On Grace, Discipline, and Integrity

Hello dear reader,

Good morning from a “Shut Up & Write” meetup on the top floor of the Oba library in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Below is a touristic photo on the Keizersgracht that my dad’s friend’s wife took of me after a cozy, curious dinner together. This is my first touristic photo taken in 2026. Here’s proof I’ve lived in Amsterdam for the past four months already(!) That’s something worth celebrating.

Let’s dive straight into this week’s letter 325 because I have some things I need to get off my chest…

It has been ten days since I last wrote you.

Needless to say, I feel like a slackasaurus1 who has been dropping the ball. And it’s a bit ironic because the last letter I wrote was on the pressure to be smart. And now I have been thinking about the pressure to have integrity with my twenty-four- year-old self and her promise of a weekly publishing rule.

When I first started this publication in April 2020 after pivoting away from my first ‘failed’ book project2, I wanted a project that could make me feel creative and courageous. Something that could bring me purpose week after week during COVID and my time of sulking in bed sad about the uncertainty of my life. About a week into unemployment.

So, this creation of weekly letters came out of a desire for certainty in a time of uncertainty. And when I blew up my life with my quarterlife crisis at age twenty-five with a plane ticket to Hawaii, this creative ritual was one of the rocks in my life. I gripped onto this practice because it grounded me in my creative rhythm.

Many people said that making these letters a weekly thing was not sustainable. That it was a recipe for disaster. But I like challenge. Typically, I thrive on it. When people say I can’t do something, I get even more curious and want to rebel and do it anyway. At age twenty-four, I especially got pushback from one of my mentors at the time who kept saying weekly was too ambitious. I really, really loved proving her wrong.

It also helped that I would read from other writers week after week the past half decade like Charlie’s Call Me Charlie, Katelyn’s Declarative Statements, James’ 3-2-1 Thursdays, Kai’s Dense Discovery. They’ve got super duper busy lives too, more so than me presumably as a youngish single lady where responsibility is comparatively less than the majority of these adults in the western world.

~

I was talking to my friend Tamara about my shame of not publishing my letter last week a couple of nights ago after a mic night. A year ago, I borrowed her book on Stephen King’s advice On Writing. We both enjoyed it. My biggest takeaway was to close the door and get my writing done each morning no matter what.

I had already been disciplined with this, doing Julia Cameron’s three pages, but getting this affirmation from King meant again that I was on the ‘right path’. I’ve been writing every day since April 2019. It’s become a non-negotiable to have roughly three pages streaming off my magenta pink fountain pen onto the page like a boisterous waterfall. That’s been over seven years now. Wild right? Seems like a long time, and at the same time, I’m devoted to some form of a writing practice for the rest of my days that I breathe air, so it’s not really that long in the grand scheme of my potential existence.

For 325 weeks, I’ve followed this self-imposed rule of weekly publishing. That’s from almost six and a half years. That’s over half a decade. I can’t really process that chunk of change either. I just know this publication is one of the most proud creative creations of my life.

When I declare I am a writer, I truly feel it in my bones.

There’s no flinching or reservations. Nobody can call me a fraud with this identity, since I have this whole entire house of 325 bricks of what I’ve been building a sturdy house with. This rule has gifted me creative confidence.

At the same time, this rule feels stale, and I want to freshen it up. It needs a glow-up.

This refresh doesn’t mean I am going to wait for inspiration to arrive. I still write every day. The blocker is more about answering the question of: how can I publish in a way that makes me enthusiastic?

Lately, publishing has felt like preparing for a surgery to get my wisdom teeth pulled.

Back in 2024, I wrote on feeling guilt and on Discipline or Grace, and I shared about having more grace with myself by varying the style and format of my weekly letter saying:

I’m going to stop feeling like I need to apologize for my handwriting or something being less thoughtful than perfection. I’m still going to keep going and will share each week, but with that grace, I might be sharing in shorter lengths. And it might be a wider variety of things that I’d like to “show and tell” from my life and what I’ve been pondering, feeling, or experiencing.

But something bigger needs to shift this time around than merely that.

So where does that leave me?

Will I keep this weekly publishing thing going?!

