A decade and a half into my practice designing products and software, some things keep coming up. I’ll keep up with them here.

1. Make the software explain itself

Ideally software should need no manual, instructions or training. Instead the meaning and actions available should be discoverable by the user and they should be able to play with and explore them to get a sense of what they do and how they work. Users feeling free to “play” with an app is a pre-requisite to feeling comfort in it and mastery of it.

2. No ornamentation without meaning

Colors, images, icons, and especially animation that don’t convey meaning are like noise. When mixed in with elements that do convey meaning, They present the user with a puzzle to solve that has no answer. They create a lingering sense that one is missing out on the joke.

3. Use self-explanatory labels

Avoid using jargon, company or domain specific labels. Instead aim for 5th grade vocabulary level terms whose dictionary definitions make sense of what they are describing in the software.

4. The software should show its model of the problem or the world to the user

Especially when AI or models are involved, the more that the software can visualize or make clear what data it is considering to make sense of the problem or the world, the more the user will be able to match their mental model to that of the software making their experience feel intuitive by minimizing surprises. Importantly, this also allows for critical thinking about whether the user knows something the model doesn’t. In many cases this improves the safety of using automation.

5. Teach the user what they need to know when they need to know it, not before

A basic principle of adult learning is the concept of just-in-time learning. This is not only an affordance to the limited time and attention our users have. It’s also about recognizing that users are motivated to take in new information when they see that information as relevant to solving a problem they have now. Just-in-time learning is stickier because users are ready to learn instead of seeing the education as an impediment to get over to accomplish their goal. Framing is important here.

6. Show me what’s important by how much of the screen it takes up

Visual hierarchy gives unconscious cues to the user on what’s important as they scan across the page. Important features can have more than one embodiment or entry point.

7. Only break UI conventions when you want to slow the user down and add friction

Only do this when safety or the experience requires it. Using conventions in UI elements increases users sense of familiarity with your software and their sense of it being “intuitive.” Read Daniel Kanneman’s _Thinking Fast and Slow_ for more detail on how to use the two thinking systems to create smooth intuitive experiences (system 1) and when to break that by adding friction to create a pause for conscious (system 2) evaluation.

8. Don’t fear the scroll

Especially on apps with dashboard or monitoring features, there’s a temptation to put everything on the screen at once. Screens want to scroll. As long as users feel confident they are on the right track of the information they are looking for they have no problem tapping or scrolling to get to it.

9. Touch targets should be as large as large as you can afford

Apple’s Human Interface guidelines suggest 44 pt as the smallest touch target designers should use. But bigger is better because it makes it easier for people to hit without intense focus, and improves accessibility. Just pay attention that it isn’t in conflict with #6.

Like so many of us, I’ve been watching in horror since October 7th. I’ve felt paralyzed by not knowing what to do or say or how to understand how we got here.

It feels again like it felt after September 11th; the first time I felt myself clinging to the back of my country like some angry beast lumbering towards vengeance.

I’ve turned myself inside out imagining: hiding in a bedroom with with my kids while gunmen stalk us; calling to my daughters buried under rubble; watching my littlest one wither without access to insulin.

I’ve called and messaged my government representatives demanding they not support and pay for this because that is what the people the I know with friends and family in Gaza have asked us who have the power and privilege of being American to do.

After a month of talking with friends and family this is what I can say:

Making people into non-people

These weapons and these actions are inhuman. October 7th is a horrifying tragedy. And the people of Palestine are not animals and their ongoing slaughter is a travesty. The holocaust was possible because people convinced themselves the Jews weren’t human. The Isreali defense minister started this bombing campaign by saying “these people are human animals.”

We don’t have to know the solution to know it has to stop

We don’t have to have a foolproof plan to imagine a future other than this. In fact imagining another way forward is a prerequisite for finding another way. It doesn’t have to be this way.

The challenge to be present with others’ suffering and not be overwhelmed into inaction

When I worked as a hospital chaplain early in my career I was with people who were suffering and dying every day. And I was with doctors and nurses who cared for them. We all struggled to find the right balance of being present to the suffering all around us and not being so overwhelmed that we couldn’t do our jobs to serve those people suffering. There were times that being present to such intense suffering felt like holding my head underwater. I could only do it for so long before having to leave and come up for air.

