At least once a month, I get the urge to start writing publicly again. Occasionally this comes and goes without action. Sometimes, like today, I actually write something. I want to move from this sporadic writing activity to a writing habit.
So, as I open my Substack community, I thought I’d reflect a bit on the decision process that I went through that led me to take the nuclear option of actually deleting my old blogs and moving to Substack.
I need accountability
As a huge fan of Gretchen Rubin’s Four Tendencies, I seriously identify with my tendency of being an obliger. If you’re not familiar with Rubin’s work, this means that my response to outer expectations is that I do them and to inner expectations is that I don’t do them as easily. Publishing to a blog on no set publishing schedule with no real means of accountability just doesn’t fit who I am. Creating a newsletter that people come to expect - and perhaps even anticipate - is much more in line with my tendency as an obliger and my need for outer accountability.
I’m trying to simplify
On my goals list for the last two years, I’ve had the a project to clean up all the digital mess that is my life. I’ve finally gotten around to have the book Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport as next up on my reading list. As I thought about what I wanted from a newsletter like this one, I really want a place to just focus on writing about what’s going on around me, what I find interesting, what new things I’m trying that I think you might benefit from. I’ve had both blogger and wordpress blogs over the years and maintaining each is cumbersome, hard, and more time-consuming than I wanted.
If I ever make money writing, I want it to because people found the content valuable
I detest web sites that are filled with advertisements and click-bait designed to make revenue simply because your eyes fall on it. Don’t get me wrong. I’d love to create an income stream from writing, sharing, talking, etc. I’d also love to create a passive income stream that doesn’t involve 7 a.m. breakfast meetings all the way to Board meetings that don’t end until 9 p.m. and I walk in my house at 10 as a zombie only to have to get up again the next day and do it all over.
However, I’m not going to do that because I subject people whose eyes I care about - you dear reader - to annoying pop-up ads. I may launch a YouTube channel as a part of this entire next phase in my life of digital publishing and media and I will allow ads in videos. I may also add links to sponsored content or share affiliate links to other programs. While in some ways, I think those are pyramid-schemey, they’re less-so to me than subjecting your eyes to 100 pop up ads on a web site.
I want to be clear about the intention
When I started my first blog, it was to showcase my photo a day project. While I still love to have a camera in my hand and I will share my own photos here from time to time, for me now, it’s far more about the words than it is about the images. A traditional blog was nice to allow plug ins to sites like Flickr and Instagram, but for now this is nice too. I really just plug in my content as I go and let Substack figure out the hard stuff.
It’s an experiment
As I’ve been thinking about what the purpose of my writing really is, it’s about an experiment. I want to see what resonates with others. I want to see what helps me get better. I want to see if I’m as weird and awkward as I think I am or if there really are people out there like me ;-) So, I’ll be sharing with you in the hopes of engaging, of learning with you, and of sharing what we learn together.
What can I expect?
So, I won’t decide on a final format, maybe ever. There will often be some sort of long form analysis or writing like you just saw above. Here are a few other things I think will show up in most, if not all, editions.
A quote and a note
I’ve always been a collector of quotes. I want to share them. I’ll add a brief note to each one.
"...it’s hard to remember that the brokenhearted are the bravest among us because they got past their egos and busted their hearts out of that prison so they could love." - Brené Brown in Dare to Lead
This quote was resurfaced via Readwise - which I’ll talk about more below. I felt like this quote was really appropriate right now given how hard life is as we all navigate the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic together. I think the pandemic has made me more open to see people’s brokenheartedness. I’m not an enormously empathetic person - I have to think about it to be empathetic - yet living through a pandemic has made me see people differently. It’s made me more open to all of the emotion and challenge of this situation.
A tool and a tip
I love technology. Lately though I’ve been thinking about how I need to make sure that my technology defaults are things that actually make my life better and easier. I’ll use this section to share a tool and a tip with you.
Readwise.io
I usually jump right on the bandwagon of a new tool and then discover later that it’s not worth what I spent on it. I actually used 14 days of a free trial with Readwise, tested things out with it, and even changed my read later tool from Pocket to Instapaper because I like the way things feed over into Readwise from Instapaper better than from Pocket. I did opt in to the premium version of Readwise which makes it quite the investment. You can benefit from my investment if you want to subscribe to the notes I’ve “liked” each week. If you read a lot on a Kindle or via Pocket or Instapaper and you want to truly learn from what you’ve read, then Readwise may be a valuable investment for you.
A tip
I shared this on Facebook a few weeks ago and got a lot of other tips in return. That’s one of the joys of social media. I thought this was a good one to share again. So, if you do a lot of copying and pasting - you may want to remember that adding the shift key to your normal Ctrl+V (Cmd+V for my apple/mac friends), it will paste just the plain text. Word and excel offer a tool to do this after you’ve pasted. However, doing it with the addition of the keyboard shortcut is so much faster from my perspective.
What bugs you that you’d like a tech tip on? I love making technology work better for people.
What I’m reading and learning
I am an enneagram 5 with a top Clifton Strengths Finder strength of “Learner”. Learning is just a part of who I am. A lot of my learning is from reading. I’ll share books and other things I’m learning here.
Just finished - Make Time by Jake Knapp and John Zeratsky
I came across this 2018 book by Knapp and Zeratsky in Ali Abdaal’s YouTube review of the book. Abdaal calls it his favorite productivity book of all time.
Ali gives a great summary of the book in the first five minutes of the video before he goes on to interview Knapp and talk about the book in more depth.
I really enjoyed the book. It’s a quick read - taking me less than five days of reading just for 30 - 60 minutes a day. I also will say that the framework of Highlight - Laser - Energize - Reflect makes sense to me. My highlights for the last few days have involved getting ready to publish this very newsletter you’re sitting with right now and today’s highlight is to actually hit publish which I know I’ll accomplish.
Up Next - Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport
Newport’s book was recommended in Make Time. I also want to read his book Deep Work as well as several of the other books recommended in Make Time. This is a part of how I select my reading journey. I read one book which leads me to another which leading to another. The book is from 2019 and is 302 pages so it’s not unsubstantial.
Also Up Next - Leonardo Da Vinci by Walter Isaacson
I bought Isaacson’s biography of the great master Da Vinci after finishing How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day. I read the Seven Steps book in May when my brain finally relaxed a little in pandemic world and I could actually read and focus. It was a struggle when we first sheltered in place so I was grateful to find a book that allowed me to embrace reading again. Isaacson’s biography is daunting - 624 pages. However, I did a quick skim and it looks very enjoyable so I’m looking forward to reading it.
What are you enjoying reading at the moment? Share in the comments what has helped you navigate the pandemic.
About subscribing
As I build this newsletter community, I’m offering free subscriptions to nearly anyone so if you want to subscribe, now is the time to do so. If you see a link on social media, it’s very likely a free subscription link. I welcome you sharing the link too so that we can build a community of people who want to help one another get better and and live a more authentic life each and every day. Once I know I can stick to this habit and build something I think people may find valuable, I may start to charge. At that time, you’ll want to already be subscribed for free for life so subscribe now.