I started this project a month and a half after I turned 24 years old. Do I, today as a thirty-year-old, believe that my 24-year-old self is wiser than me today? Do I really need to continue to honor the promise she set for weekly publishing?

I’ve since learned so much more about the world and creativity and my energy levels. Right now, as a woman, it is my time of the month, and this masculine weekly publishing regime to produce and force something out each week doesn’t align with me anymore. I already grant myself grace in my entrepreneurial and social schedule to rest more during certain phases of my month’s cycle. And yet, do I really still expect my creativity to be linear when it’s more of a cyclical nature? Where’s the grace and kindness in that?

As I sit here during my time of the month, coming out of a weekend where I woke with migraines that made me feel too nauseous to eat breakfast, I sulked in bed in darkness, hiding from the sun. Dread filled me with any thought of opening a computer screen to write this publication.

My past self inspires me in how, no matter what, she’d been regular with this weekly cadence, but lately, it doesn’t honor me or fit my creative process.

I’m not sure exactly what that means, but I know it’s time to tinker. It’s time to try something anew. To apply some beginner’s mindset to what this could look like.

My past self also is a thief of my present-day joy because she made weekly publishing look easy. Like what the heck?! She’s making me look bad now that I need to drop off, simmer, and stew over my ideas more and how my writing can evolve to have more depth.

But at the same time, I want my publishing to nourish me.

Weekly publishing doesn’t feel sustainable to keep up. Sure, past me might be embarrassed, but this is what’s real for me, and that’s the bravest thing I can do to meet my needs.

This publication needs to flow into a new mold where sharing feels fulfilling. I’m not sure what that shape will look like, but I do know I want to feel energized by this again. I want to feel excitement and zest and like this outlet is something I look forward to rather than socks I need to sort from the dryer each week.

I want to balance grace and discipline while still having integrity. And to stop thinking dualistically and allow myself to coexist with being consistent and adapt to where I am.

I want to keep going without writing superfluously merely to be in service of some weekly deadline.

So I’m setting a basement intention of publishing at least two times a month. And maybe this isn’t forever. Who knows, maybe I’ll miss the weekly outlet for creative expression that this has served the past 325 weeks. But for now it is time to tinker and see what shoe fits me best now.

Rather than gritting my teeth through a promise my 24-year-old self made without knowing my cycle, my body, or how my thirty-year-old life would feel, it is time to update my creative contract. And to update the terms honestly, instead of quietly resenting a rule I never renegotiated.

That’s what integrity looks like now.

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~~~

Ready for a New Thing by Bahamas

Just rediscovered Bahamas last night and loving this newer album. When I was tired of listening to Jack Johnson on repeat while living in Hawaii, The Bahamas would enter the scene.

In Eastern philosophy, there is a Sanskrit word “citta,” which translates to “heart-mind,”. This means the union of logic and emotion, which can then lead to wiser actions and more embodied life experiences.

How could I have more citta in my days?

“First forget inspiration.
Habit is more dependable.
Habit will sustain you whether you’re inspired or not.
Habit will help you finish and polish your stories. Inspiration won’t.
Habit is persistence in practice.”

– Octavia Butler

• to Tamara Hasekamp and Michael Dean for exchanging ideas with me and inviting me to rethink what my publishing schedule could look and feel like

• to my friends Laurie and Isha for our divergent conversations about how to keep writing even when we’re blocked

• to Jane Stephenson for sharing with me about this Shut Up & Write meetup. I really enjoy the energy of spaces like this where I can feel less alone while writing.

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I am grateful you chose to fill part of your day here.

If something in this letter resonated, press the ❤️ , leave a comment, reply to this email, or reach me at vermetJL@gmail.com. I love hearing from you.

Keep on learning 😁

Tot snel 🌺 🌺

Toodles :)

Jen

P.S. #1 - I coach writers. I guide them to build a writing routine and have fun hitting “publish.” If you’re curious to learn more, email me or check out workwithjen.ink

P.S. #2 - I wrote a book. Letters to My Life is my favorite way to share my writing with you (and it keeps your screen-time stats down). Grab your copy here.