Over time, the veteran chaplains and doctors and nurses who had learned how to show up day after day taught me that it does not do any one any good for me to try to take on other people’s suffering for them as though it were my own. It’s not possible, it’s not true and it doesn’t actually help. One nurse I worked with explained that holding this boundary is like having a callus on your foot: it has to be thin enough to feel when you are being hurt but not so thin you can’t keep walking.

I learned that what does help is paying attention to other people’s suffering, really paying attention, allowing ourselves to enter into it and know it and imagine ourselves in it and doing this in such a way that the people suffering feel seen and known in the truth of their pain. And then to step back into our own lives and positions of safety, stability, power and privilege and to take action on their behalf to help; the sort of action we can imagine we would want someone to do for or on behalf of us if it were us who were suffering this way.

Painting as a practice of paying attention

Painting for me is mostly about focusing my attention for an hour or so on one thing. It’s been hard to be present to the kind of suffering the people in Gaza are enduring without feeling it will overwhelm me. But this is one way I’ve been able to.

The Washington Post photo I was working from captured my attention with the dark monstrous thunderheads growing from air-strikes looming high above the fragmented buildings. The photo is from so far away we can’t see any people. That’s how the people running this war want it. As viewers we are far away. But the destruction is still overwhelming.

The explosions and smoke are eating the city and the people in it.

I’m ashamed that I can’t stay more present to this suffering and do more. But this is what I can do today to stay present and stay human without being so crippled by it that I can’t keep walking.

After buying my first home I had a lot shelves I wanted to add to closets. Eventually I started designing and building furniture to fit particular spaces. Most importantly I had a small 6’x8′ back patio behind my townhouse where I could work. This might sound small, but it was a lot better than clamping things to the dining room table.

It’s been a few years since then. I’ve finished a few more projects and shared a lot of them in process on Instagram. More than a few friends have asked what tools they need to get started with woodworking so I decided to make it shareable.

What Tools Do You Really Need?

It can be tempting to buy power tools because they are, well, powerful. But the noise and air-blown sawdust can make them a bad fit for working inside apartment buildings or in shared spaces. On the other hand, a small kit of hand-tools are how most furniture has been made throughout the hundreds (thousands if you count back to Rome) of years of woodworking history. And for me, it’s a lot more relaxing using tools that can’t cut my hand off in a moment of inattention.

A lot of my decisions on which tools to buy and keep flow from living in the city, in a townhouse, without much indoor storage or room to work. That paired with some early influence from youtube woodworker / curmudgeon, Paul Sellers, means that I have bias for tools where the accuracy is in the hand of the person rather than embedded in the tool. Beyond that, there is a real practicality in a set of tools that can build all kinds of furniture (bookshelves, benches, cabinets, desks etc.) with a set of tools that can fit in a small tool-box.

I started seeking out estate sales and yard sales looking for hand tools and slowly began picking up and restoring old tools. With a very few exceptions, the tools I use every day I bought used and spent time getting back into shape.

The list below are the hand tools I would say are essential to start with. You can have them all for less than $100 total. Where used tools are a good option I’ll share a price range where I’ve seen and bought these tools.

Universal-Cut Japanese Pull-saw

My father-in-law who has been working wood his whole life, surprised me by recommending I buy a Japanese pull-saw. “These are NICE,” I remember him saying.

Unlike most western saws you’re used to seeing which cut on the push stroke, these cut on the pull. This also pulls the blade straight even when it is made up of very thin steel. This plus post-war manufacturing magic and heat-treating the tiny teeth after sharpening mean that these saws cut better than any saw you’ve ever used. My first blade stayed sharp a year and half of regular use.

The universal cut has teeth set up to work for cutting across the wood fibers as well as down them which is nice not to have to worry about when you are still learning to read the grain.

Caution: not all saws and blades are created equal. I’ve had nothing but good experience with the Z-Saw brand.

Buy New Here ~$25

Combination Square

This is your main tool for laying out cuts and joints. You can pick up cheap ones at the hardware store but they likely aren’t very precise.

Starrett is the industry standard but they are pricey (~$100) new. I use a 6 inch combination square for most of my work though occasionally I find a 12 inch useful. Products Engineering company makes very finely machined squares that can be had for much more affordable prices.

Buy Used: $5–15

Buy New Here: $15–25

Marking Knife

Literally any small knife you can keep sharp will do here. But the key to straight, sharp cuts with the saw is marking out your lines with a knife which makes a little groove for the saw-teeth to follow.

