potentially, Trump supporters who participated in the January 6 attack on the US Capitol. Although the fund appears dead after it received bipartisan pushback in Congress, a DOJ press release announcing the fund said it was “established” by the attorney general, a role performed by Blanche, and that the fund would be administered by five people chosen by Blanche.

Before Trump took office, Bove was Blanche’s law partner. Shortly before Bove joined the bench, he briefly served as principal associate deputy attorney general — essentially the DAG’s top deputy, which meant that Bove was Blanche’s right-hand man. In that role, he was often described as Trump’s “enforcer.” 

Bove spent only about half a year as Blanche’s lieutenant, but he managed to spark a mini-revolt in one of the Justice Department’s most prestigious offices during his short tenure. After Bove ordered the DOJ to dismiss corruption charges against then-New York City Mayor Eric Adams “without prejudice,” a maneuver that would allow the charges to be reinstated if Adams did not cooperate with the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, seven federal prosecutors resigned rather than comply with Bove’s order. 

One was Danielle Sassoon, a former law clerk to Justice Antonin Scalia, a conservative icon. Another, Hagan Scotten, wrote in his resignation letter to Bove that “I expect you will eventually find someone who is enough of a fool, or enough of a coward, to file your motion. But it was never going to be me.” Scotten clerked for Republican Chief Justice John Roberts and for future Republican Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Meanwhile, a whistleblower complaint by another former DOJ lawyer claims that Bove said, in a meeting about a court decision halting some deportations, “that D.O.J. would need to consider telling the courts ‘fuck you’ and ignore any such order.”

Trump appointed Bove to the US Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit last September. Federal appeals courts typically spend months deciding cases, so his tenure on the Third Circuit has thus far been less eventful than his time at the DOJ. But there are early signs that he remains loyal to Trump even after moving into an independent branch of government. Bove attended a Trump rally in December, a highly unusual move for judges who are supposed to remain nonpartisan. And the background image on his iPhone is reportedly an image of a defiant Trump raising a fist, or at least it was months after he joined the bench.

That leaves Sauer, who, as solicitor general, is tasked with defending federal government programs in the Supreme Court. That includes the Trump tariffs that the Supreme Court struck down last winter, and Trump’s unconstitutional attempt to strip many newborn Americans of their citizenship.

Despite these losses, Sauer has an impressive winning record before the Supreme Court, largely because the Court is controlled by six Republicans who are highly sympathetic to Trump and his agenda. This is, after all, the same Court that said that Trump may use the powers of the presidency to commit crimes, after Sauer argued as much. 

Sauer has been particularly effective in persuading the Republican justices to block lower court rulings against Trump on the Court’s “shadow docket,” a once rarely used mix of emergency motions and other matters that became a routine part of Supreme Court litigation during Trump’s first term.

So Trump has taken several of his personal lawyers and transformed them into some of the most well-credentialed — and in some cases, the most powerful — figures in the legal profession. Thus far, the evidence suggests that these individuals remain loyal to Trump, even when they move into jobs that are supposed to be nonpartisan. Three of them already have lifetime appointments. 

Any nation governed by the rule of law must have government officials who will obey whatever constraints the law imposes — whether they be federal agency leaders who follow the law out of a sense of duty, or judges who rein in executive branch leaders who refuse to do so. Institutions like the Department of Justice also depend on informal norms, many of which are a response to similar abuses of power during the Nixon administration, that have long constrained federal prosecutors.

But Trump’s DOJ is often actively hostile to these norms, and the growing legal power of Trump’s personal lawyers is just the latest example. Their steady reshaping of the judiciary clears the way for a federal government that is not constrained by anything.

If you’re looking to wean yourself off social media and replace it with a more productive habit — and who among us isn’t — a lot of the common advice can sound like it’s coming from a drill instructor: Go outside and touch grass. Routine is key. Get your butt in the chair and don’t get up until you’ve done the work. They might as well be telling you to do a hundred pushups while they’re at it.

As valuable as that advice may be when you need a kick in the pants, these imperatives create an uneasy tension between leisure and labor. It’s all well and good to try to turn away from the siren song of your phone, but how likely are you to stick with the alternatives — reading books, drawing, meditating — if they feel like homework? 

It’s a lot more fun, and a lot less arduous, to try to beat social media at its own game instead, and harness your curiosity. 

Social media apps work in part by playing off our natural curiosity. Every time we refresh the endless scroll, they promise to give us new information, capturing the parts of our brains that always wonder what’s about to happen next. But they rarely actually satisfy that curiosity. They just repeat it endlessly: What’s going to happen when I scroll this far? Or this far? Or this far? The answer is almost always: the same thing as last time.

Away from social media, however, the world works differently. If you get curious about a question off the algorithm, it can lead you somewhere new and interesting. 

Even when we begin with a utilitarian goal, curiosity can take us in surprising directions. A few years ago, I got interested in running. At first I would just lace up my shoes, do a few perfunctory stretches, and jog straight out of my front door. But I gradually became curious about the mechanics of what I was trying to do. I began investigating running form, which led me to theories about how you should be doing different kinds of running every week. From there I learned about how strength training was important to support running, and then weight lifting led me to nutrition. I’m still not a particularly fast runner, but I am a data bank on all the ways there are for a person to make themselves just a little bit faster, and I know there’s more for me to keep looking into.

