When your body tells you to slow down
Or how I have been staggering a lot this week
First up I want to thank all of you who have been subscribing to my newsletters. As you’ve probably noticed I’ve moved onto doing more paid posts. I hope you’ll consider becoming a paid subscriber - my plan next year is to do twice monthly unpaid posts too (I’ve not had time to do these recently as my writing career has thankfully started to take off).
One quick note on writing and things going well right now. I will say that there have been MANY TIMES over the last 10 years that I’ve given up writing entirely. It’s no secret that writing books is a labour of love, it takes massive amounts of time and you don’t make money or you rarely do, and I didn’t see the point of continuing when I had 5 books under my belt but was basically having to work in the corporate world to make ends meet. Substack has been one avenue that really helps writers keep their dreams alive. My ambition now is to make writing 100% my life, and so this is what I’m manifesting. If you have an ambition for next year then don’t give up. I can honestly say that things will work out one way or another but you have to keep going.
The longer I’m away from corporate life, the more I realise how I’m not cut out for it anymore.
Anyway this week has been hectic. The school has literally delivered a barrage of stuff to do. It amazes me how much women (chiefly women) do around this time of year. There were collections for teachers, parties, Christmas jumpers…the list went on and at the same time I was writing last minute features- all stuff I wanted, but tomorrow is also my youngest daughter’s birthday. I went into the shed just now, tried to wrap everything in the freezing cold, my hands trembling and also made a stew because I felt out of sorts. I had a Zoom call for the BBC about an article (about how Christmas was better in the 80s), and I had somehow managed to put my phone into ZOOM mode so I couldn’t see any of the apps and it kept making a screeching noise (locked into emergency something or other). My fingers were shaking. I could see the presenter in the studio getting ready to talk, and I just felt like this was the moment when I was going to finally lie on the floor and surrender. I HAD REACHED MY LIMIT. But I breathed, took a deep one, right into my guts and then I remembered that I have asked for this stuff, these interviews, more people reading my writing and I am REALLY LUCKY. SO SO LUCKY. My dad would have been proud.
The interview went well. I then managed to get the ZOOM function off my phone and I am now writing this. Also feeling guilty as I am aware I haven’t written as much as I’ve wanted to on this platform. That I have been spreading myself thin and don’t want to continue doing that.
Next yeaer I would love to grow this great community - offer more of the types of things I love to write about, and also provide some positive messaging around growing older and it not being entirely shit.
To all of you happy Christmas and if you need to lie down now, just do it. I am actually telling you to do it.
So do it please.
Love Anniki xx