Happy 2023, friends!
Is it weird that January, the same month when we’re setting new goals and challenging ourselves to be better, is also known as the saddest month of the year? At the top of the month, many of us are gung-ho to achieve and make this the best year ever with our resolutions, but by January 16th (allegedly), a disproportionate number of us will be struggling to survive what has come to be known as Blue Monday, the saddest day of the year.
Oh, wait.
If you didn’t click that last link, Blue Monday is made up. There’s a so-called “formula” to calculate the anvil of depression that many people might feel on “Blue Monday,” but there’s no real science behind it. Not really. It’s just advertised doldrums, and it’s another way so-called experts with a platform can make us feel bad about ourselves, so we spend our way to feeling better.
But if this is your first time reading my newsletter, I, a random writer on the Internet, am telling you that there’s hope.
You have the power within you. You’ve had this power all along. It’s pumping through your veins. It pours out of you onto the page when you create, and the fact that you even create at all, whether it’s that little doodle sketched during a work meeting or the hefty novel you’ve spent the last two years writing, is AMAZING.
Why? Because it’s so easy to just turn on Netflix. Literally the easiest thing you could be doing right now is disconnecting from everything — work, the family, that pile of laundry waiting for you on the floor. Instead, you’re reaching deep down within yourself, rooting around for inspiration, and releasing that tangible something onto a page, a soundcloud file, etc.
In my last newsletter issue (“Imposter Syndrome”) I wrote about how I started tracking my writing, so I wouldn’t get so down about how many hours I don’t spend writing. As it turns out, between November and December of last year, I wrote 10,307 words. That’s not too bad for two months.
On January 1st, I started another tab, and began the process anew. As of writing this, I’m at a paltry 1,607 words, but if I keep at it, I bet that number will be huge by the time December rolls around. All that worrying about whether I’ve written enough or not will dissipate, and hopefully, I won’t waste too much time fretting over whether or not I can even call myself a writer.
Because it’s so easy to get down on ourselves. One could argue that the world around us — all the news, media, zealous religious sermons, advertising — is designed to make us feel bad about ourselves, so that we’ll trust others to deliver something that’s already innate within us.
Whatever you’re planning to accomplish this year, I hope you knock it out of the $&#%ing park, and if you don’t quite achieve all of your hopes and dreams, just keep at it. Things will happen. If you keep chugging along, creating and sharing your work, I like to think that someone out there will take notice. You just have to shoulder the burden of not knowing when or how.
Two days ago, after over a year of mostly silence from publishers big and small, an indie press I submitted my robot novella to responded asking for a full manuscript. I had to rub the sleep out of my eyes and check my email again just to be sure. Granted, there’s no guarantee that said press will like the other 100 pages they haven’t read yet, but it was enough to rekindle hope. Because it’s been over a year — a long, silent, disheartening limbo of time of pondering when I’ve waited enough and should just give up.
But don’t give up. That’s what “they” want you to do (preferably on Blue Monday).
I hope they take your book. You write soothingly.