Ingrid Fetell Lee Rewrites Her Chapters with Scissors—Literally
21 questions with the author of Joyful on ritual, research, and writing a life you love.
What do you get when you mix an industrial designer, a deep thinker, and a true believer in joy? Ingrid Fetell Lee. She’s the author of Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness, the founder of the School of Joy, and someone who approaches writing with the same playful curiosity she brings to everything else, whether she’s designing wallpaper, hosting a course, or cutting up a chapter with literal scissors to get the flow just right.
In her 21 Questions interview, Ingrid shares how she builds community around her work, what AI tools are actually useful, and why writing success should feel as good as it looks.
—Panio
21 Questions for Ingrid Fetell Lee
1/ I couldn’t have written my last book without… scissors and tape. I need to see the whole chapter visually, and I often can’t figure out the right flow unless I lay out the printed pages, cut out paragraphs and move them around, and then tape the whole thing back together
2/ What’s the thing most people get wrong about being a writer? That it’s a solitary, lonely occupation. Yes, writing is something I do alone, but the act of writing and publishing has brought me into community with the most wonderful people—readers, writers, researchers, and so many others—in ways I never could have imagined.
3/ What’s something you wish you’d started doing five years ago? Taking an hour-long walk every day. I recently discovered that whatever problem I’m having with my writing usually gets solved about 15 minutes into a walk. This usually leads to me typing into my phone while I walk which is less than ideal, but better than staring at a blank screen at my desk!
4/ Hemingway wrote standing up; Edith Wharton, lying down. What are your quirks? I write sitting on a backless bench instead of a chair. It makes it easy to change positions while writing — sit cross-legged, put up one leg or another. And there’s nowhere to lean, so when I start slouching, I know it’s time for a break.
5/ Do you read your reviews? Ugh, yes I shouldn’t but I can’t help it. I do try to remember Seth Godin’s very good advice, which is that when someone says they hate your book, what they really mean is it’s not for them. And it’s ok — nothing is for everyone!
6/ What income streams make up your writing business? Other than books, speaking engagements and courses are the majority. We also do a very small amount of affiliate work via ShopMy. And we just launched a joyful community called The Commons, a gathering space for people who are intentionally cultivating a more joyful life. I have a hunch that with AI, resources will become less valuable and community more so. But we’ll see…
7/ Is there a book you wish you’d written? A Natural History of the Senses. Everything about it. So many of Diane Ackerman’s sentences live rent-free in my head.
8/ Have any tech tools made your job easier? I find Notion to be very useful as an external brain. I keep all my notes from books, articles, and interviews there. A new tool I like is Sunsama, which is kind of like a to do list meets day planner. Every morning it guides you through a little "planning ritual” in which you slot your work into your calendar. It makes it easy to see whether you’re overcommitting (which I’m often guilty of) and gives the day a sense of structure.
Lately I have also been using Granola, an AI note-taker, which everyone seems to love, with good reason. You take notes as you go along and then Granola enhances the notes based on its transcription of the call. Sometimes I just open Granola while walking and talk off the top of my head about something I want to write or build. When I’m done Granola gives me an outline and next steps—it’s amazing.
9/ How has AI changed your writing process?
I’ve found Claude and ChatGPT useful for turning writing I’ve done into other formats. For example, let’s say I write a newsletter, I will sometimes ask it to turn that into a caption for Instagram or LinkedIn post. Or I’ll ask it to turn it into a video script I can use for a course. I do a lot of manual editing and rewriting, but it definitely saves time.
I also use it a lot for research. One of my favorite workflows is to take a picture of a passage in a book that I want to quote and ask it to extract the text. Then I switch to my laptop and copy-paste the text into my research notes in Notion.
I believe in “writing to think” so I really don’t want AI to write for me, but I’m all for giving it the boring, rote tasks so I have more energy to do what I love.
10/ Where do you find new ideas? Lately, I've been finding that smaller, closed communities are the places I’m getting the most inspiration. Groups chats organized around niche interests where people share articles and book recommendations, share perspectives on current events, and support each other in personal and professional endeavors. Social media feels very tired these days, everyone just paddling against the tide of the algorithm; the energy has drained out of it. The life is in niche communities, face-to-face interactions, and old books.
11/ How do you keep track of new ideas? A hodgepodge of screenshots and apps. I keep a lot of notes in Simplenote: I have one pinned note that’s like a scratch pad of thoughts related to my next book. And then I have notes for post ideas, links, etc. Once a month or so I sort things into Notion. I also take a lot of screenshots, and I’ve been using an app called My Mind lately which is like a simpler, more private Pinterest which I use for visual inspiration.
