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Hey WordPress fam, 

Happy Tuesday. I can’t believe it’s the 9th of November ~in the yEaR oF oUr Lord~ 2021. Life is truly experienced one moment at a time. Before you know it, it’s almost mid-November! 

This time last year, the world found out that Joe Biden had been elected as the next President of these United States.

I logged into remote work on Monday, November 9, 2020, and shared such collective relief and lightness with my colleagues. The sun shone bright, my coworkers smiled, my boss at the time appeared in a good mood. The pressure cooker released. We could breathe again.

Positive energy flowed among us, exchanged on that Monday morning all-hands meeting. It had been a week’s worth of holding one’s breath, not knowing what the state of the world would look like for the foreseeable future. Suspended in time. 

The tension, the drama, and the stress had built up for four long, hate-filled years, heightened and exacerbated by the public health crisis we still find ourselves in, and it all came crashing down with the results of that November 2020 election. 

That same weekend, I had gone on a masked hike with a friend, a rare and much welcomed opportunity to connect with nature and good company. 

What I’ve Been Up To

The 2021 fall season has been lined up with consistent social gatherings. 

My husband and I closed out the summer celebrating the wedding of friends followed closely by a small get-together at a local vaccinated-only hang out with a few kind souls we hadn’t seen in a long time. Two weeks later, we attended a fun and hectic reunion of my business school’s class of 2020 to make up for last year’s cancelled festivities. 

I then had the pleasure of hosting my parents for a visit full of quality time. I took them wine tasting, apple picking, and on long walks in nature. We cooked and celebrated my Libra spouse’s birthday.

He and I also made a trip to Indianapolis to celebrate the wedding of a friend from business school. We shared some much-needed high frequency energy during a warm reunion with great people after a long-felt absence of gathering and joy. ‘Twas beautiful. 

I’m now back on my regular daily routine, and that brings me to my intentions on writing.

From mid-September to mid-October, I decided to embark on a “30 Days of Writing Challenge”. She really thought she could pull off 30 days of writing without sitting at the keyboard every day to write.

In my journal, I wrote:

The results? Four new articles, unknown days spent writing, but much fewer than 30 days, $33 dollars, 35 new followers.

I fell short on the written articles by 26. I did end up writing more than I otherwise would have, which I suppose counts as a win. And I have hypotheses surrounding why I didn’t reach my goals.  

“What’s in your way is your way.” 

-Unknown (brought to me by Chimdi, see below)

• I hadn’t defined my “Why.” I just sort of came across this challenge by a writer on Medium, and I thought, “Why not give it a go and see what happens.” 
• There was no foresight or planning as I entered the challenge. 
• I held a lot of fear surrounding quality versus quantity, and I didn’t know how to reckon with either. 
• My goals were loosely defined, more like vague targets than concrete, realistic goals. 

As a result, I didn’t quite hit the mark, but it doesn’t stop me from publicly and proudly sharing that I have made a new writing goal for myself: 

One post every day this week (minus Sunday)

Six days of continuous posts sounds much more realistic for my brain than one post every day for thirty whole days. If I were to keep that up for five weeks in a row, I will have written 30 posts almost everyday.

Why am I doing this? 

• I want to know what it’s like to sit at my keyboard everyday and write. That will pull together the building blocks of a sound, healthy, and sustainable writing habit. 
• To show myself I can. 

What I’ve Been Reading

Honestly, I’ve been reading hundreds of articles on Medium. I have been studying that platform like a full-time job to observe what works and what doesn’t, what good writing looks and feels like, what resonates, which publications to target, and for the simple joy of learning about people’s stories. It’s quite a platform! 

The writers who have made their mark on me include:

• Hogan Torah’s nonfiction titled, “Escaping Los Angeles Down The 405 of Shattered Dreams: To get to my future, I have to relive my past”
• Any time spent reading works by Jessica A and Jessica Wildfire (lol, both Jessicas) are never a waste of time 

One of the joys of writing on Medium is building up a community of like-minded readers and writers. I’m tuned in to see how writing on WordPress may yield similar results. 

What I’ve Been Watching

On Netflix

• Maid inspired by Stephanie Land’s memoir – I have share-worthy thoughts on this show, and I’m excited to write more and share. 
• The Closer, Dave Chappelle’s latest comedy special – this is not an endorsement of Chappelle’s show. I wanted to learn more about recent events taking place in the trans community.
• Squid Game written by Hwang Dong-hyuk

On HBO 

• Love Life Season 1 starring Anna Kendrick
• Love Life Season 2 starring William Jackson Harper

On YouTube

• Chimdi Ihezie’s channel and her 30-day video upload for the month of November. She very much inspired my 6-day writing challenge, and I do endorse her videos. Go check her out and subscribe if you haven’t already!

I’m excited to come back tomorrow and see what I whip up for Day 3 of my 6-day writing challenge.

Thanks for reading!

PS – if you still want to access my stories on Medium alongside other talented and lovely writers, you can sign up for a membership using my personalized affiliate link, which will help support me and my work directly. Thanks again!