To substack or not to substack...

I went down a lovely rabbit hole yesterday.

I asked myself if I should set up a substack for this blog.

I looked at Substack.

I read some very interesting articles.

Checked out the feed.

Mostly figured out what was where.

Got completely overwhelmed.

Wondered if my writing was serious enough for Substack.

Looked at some of my friends' substacks.

Decided I wasn’t good enough for substack.

Got overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information out there.

Felt the pressure of social media, likes, subscribers, followers, comments…

Wondered if I should share anything ever anywhere.

Was discouraged by how far along I wasn’t already.

Looked at velma.substack.com and saw it was taken in 2020 and they haven’t written anything.

Got pissed that that’s being wasted.

Wondered if I should ask them if I could have it.

Decided I shouldn’t because they’d probably say no anyway.

Downloaded the substack app.

Created an account.

Checked my contacts.

Followed some friends.

Discovered I had an account already with Mama Mavel that I’d forgotten about.
WTF.

Took a break.

Took a breath.

Checked in with my body.

Asked myself what felt good.

Asked myself what I was doing this for.

What I noticed is that Substack is interesting, and doesn’t feel good for long amounts of time.

The reason I am writing this blog is so that the people I’m getting to know can get to know me.

I don’t need loads of likes or follows or subscribers.
I desire to connect and spark conversation with the people I care about.

I’m sharing all this because it’s a great example of how we can get seduced and distracted by all the “shoulds” out there. I heard a “you should be on substack” from somewhere.

I had a choice. I could listen to the shoulds and let myself feel bad about all the shoulds I wasn’t doing.

Or I could come back to my self, and look at what felt good for me. What worked for me. And remember the reason I’m doing any of this in the first place.

This is allowing me to actually DO something. It may not be what I should be doing, but something’s getting done. The picture I’m posting with this article is a good example. I should have a picture that is somehow tied to the content of this article. I should take the time to think about that, find it, make it the right size, but if I did that (which I don’t like doing), I’d never post the actual article. So, instead, you’re getting a picture of some daffodils in the sunrise light from equinox morning. I hope you enjoy them. =)

INVITATION:

What are you shoulding yourself about? What would you rather do? How would you feel if you gave yourself permission to listen to yourself?