Throwing out my script
Getting personal, because that's always more interesting, don't you think?
I did it again.
I mapped out a full slate of topics for this month, but just like last week, when I sat down to write this week’s theme, I didn’t know what to say.
“Can inspiration and comparison coexist?” sounded like a solid concept, one I thought might be helpful to readers. But I couldn’t relate — not enough.
Do I get jealous of people on the internet? Do I let comparison get in the way? Of course! But enough to write a full post about it with personal examples? I still think it’s a great topic but I don’t think I’m the best person to write it.
I was able to come up with one big thing that gets me envious, but describing it didn’t amount to more than a couple of paragraphs, (I’ll share that later in the post).
So this got my wheels spinning. If not this topic, this week, then what?
Sharing what’s true
The Substack posts I most enjoy reading are the ones that get personal. You can find a list of my favorite Substacks here, but to give some recent examples of other posts I’ve enjoyed, look to
’s Sorry I’m late, I was crying at a comedy show, ’s I Always Bring Books To Baby Showers or ’s A Leap of Faith…My favorite part of Jess Pan’s post was the section about watching men shopping for Valentine’s Day cards in the bookshop where she works. That could have been the whole article, and I would have been delighted.
I keep telling my friends that I’ve enjoyed writing on Substack so much more than blogging because I don’t have to worry about keywords, or searchability. Yet many weeks, I feel like I’m still acting like a blogger instead of a storyteller.
I feel compelled to teach a big lesson, when some weeks, I have nothing profound to share. But mundaneness — that can be a whole lot more relatable, especially if it’s told in an interesting way.
I’ve also been considering the idea of sharing these posts in audio form that you could listen to like a podcast (as an addition, not to replace written posts). What do you think?
A small shift
So that’s what I’m aiming for in coming weeks. More personal posts, maybe about boring things, but that will hopefully be intriguing to you.
Does that sound good to you? Please let me know in the comments. Also if there are particular things you’d enjoy hearing about (or not hearing about), I’d love to hear that too!
But for now…
Okay, so on to what I decided to do with this transition post which is to share a few unrelated things that have been on my mind. Here’s what we’ll unpack:
1. The one big thing that makes me envious
2. The movie I loved but the internet hated
3. Finding the best homes for our ideas
4. Birth-year buddies
5. Where are all the artists?
In this and every post you’ll also find:
✍️ Three creative exercises
🌞 Five good things that happened this week
💬 A prompt to set your intentions for the new week
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