Just what is Building Your Future?

It’s a dumb pun based on my name, because that seems to be the thing to do here on Substack.

Seriously though, I’m John Fawkes and this is my Substack, which means it’s a combination of blog and newsletter– you can read my articles by visiting the site, or subscribing and getting them emailed to you, or you can use the Substack app.

Crazy Like A Fawkes is mostly about health, fitness, science, technology and public policy, but occasionally I veer into personal interests like novels, games, travel or photography. Most of all though, I write about the places where these things intersect– like studies about building muscle, or using AI to generate meal plans or game content, or how to stay in shape while traveling.

I write about 1-3 posts a week, and that number is going to go up over time. Generally about one in four posts will be paywalled– that is, you have to be a paid subscriber to read it. If you’d like to become a paid subscriber, you can do so by clicking this button:

Why should I become a paid subscriber?

There are two distinct reasons to become a paid subscriber. First, you might simply want to support my work. The more paid subscribers I get, the more articles I can write, and the more in-depth those articles can be. I don’t do this full-time, and my writing takes me away from my other work– freelance writing and marketing consulting– which pay more than my writing makes. If you really love Crazy Like a Fawkes, you can even join at the “founding member” tier to further support my work– I really appreciate when people do that.

The second reason would be if you really want to read those paid articles. They’re generally the longest and most in-depth articles I write, and usually about something that’s immediately usable by the reader.

In the future I’m also going to start archiving old articles, meaning only paid subscribers will be able to read articles that are older than– I don’t know, maybe a month. If this blog really takes off, at some point I’ll add community features for paid subscribers as well.

Okay, so who is John Fawkes?

Well, I’m kind of a weird guy. Weird in an interesting way. Or at least that’s what my girlfriend tells me.

First off, if the subject matter of my Substack sounds like a real grab bag of different topics, that’s because I have a rather eclectic background. I got my bachelor’s in criminal justice, which is a sub-discipline of political science. I minored in psychology, and came very close to getting a PhD in either psychology or economics, but instead I got an MBA with a focus on marketing. I’ve worked as a marketing consultant, BizDev director at an ad agency, freelance writer, and personal trainer and health coach. I also spent a year traveling the world as a digital nomad while running my fitness business.

I currently live in Los Angeles. My main sources of income are freelance writing and marketing consulting, mostly for tech startups and companies in the health industry, but I hope that someday this blog can be more than just a side project. In my spare time I go to concerts, visit my parents and girlfriend in San Francisco, read a lot of fantasy and sci-fi novels, hang out at the beach, and play sports– mainly volleyball, medieval combat with foam swords, and jugger, which is sort of like Mad Max football.

You can email me at johnmfawkes@gmail.com