The Design Of: Ten Years of Listening
Posted By Justin Ahrens in Podcast
Read Time
1 minute
“The universe is made of stories, not of atoms.” — Muriel Rukeyser
Listening is an act of respect. It says this matters. It says slow down. It says there’s something here worth understanding.
Ten years ago, Design Of began as a way to practice that kind of listening. Not to build a platform, but to create space. To sit with people long enough for something real to surface. We weren’t as interested in what people made as we were in what shaped them. The work mattered, but so did the moments, choices, and tensions that formed the person doing it.
That curiosity has carried the show for a decade.
Why Story Has Always Been at the Center
Story isn’t decoration. It’s how humans make sense of complexity. Long before brands or business language, story helped us remember, belong, and move forward when certainty wasn’t available.
Over ten years of conversations, that truth keeps repeating itself. The stories that matter most aren’t polished. They’re honest. They include doubt, missteps, and clarity that arrives later than expected.
Those are the stories that actually help people move.
What Listening Reveals Over Time
Listening closely teaches you things you don’t learn any other way. Patterns start to appear. Growth often comes from discomfort, not confidence. Clarity usually comes from subtraction, not addition. Leadership reveals itself less through certainty and more through responsibility.
Story isn’t something people tell once they’ve figured everything out. It’s how they navigate while they’re still in the middle. That insight has shaped every season of Design Of.
A Show That Grew by Staying Human
Over time, the conversations reached more people than we ever expected. Not because they were engineered or optimized, but because they respected the listener.
Today, Design Of sits in the top 5% of podcasts globally. Not as a badge to chase, but as a signal. There is still room for thoughtful, long-form conversation. There is still an appetite for depth.
That shows up clearly in what people choose to listen to.
Who We’ve Sat With
Over the years, Design Of has brought together a wide range of voices. We’ve sat with Grammy-winning musicians, Oscar winners, Olympians, bestselling authors, founders, and creative leaders. And we’ve spent just as much time with everyday people doing meaningful work quietly, faithfully, and with intention.
What connects them isn’t fame. It’s reflection.
Each conversation starts in the same place. A human being. A lived experience. A willingness to slow down and speak honestly about what shaped them. That’s what levels the room. And it’s why the stories resonate long after the episode ends.
What People Are Actually Listening To
Over the past year, listeners consistently gravitated toward conversations that helped them slow down, find clarity, and stay grounded in the middle of complex work and life.
The most-listened-to episodes this year include:
These episodes weren’t popular because they were timely. They resonated because they were honest. Each one explores how to move forward without oversimplifying the work or the human experience behind it.
Looking across the full ten-year archive, a different pattern emerges. The episodes people return to again and again aren’t tied to a specific season or trend. They speak to deeper, enduring questions.
Some of the most-listened-to episodes of all time include:
These conversations endure because the questions they explore don’t expire. Meaning. Faith. Creativity. Courage. How to live and work with integrity over time.
Together, these listening habits point to something encouraging. People aren’t just consuming content. They’re looking for perspective. For language. For stories that help them make sense of where they are and where they’re headed next.
Why Season 10 Stood Out
Season 10 arrived during a period of real change. Work is evolving. Roles are shifting. Old playbooks are giving way to new questions.
Instead of resisting that tension, the season leaned into it with curiosity and hope. Getting unstuck wasn’t framed as pushing harder, but as learning to see differently. Clarity came through restraint rather than noise. Joy showed up as a deliberate and powerful choice. Leadership was reimagined as presence and care.
Even conversations about AI focused less on hype and more on agency. On how creativity expands when guided by human values.
Season 10 didn’t try to simplify the world.
It reminded us that we are capable of navigating it.
Looking Ahead to Season 11
Ten years of listening has made a few things clear. Listening itself is a form of leadership. Story creates alignment before it creates attention. And beauty, empathy, and joy are not soft ideas. They are essential ones.
When people are given space to speak honestly, they usually rise to it.
If you’re someone who believes good work starts with better questions, you’ll feel at home here.
Season 11 grows from that foundation. As we continue learning more about story and the human experience, we’ll also be trying a few new things. New approaches. New ways of creating space. Not change for the sake of change, but growth rooted in curiosity and care.
And we’d love your help.
If there’s someone you think we should interview, a voice we should hear, or a story worth exploring, connect us or let us know.
Ten years in, Design Of still exists for the same reason it always has. To slow the conversation down. To honor story as something that shapes who we become.
The same approach that shapes The Design Of also shapes our work at Rule29. We start by listening.