12/ What’s the best piece of professional advice you’ve ever received?
Stop seeing yourself in competition with others. It’s not a zero-sum game. Focus on what you do uniquely well, and put your energy there. If you show up for others with a genuinely supportive, loving energy, they’ll do the same for you, and you’ll all grow in a way that feels good.
13/ And the worst? That you need a big social following to get a book deal. While that’s often the way it goes, it’s not an absolute rule. I spread myself too thin trying to work on my book proposal and build a following because I believed that I’d never sell my book if I didn’t have enough followers. Without focus, both my social efforts and my book languished. When I finally decided to ignore that advice, I developed my idea to the point where it sold without a big social presence. The reality is that everyone has their own path, and anyone who tells you that there’s one right way to do it is usually wrong.
14/ What is the one piece of advice you would give to recent graduates that want to make a living as a writer? Think about how you like to spend your time, and then build your writing ecosystem based on that. Ultimately, you have to figure out how to build a community around your writing and get paid for it, but there are lots of ways to do that. For example, do you like speaking to large groups? Do you like consulting directly with organizations? Do you like teaching? Do you like interviewing, or making videos, or do you prefer quietly putting your thoughts to paper? If you had to make money, would you rather ghostwrite for someone else or go find sponsors for a podcast?
It’s very easy to build a career based on what seems shiny or appealing to others, and then realize you’re “successful” but your days are mostly spent doing things you don’t like. Prioritize what you actually enjoy while you’re doing it, and you can build a sustainable writing business that feeds you — literally and metaphorically.
15/ Foreign rights, audio rights, film rights: which have been the most valuable to you? I’ve never thought about this before but I would have to say audio because so many artists tell me they’ve listened to Joyful while they work, and it makes me smile every time.
16/ Coffee, tea, or something stronger? Matcha. I got a milk frother last Christmas and it’s a game-changer!
17/ What's the most effective way you've found to build your email list? I love personality-type quizzes. They’re a little bit complex to implement but I think because my background is in ethnography and research, I just love crafting the segmentation behind them. And they’re the beginning of a conversation — we can craft offerings around the answers, and we learn a lot about our community from the results.
18/ Can you describe your ideal workday? Wake up around 6 am, exercise, have some quiet time to journal with breakfast, and be at my desk by 8 am with a cup of tea. Do research or write until 2 pm, then a walk, then read for a couple of hours before spending the late afternoon and evening with my family. Read again for an hour before sleep at 10 pm.
19/ How does that compare to your actual workday? The actual day is somewhat similar, but with a five year-old, I’m in a hectic season of life, so all the leisurely reflection time isn’t really in the cards. I try to be up and showered before my kiddo so on mornings I work out, it’s around 5 am. Instead of journaling, there’s getting him dressed, making breakfast, and making paper airplanes or doing Legos before getting out the door for school. I often do errands after drop-off and listen to audiobooks at 1.75 speed for research on the way home.
I’m usually at my desk by 8 am or 9 am. I try to dedicate a few days a week to research and writing, and then have a day for writing the Joyletter, course development, community management, and social. But in reality, it’s not so clearly time boxed. A few days a week I pick my son up from school or camp and take him to activities or playdates. Others I work through the afternoon, which honestly is when a lot of my best writing happens. I fit the walk in whenever I can, usually at 4 pm before I cook dinner.
5 pm to 8 pm is family time: I cook dinner most nights, and we eat together and sometimes have a dance party before the bedtime routine. I rarely open my computer at night, but I do usually manage to squeeze in some reading or a quick journal entry at the end of the day.
19/ What do you wish you’d known when you were starting out? I wish I hadn’t felt so much pressure to figure everything out myself. I had so much imposter syndrome, and I was often afraid that if I didn’t know something, people would realize that I had no business being a published author. I would’ve saved myself a lot of stress and felt much less alone if I’d just reached out for help.
20/ Any new projects the Author Insider community can help support? I recently designed a wallpaper line in collaboration with Hygge & West. It’s full of color and fun, and it’s been so rewarding to be able to give readers a way to bring the ideas in Joyful into their homes.
And I’d be honored if you’d check out and share the School of Joy Commons. We’re building an intentional space for people who are prioritizing joy, creativity, and personal growth. It’s meant to offer a way to connect without the overwhelm of social media, just thoughtful dialogue and shared exploration.
21/ Any questions or feedback you would like from authors in the community?
I'm looking forward to seeing your responses!