Thinking Out Loud: a Tiny Experiment pact
For the next 100 days, I’ll be using this part of Spark’s website as a thinking space.
A thinking space to:
Share emerging ideas (however imperfectly formed)
Shape and share questions, without the pressure of an answer
Create connections between ideas and knowledge, without the need for a tidy conclusion.
Over the festive break, I read Tiny Experiments by neuroscientist Anne-Laure Le Cauff. She describes Ness Labs, the venture she founded, as “a playground of curiosity” and this phrase stayed with me.
Her book challenges traditional big goal setting, not because ambition is wrong, but because the weight of it can lead to overwhelm, distraction and quietly abandoning the work we care about most.
In its place, she suggests tiny experiments: small, repeated steps that create momentum instead of pressure. A simple idea: I will try this, for a while, and see what happens.
As I read on, I felt I had found an entry point into this playground of curiosity.
Ever since we upgraded Spark’s website two years ago, there’s been a lingering Big Goal of creating a compelling content series that somehow brings ten years of work, learning and lived experience together with clarity and care.
Our website has stayed sparse, and the Big Goal has remained on my To Do list. Gathering digital dust and if I’m honest, a smattering of shame too.
So I’m asking a different type of question: What happens if I focus on process rather than polish? On practice rather than product? On a playground of curiosity rather than a pressured content strategy?
The Tiny Experiments pact
For the next 100 days, I’ll be sharing short written pieces of thinking here on Spark’s website. One idea, question or experience at a time.
What it is
A space to name what feels true right now
To explore questions that invite collective answering
To make my thinking visible, even when it’s unfinished
What it is not
A definitive account of Spark’s ten years of work
A comprehensive explanation of what we do
Another source of pressure
Rules of this playground
Short posts (around 200-400 words)
Clarity over cleverness
Changing my mind is allowed
Repetition is allowed
Pausing, pivoting and/or persisting are all part of the practice
Progress, not perfection
My measures of success
Did I show up?
Did I learn something along the way?
Here’s to the experiment.
About the image:
This drawing is a reminder that knowledge, left scattered, can stay hidden. It only comes alive when connected through experience. I first saw a version of this image years ago and copied it into my own notes. I can’t remember the original source, but the idea stayed with me. The drawing was water-damaged during our recent office move, and I chose not to recreate it. In the spirit of this experiment, it’s shared as it is.
Thinking Out Loud is where I share short pieces of thinking from the middle of the work. Ideas, questions and lived experiences, shared as they are, while they’re still forming.