You’re Allowed to Change How It Works

You didn’t receive a letter from me at the start of the week, and surprisingly, I didn’t feel the guilt I expected to feel. That was a huge step for me, because I’ve always been someone who follows through on what I say. If I commit to a five-week series, I finish it. If I say I’m writing a book, I write it. Integrity to myself is something that matters deeply to me.

Two letters ago, I told you I would be putting out a letter every week. And because of who I am, I would normally deliver on that simply because I made the promise. But this week, I paused and reflected, and I arrived at something new. Sometimes, it’s okay to break your own promise. I honestly couldn’t believe I was saying that, but I meant it—especially when keeping that promise comes at the expense of yourself, or when you can’t find a strong enough reason to fulfil it beyond “because I said I would.”

I realised I had two options. I could either pick this up and continue writing every week, or I could take a step back and ask myself if weekly letters are actually sustainable for me right now. And the truth is, they’re not. This season I’m in is full. I have a lot going on simultaneously, and I’m also committed to writing in other spaces, like the Crea8torium Substack, which is a priority for me as well.

The other thing is that I’m not someone who writes just for the sake of fulfilling an obligation. I write from a place of flow. I write from an authentic place. I write because I genuinely enjoy expressing what I’m thinking. So I made a decision. For this year, these letters will be monthly. Will that change in the future? Maybe. Will I go back to writing weekly at some point? I don’t know. But what I can commit to right now is one letter a month, and I’d rather be honest about that than perform consistency.

This decision also made me think about something bigger, which is the importance of being honest and straightforward about where you are at any point in time. There’s no harm in that, but sometimes, especially as Creators, we feel like it’s our obligation to satisfy the consumer—to give people what they expect, when they expect it, and how they expect it. And I don’t fully agree with that, because part of the beauty of creativity is that you get to do it on your own terms. You get to decide the pace, you get to decide how you show up, and you get to decide what feels true for you.

Self-awareness has played a big role in this for me. It helps me recognise when something is no longer aligned in the way it used to be, and it gives me the clarity to make decisions from that place. One of the decisions I’ve made for my life is that I will never be in a position where I’m performing my creativity. I will always create at my pace, in ways that excite me, and in ways that feel real to me. The moment it starts to feel like performance, something important is lost.

If you’re reading this, I want you to take something from it. You’re allowed to change how something works. You’re allowed to adjust. You’re allowed to be honest about your capacity. It doesn’t mean you’re inconsistent, and it doesn’t mean you’ve failed. You’re not stopping the thing—you’re evolving it. You’re changing the way it works in a way that also works for you, and that’s okay.

Old promise - one letter each week.

New promise - one letter each month.

x Lumina