Remembering Why I Started This Project
Like, how did I forget already?
The past few days I’ve been preparing like a mad thing to go on holidays (and yet still post stuff on social media and here on Substack—yeah yeah I know, bear with). I went back to the to do lists of my day job (super ironic given how I just shared my current planning system on YouTube1) in order to get it all done.
The push originated from starting a Substack and attempting to gather readers. I did not want to lose momentum, although I haven’t gained any readers in the last couple of weeks.
Speaking of…
The list loomed over me and this week I finally wrote down everything I would need to do. After a day of “getting it done”, crossing off about a third of my list and not getting to type up the manuscript or create hiding spots in the journal, I stopped for a time of reflection in my examen group2. One member mentioned their word for the year.
In what she said, she reminded me of my word. Foal.
And something connected, shifted.
Because what I really want to do is what my word of the year does. In this heavy, hard time, my word calls me not to pull wagons or race around a giant circle for man’s amusement.
Foals play, they delight in learning how to use their limbs and then play some more. They race for the joy of it, not for a prize.
How is it October and I just figured this out? My word “foal” was not about gestation or ushering a new being/project into my life.
It was about play.
The whole point of The Môrdreigiau Chronicles (aka Project Starfish) was to play, to delight in writing again, and it 👏 Doesn’t. 👏 Even. 👏 Matter. 👏 If only a handful of people read it. It is delight and it is joy. Even when a scene makes my heart squeeze in agony.
I can’t believe I ignored the oracle cards I drew on the new moon earlier this week. They are all about the radical delight of play.
Things are hard and things are heavy, but everything does not need to be.
So you will excuse me if I don’t post for a bit, or only when I want to. (OK, I have stuff done and scheduled, that will not be going to waste!) I will be in a green field, kicking up my heels and playing.
So much else is hard and heavy. But everything does not need to be like that. Especially when so much falls outside of our control, and virtue-signalling does bupkis (nothing).
I wrote the first draft of the above in about ten minutes. It wasn’t even part of
‘s Iron Chef challenge from last week (which I missed). I realised that I had to change gears in my posting plan and that this had to be shared in case anyone else is feeling that ridiculous pressure to perform.My newfound resolution is of course tempered with a respiratory-virus-that-is-not-covid sick husband and so I am on grocery shopping, chemist (pharmacy) runs, and cooking duty. And there are still the hard and heavy things.
I have returned to creating the journal this novel will be living in (outside of its life in Substack) and having so much fun. Oh, and apparently doing another round of edits, as I find typos in the the typed up manuscript!
I am posting mini updates like the one below over on the Môrdreigiau Chronicles subscriber Chat … if you haven’t signed up for a Substack account or if you’re not using the Substack app yet, you’re missing out!
How do you find joy or delight in the overwhelm? Please share in the comments or over in the chat.
My examen group meets online once a week to reflect on our past week and notice what we notice and hold each other through the good and the bad. It’s absolutely lovely.
I too have a husband who does grocery shopping, chemist runs, bill paying and everything else in between while I stay buried writing Substack posts, books, novel edits, social media comments. Sometimes I wonder why the hell I am doing it. The feeling passes soon and I am back to my writing.
Write/create for yourself first, everything else comes second.