The goal here should be to get away from simple goals (running more, as in my example) to a more open and adventurous experience of what interests and engages us (understanding how I can support my body when I’m running). The experience is simple: Find something that fascinates you, learn a little more about that — whether from your friends, a documentary, or even an old-school internet search — then try to figure out what new questions that opens up and keep asking them. It’s a process that allows us to become our guides, whether we know where we’re headed or not.

In a recent essay, the writer John Paul Brammer explains that that’s exactly how he got himself to read more. 

“Curiosity is a child,” Brammer writes. “When it wants something, when it truly wants something, it’s nearly impossible to keep its hands away.” Brammer found his way to reading by getting curious about David Foster Wallace, which in turn led him to Wallace’s influences: from Donald Barthelme to Thomas Pynchon to Clarice Lispector.

“I read out of strict obedience to curiosity, the desire to know what these words in this sequence might hold,” Brammer writes. “I had to make it fun at first. This was messy. I sipped from this book, then that one. It wasn’t formal or rigorous. I read whenever I felt like it.”

Where habits are mindless and rote, curiosity is something to be indulged: It’s fun, even hedonistic. Embracing curiosity means finding ways to play with art and ideas, as if they’re clay, instead of chipping away at them, as if they’re solid stone.

“The relevant science isn’t something I’m qualified to parse,” Brammer writes in his essay. But when I looked into that very science, I found that his experience aligned with it quite well.  

“If you link curiosity to the accumulation of knowledge, you can actually self-boost your curiosity over time, with the end result of more continued interest.”

Kou Murayama, University of Tübingen

“People have likened the state of being curious about something to an aversive state,” says Celeste Kidd, an associate professor of psychology at UC Berkeley. “It’s unpleasant, akin to something like an itch. When you have that aversive state, when you really want some piece of information, it feels very satisfying to scratch it. There’s all sorts of positive feelings that come with satisfying specific curiosity.” 

The endless scroll of our phone apps can function like a hydrocortisone cream, offering a balm for the irritation without really dealing with the cause. It’s not actually scratching the itch. To do that, you have to get curious about a question that can guide you through an idiosyncratic and looping itinerary that is never fully determined in advance. 

Writer and tech designer Celine Nguyen has written about letting her curiosity guide her down rabbit holes in her essay on “research as leisure activity,” a phrase she borrowed from librarian Karly Wildenhaus. Speaking to me, Nguyen describes getting interested in the way the rise of vibe coding is affecting app design. 

“This idea around shifting design processes made me think of this art historian Claire Bishop,” Nguyen says. Bishop’s most recent book deals with the way technology changes our response to contemporary art, and Nguyen says that “after reading that, I was like, ‘I really like reading about contemporary art and performance. What else can I read in this vein?’” 

Nguyen followed her new interest in dance to a fixation on choreographer Pina Bausch, and soon found herself scouring the internet for still images from Bausch dances. 

“It’s sort of like this pleasantly fizzy, almost like ADHD brain thing,” Nguyen says. “It sort of feels like I’m wandering around this massive information landscape and I’m just coming off all these images or all these reference points or quotes that speak to me, and maybe at the end of this process I can sum up what it is I’m interested in.”

The point at which you satisfy your curiosity can be dangerous. Once the itch is gone, the desire to learn can disappear completely — even if you don’t know as much as you think. 

Kidd describes a study in which she tried to motivate people to learn a new fact about something they thought they already completely understood, but were actually wrong about.

“When we paid them to look up the right answer, they weren’t motivated to seek out more information,” she says. “They did it, but it was like they were out to lunch. They were thinking about something else. That information did not go in.” 

According to Kou Murayama, a professor of psychology at the University of Tübingen in Germany, the best way to maintain your momentum is to marshal your ephemeral curiosity into long-term interest by letting the answer to one question prompt a new one, as if you were figuring out where to eat each meal in a new city by asking your waiters where they like to eat. 

“If you link curiosity to the accumulation of knowledge, you can actually self-boost your curiosity over time, with the end result of more continued interest,” Murayama says. “Curiosity is basically short-lived, but if it’s linked to accumulating knowledge, or if you can link it to your self identity or importance, then you can self-booster interest.”

The trick is to, like Brammer and Nguyen, guide your curiosity toward a topic that can keep surprising you over time. What that usually means is to look for a topic that you already know a little bit about that can keep surprising you.

“We’ve done studies with 7-month-old babies, and they’re seeking out particular kinds of things in the world that violate their expectations, just a little bit but not too much,” Kidd says. “It tends to be the case that people want to elaborate on knowledge they already have as opposed to going into other domains. If there’s some way to relate a desired new set of expertise to something that you already have some background in, that’s a thing that you could absolutely do intentionally.”

So if you want to find some creative outlet for your time — or even if you just want to read more — there are straightforward steps to take: Look for something that excites your curiosity. Look for something that you are uncertain about, something so maddeningly unclear that you can’t help but itch at it. 

This mystery doesn’t have to be about science or philosophy. It could be about what happens to a character in a particular thriller, or how to capture a likeness in charcoal, or what a certain part of your city looks like. The point is that it should be the kind of question that you can’t let go of.

Then indulge in finding the answer — and let that question prompt another one. Then another. Then another.