I’ve used pocket knives, little whittling / carving knives, really anything small and sharp you can control well in your hand.

I particularly like these one-beveled Japanese knives that are flat on one side so you can put the flat side against your square and slide it down. But, be careful, they are brittle, high-carbon steel, so drop it and you may damage the tip. A fun project is building a wooden scabbard for it.

Buy New Here: ~$20

F-Clamps

F- clamps are extremely powerful and easy to use. And they are easy to use to hold your work in place until you can build a workbench.

Bessey and Stanley are great brands to pick up used. But the budget Harbor Freight variety work just fine. Start with a pair of f-clamps at least a foot or two long.

Buy more when you’re building something that needs them.

Buy Used: $5–10

Buy New Here $11

Chisels

Chisels are easy to find used and to buy new. I pick up used ones with or without handles whenever I see them. I avoid big nicks or chips in the cutting edge because they’ll be work to get out. I started with a cheap Chinese made set with plastic handles from the hardware store: 1″, 3/4″, & 1/2″. They performed just fine as long as I kept them sharp.

Most of the time now I use a 3/4″ chisel I always keep extremely sharp, a 1/8″ chisel I use for getting into tight spaces or cutting grooves for the bottoms of boxes or small drawers, and occasionally the large 1.5″ chisel in the photo above for large subtractive shaping of stock for carvings (hence the two handed handle).

Chisels are the essence of woodworking: a sharp wedge that removes wood. The plane is just a chisel in a housing. There are a few types but you should start with “bench” chisels which have a beveled cutting edge and beveled sides. You’ll use these the most anyway.

You can hit it with any hammer you may have (smaller the better) or make your own chisel mallet or hammer.

Buy Used: $2–10

Buy New Here: $8

Hand Plane (#4)

First: it’s a plane or “hand plane.” “Planers” are powered versions of the hand held tool with a rotary cutter. “Power planers” are big rotary cutters with an in-feed that flatten out boards.

Record, Stanley, Dunlop, Bailey, Miller’s Falls; these are all fine brands you might find in various states of disrepair or rust at a yard sale. I’ve paid as little as $5 and as much as $30 for hand planes at yard and estate sales. Look for cracks in the cast iron body, especially around the opening on the bottom where it joins the sides and makes a weak spot. The bodies are cast iron and hard to repair if cracked. You can check how flat the bottom is against a ruler or your new combo square, but this can be flattened with sandpaper taped to glass or granite or something else very flat.

Look to see if any pieces are missing and if there are any big nicks or deep pits from rusting in the blade. Nicks are work to fix. Pits are hard. Though Hock Tools sells excellent replacement “irons” or blades.

Sadly it’s hard to find good quality planes new for under ~$100. Stanley’s Sweetheart line are quality. Wood River, Veritas and Lie-Nielson are top of the line reproductions of classic Stanley models.

But even the perfect out of the box Lie-Nielson will eventually dull and go out of tune and require sharpening, and set-up. So when you are starting, it’s best to get an old tool that needs some TLC for $15–20 and learn how to take it apart, clean it, put it back together and really get it to sing. There are lots of models but the #4 is generally regarded as the first and most indispensable plane for your kit.

More than any other tool I use, hand planes provide the most satisfaction to use because, like musical instruments, the more time you spend with them, the better results you get. As your skill grows you learn to read the grain better, hone sharper and you can get glassy smooth finishes and bright, sharp grain patterns from just a few strokes that you could never get from sanding all day long through a dozen grits. But beware: there is also heartache once you tear out a chunk of that glassy surface where the grain changes direction. Learning when and how to avoid doing this is a lifelong journey.

Buy Used: $10–30

Buy New Here: $80-$350

Sharpening Stones & a Leather Strop

The key to having fun with planes and chisels is keeping them sharp. There are a million opinions on this. I mostly follow Paul Sellers’ guidance on freehand sharpening though I haven’t invested in his high end DMT diamond plates. I started with cheap stones from Harbor freight but they were very very coarse and never got very a very fine edge.

I started making progress when I bought a King Combination Stone 250/1000 grit. The grits are on the same scale as sand-paper and the higher the grit the slower and finer the cut.

Then I acquired some medium and glassy-fine “Arkansas Stones” which is the market name of various novaculite stones that naturally occur in Arkansas. They are my preferred setup for maintaining an edge on my chisels, planes, marking knives, gouges etc.

