College teacher turned ghostwriter | Scaling founders, coaches, and consultants to $100K+ /mo | Writing to build wealth and better self | 98,000 on Twitter (X)

Taylin John Simmonds

3 years ago, a friend lent me $40K to pay off my debt. So I could focus on business.

2 years ago, I offered to pay it back. He said no. Reinvest. Pay me later. 1 year ago, first payment. 

Yesterday, I paid him back!

Find the people who bet on you before it makes sense. Then spend your life proving them right.

College teacher turned Substack ghostwriter | Thoughts about craft, ideas, and AI as a creative partner (not a replacement) | 2B impressions | $4M+ revenue generated | All in on Substack

One pattern I’ve noticed in all the people that inspire me: They live a diverse life.

They layer unrelated skills. 
Read widely. 
And have friends you'd rarely see together. 

A rich life isn't only about money. It's about the range of experiences that made you who you are.

Stop calling yourself a content creator. Content creators chase algorithms. You're cultivating a body of work.

You're not in the content game. You're in the depth game.

And depth doesn't scale. It compounds.

I'm noticing a quiet rebellion against balance. 

People who disappear into their craft. 12, 15 hours a day for weeks. Then step back completely. No guilt. No routine. No splitting the difference. Full immersion, then full recovery. 

Seasons, not schedules.

You don't actually want to stop working. You just haven't found work worth your devotion.

The goal isn't to do less. It's to care so deeply about one thing that everything else becomes noise.

Find that thing. Then you'll never need convincing to start.

Everyone's trying to escape work. Fewer hours. Passive income. Early retirement. That's not freedom. That's avoidance.

You don't want to do less. You want something worth pouring everything into. Work that's worthy of your full attention, your full energy, your full devotion.

Find that first.

If AI is speeding up your writing process, you're using it wrong.

AI should slow you down. Stress-test your ideas. Pressure-test your arguments. Find the angle that actually matters before you write a word.

The bottleneck was never your writing speed. It was your thinking clarity.

You don't need 100 clients. You need a handful of the right ones and the devotion to serve them so well they never want to leave.

No empire. No team of 30. No "scaling to seven figures."

Just craft you're proud of and a livelihood that lets you live well.

A book you highlighted but never practiced is a book you never read.

Understanding doesn't live in the notes you took.

It lives in the choices you made differently afterward.

A life-changing habit I picked up recently: Fifteen minutes of breath work before work.

The breath brings me out of my head and into stillness. A stillness that makes creative work feel effortless.

Your best work is hiding behind the ritual you're skipping.

The real value in the AI age isn't what you know. It's who you can inspire.

Give them an aim, a compelling reason, and the next small step when everything feels overwhelming.

If you want to matter in the AI age, don't just share knowledge. 
Lend direction.

You're behind because you've never given 100% of yourself to the thing you care about.

Subtract everything that isn't it. Give it everything you have. Not 40%. Not most days. Everything.

You've never seen what happens when you actually commit. Find out.

The Brand Explorer - Taking brand thinking to places it's never been :: Creator of Legend Letters, Founder of Healthy Brand Consulting

In 2015, we walked into a $10 million pitch.

We had it all: big ideas, sharp strategy, stunning creative.

For an hour, we delivered with energy, conviction, even laughter.

We walked out relieved. Certain we had nailed it.

Then came the silence.

A day passed. Then three. Then a week. Two weeks.

Finally, the news: we lost.

Over a million dollars in man hours, straight to the trash.

Why?

Looking back, the signals were everywhere:

- New stakeholders appeared in the audience.
- Our key contact was still new in her role.
- We had the RFP, but never uncovered the *real* goals and desires.
- Engagement was one-way, never true connection.

We missed it all.

That’s when it hit me: **winning is never just about the pitch.**

It’s the “invisible” forces, the “hidden” signals, the fundamentals of human behavior.

Those who understand it, can shape outcomes.

Those who don’t, call it luck.

That loss changed everything.

Because these forces don’t just decide $10M pitches.

They decide products sold, deals closed, ideas spread, lives changed.

That’s why I’ve been obsessed with influencing human behavior for the past decade.

- Mindset
- Branding
- Charisma
- Marketing
- Leadership
- Storytelling
- Psychology
- Negotiation
- Communication

and so on…

It all comes back to the same invisible truths.

I research, read, and write about them every week in my *Influence Anyone* newsletter, aggregating 13.5 hours of research for each issue. (howiechan.com/newsletter)

I interview world experts like Robert Cialdini, Will Storr, Nir Eyal, Melina Palmer, on how to apply influence psychology in real life. (howiechan.com/podcast)

And I help medtech startups go from unknown to unforgettable (howiechan.com/medtech)

Once you’ve seen this world, you can never unsee it again.

If you want to step into this world:

👉 where you can finally *see the invisible,*
👉 master the forces shaping every decision,
👉 get people to buy into your ideas and offers,
👉 and use influence to change the world for the better…

Join me for a **FREE 7-day email course:** The Behavioring Blueprint (Howiechan.com/behavioring)

P.S. If you want the biggest result in the smallest amount of time: Book a power hour (https://calendly.com/howiechan/1-on-1-power-hour)

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The Battle

Taylin John Simmonds

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