“What the salmon somehow know is how to turn their underside—from center to tail—into the powerful current coming at them, which hits them squarely, and the impact then launches them out and further up the waterfall . . . . Their leaning into what they face bounces them further and further along.” – Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening
Three folks unsubscribed from this Substack last week.
It’s thrown me into a feeling and thinking and doubting spiral.
Here’s where I’ve been:
Take 1: My enneagram Type 4 personality (think creatives, and wanting as much meaning and feeling as possible in any given moment, with a core desire to be understood) went immediately to an old story: You are too much. Your core defectiveness has been found out. Your message isn’t getting through, and you should close up shop.
Take 2: My thinking side then entered the picture and said: This is probably not about you. People have hard days. They have crowded inboxes. They have shopping binges and decide they need to unsubscribe to everything. You yourself did this just last week!
Take 3: I took a long walk, and at the end of it, my quieter mind started speaking: The truth is somewhere in between. This Substack is one of many fish in a crowded stream. You are not and don’t need to be the best or the most popular—or even anywhere close—for what you have to say to be worth sharing. But still take the coaxing, little fish. Turn into what’s hard the way the salmon do. Ask yourself: Was your last post your best work? Were you squirming in your seat with the vulnerability of it? Were you at your edge?
Which told me what I needed to write about this week: The vulnerability of sharing with you here. The hurt that comes when a close friend doesn’t read at all, or another close friend stops reading, or three people unsubscribe in a week.
Talking this over with David, he asked a simple question: “Why are you doing this again?”
Says the person who edits these posts each week.
“I mean, I support it and will always support it,” he added. “But I think your ‘why’ might be shifting.”
I didn’t think he was right at first. But he’s right. For a long time, the story I told about my “why” was this: I wanted to build resilience and lose some of my old preciousness in sharing my writing. And I wanted to keep my (figurative) pen wet even on weeks when my law job is really busy.
But now I’m not so sure. This weekly place I visit has come to matter to me deeply. It has changed how I understand myself and the people I love and my experiences. It helps me transform the day-to-day hard into something useful, time and again. Which tells me it might be time to invest more in it. Or tighten its focus. Or ask myself who my core readers are and what they want.
So I’ll be asking these questions in the next few weeks, all the while trying to remember the salmon: how powerful that pressure must feel on their bodies, and how they turn toward it anyway.
Your posts bring me back a little to Pomona and hanging there! You motivated me to write a book one november at pomona. These posts are like little does of motivation from an old friend.
This is the statement that struck me and, I believe, answers your question: “It has changed how I understand myself and the people I love and my experiences.” Some people are not comfortable sharing what you share, but can identify with it - even if they deny it temporarily. They get uncomfortable l. I look forward to your posts. They help me know you better and it helps me realize that my own feelings and thoughts over time have not been isolated and limited to me. I can identify with many of your posts. Some people just aren’t comfortable admitting those things about themselves. You should do what works for you. If I have a vote, I vote for “continue” if it does anything of value for you.