The biggest breakthrough came when I took a friend’s advice, ordered some green honing compound (chromium oxide abrasive in green clay) and rubbed it into a strip of leather I glued to a board. 40 strokes pressing the edge hard into the strop leveled up my sharpening to hair-shaving levels and enabled me to simply push chisels through wood with hand pressure in many cases rather than driving them through with a hammer. It feels amazing and leaves a glassy finish behind in the wood. And they can slice into your hands faster than you can notice.

Buy New Here — King Stone — $18

Buy New Here — Honing Compound — $3

What to Make Next?

I got started with this kit. Pretty soon I built a bench with a vise and decided I really needed a spoke-shave to start shaping contours and making long flowing sinuous edges. There are lots of tools you can make yourself once you get confident working with this set.

When I was first getting started I spent a lot of time on Pinterest and Instagram browsing other people’s projects to get ideas and sometimes walkthroughs on how to make tools and jigs. To this day, engaging the woodworking communities on Instagram and Youtube remains one of the most rewarding and encouraging forces in my woodworking practice. You can absorb so much in terms of skill, technique and strategy just browsing around. Jump in. There’s a lot of good stuff and people are very friendly.

Feel free to reach out to share your projects or ask for help. You can find me @mattlumpkin on instagram and twitter.

—

P.S. All the links to Amazon are affiliate links. So if you found this helpful, and you want to buy that Z-Saw you can click through also help my tool-fund a little bit. 🙂

There’s a fantasy floating around that if we could just get enough free time, we could do anything.  If it weren’t for work or school or family or any of a dozen other time commitments we could write that novel, record that album or paint that devastatingly honest, surreal landscape that pulls back the curtains of reality to reveal the eternal light shining through all reality.  That fantasy is a lie.  You will never get that time.  So you have to start now, doing art when you’re already busy as hell.
This talk originally appeared as a part of Fuller Seminary’s “Week Four: TED-style Talks” event.  They’ll be posting more talks here in the coming weeks.

1. Do stuff you love to do: 

Because you love it and you would do it anyway.  Because that energy, creativity and passion is like a force of nature that you can harness to drive your work forward.

If you find yourself doing it even when no one is looking and no one is paying, then you’re doing it because you love it, because it gives you energy and life.  Even if you lose sleep, there is a net gain of energy for you and those around you.

2.  Budget time for work-ish stuff: 

Don’t spend more time and energy on things that don’t require or deserve it.

3. Use the scraps: 

Structure your best impulses to create into your life so the choice you want to make is the easiest choice to make.  Use the left-over scraps of time by keeping the things you need to work on your art at hand.  Don’t worry about how little time you have.  The scraps add up.

4. Keep the stuff you do for fun, fun: 

It’s easy to lose the fun and playfulness that drew you to your artistic work which is one reason why people stop doing it.  If you don’t feel like doing it, skip it.  But take note if there’s something structural keeping you away.  This might mean it’s important not to get paid for your art.

5. Learn to love sketches, not perfection: 

Embrace the imperfections in your sketches and the background noise in your recordings.  Get past the pretense of everything you do being “world-class” and recognize the humble value in every movement toward being able to say what you need to say when you have something worth saying.  Perfectionism is a mixture of pride and fear that can deprive the world of the exercise of your gifts.  A finished sketch is more real than a vision of a perfect work never started.

6.  Find people who are interested and use their interest to motivate your work: 

When people connect with your honest work they are connecting with a part of you.  It allows people who get it and appreciate you to be drawn in and those who don’t to move on.  This is a good thing! Obviously, the web makes this easier.   

7. Say yes to limitation:

Limitations, deadlines, constraints help you finish.  They may also stop you from creating polished masterpieces, but they can also help keep you from ruining work by over-working it.

8. Say yes to collaboration:

Collaborations open up new opportunities for formation of a generative community out of which new work, energy and ideas can emerge more quickly than working alone.  They are also opportunities for you to give and receive generosity.

9.  Integrate Integrate Integrate:

Don’t think of your artistic work as something that you have to add to your schedule but as something that is a part of who you are that you bring to everything you do and experience.  

I used to think of all the things I am interested in and love as threads that I would one day have to cut off in pursuit of truly important things.  And it’s true that commitments to school, family and work have to take priority.

But I’ve found that with a little intention and perspective, I can wind all the threads that make up who I am into one cohesive identity.  

The key is wind the rope.