The point-of-no-return

I have attached myself to this very beautiful leather journal from Paper Republic. Their top notch marketing has me convinced that my life will completely change if I buy this product. I’ve clicked through every product page on their website, I have watched at least ten of their YouTube shorts, I have scrolled through their Instagram feed.

I believe that immediately upon having this item in my hands:

• I will be the type of person who carries her notebook everywhere.

• I will be the type of person to write in said notebook out in public, and those little bits of writing will be masterpieces.

• I will be the type of person that *gasp* draws in public (can you imagine?? What if someone sees my bad drawings??).

• This notebook will secure a book contract for me which will be lucrative enough to solve my financial problems for the rest of my life.

• This notebook will keep my life so organized, and my thoughts so well expressed that I will never feel stressed again.

You could say they got me hook, line and sinker. I have added multiple variations of this leather-bound journal to my shopping cart, and searched for discount codes and clicked “check out.” But I still have not actually clicked the “Pay Now” button.

Because I know myself and I know a little bit about marketing. There is no product I can buy that will do the hard work of changing my life (except orthopedic shoe insoles, I swear by those things).

This winter I came down with a serious cough that had me laid-up for about five straight weeks. With it, came a serious case of the scrollsies. I became overwhelmed on all fronts: too much news, too many opinions of strangers on the internet, brain fog, slow and achy body. I was couch-bound for so long that I forgot how to do all of the things I love. Including writing and publishing. Over the past couple of weeks I took some steps to reduce the amount of time spent looking at my phone. To no one’s surprise: I have ideas again! And the will to write and even to hit publish once in a while.

My other problem is that writing has never felt the way I thought it would feel.

What I imagined writing to feel like:

• A whimsical day sitting in the park writing beautiful prose in my leather journal

• Making a boatload of money from writing (I’m talking Stephen King level wealth)

• For others to identify me as a writer, which is the craziest of them all because I know that I can’t control how others perceive me.

My process of writing and publishing weekly looks more like this

• Sitting down five mornings a week and opening the document

• Chipping away there for thirty minutes each day

• The first couple days are for word vomit

• Then a couple of editing sessions which I find challenging because that word vomit has to be shaped into something coherent

• A day to load it into Substack, add formatting, links, and some photos

This very unglamorous process works incredibly well for me. If I do it all five days in a row, something always comes out the other end. It might not be great, but it’s always done. For some reason (probably because my pop-culture references for “writer” are not this dull) I never took myself quite seriously enough to believe that that was a perfectly legitimate way to be a writer.

For two years I published this newsletter every Sunday. Early this year something made me question my process and I thought I could find another way. But waiting around for 5 months for a secret to reveal itself to me has netted absolutely zero published newsletters. So, back to the tried and true.

When I feel resistance towards any regular task, I think of Twyla Tharp’s morning ritual:

“I begin each day of my life with a ritual: I wake up at 5:30 a.m., put on my workout clothes, my leg warmers, my sweatshirts, and my hat. I walk outside my Manhattan home, hail a taxi, and tell the driver to take me to the Pumping Iron gym at 91st Street and First Avenue, where I work out for two hours. The ritual is not the stretching and weight training I put my body through each morning at the gym; the ritual is the cab. The moment I tell the driver where to go I have completed the ritual.”

-Twyla Tharp

In my head, I call it the point-of-no return. What’s the smallest step that must be taken in order to build momentum needed to finish the task? My strongest ritual is for swimming: I put one foot into my swimsuit. That’s it. Once one foot is in, the other will surely follow. I’m a weirdo and put my suit on at home instead of in the locker room. If I try to get out the door in my regular clothes, I dilly dally for hours and then never make it. Foot in suit.. That’s the key.

Turns out, my point-of-no-return for writing is simple: bring a cup of coffee into the studio, sit down in the desk chair, and open my laptop.

And look! It worked because here you are reading my newsletter once again.

I will admit I allowed myself $16 and a few hours to make a DIY version of the leather journal.

Honestly, I know nothing about working with leather and I picked up a piece that is way too soft and floppy. Functionally, this thing is not working well at all. But I tried! Through that process I learned that the dreamy notebook is not the magical key for me. All I need is coffee, chair, and laptop.

See you next Sunday,
Bekka

P.S. Get your life-changing shoe insoles at Power Step

P.P.S If someone from the marketing team at Paper Republic is reading this: I still want the green pocket sized leather journal.