New Substack, same Essence of Toast!
I started this newsletter as a way to share reflections on both the writing process and the things I'm writing about—and especially to share them at a quicker pace than that of my "actual" writing. The letters have indeed been a fulfilling conduit for those things for more than two years(!) now. But it was becoming clear that using an e-commerce tool (Mailchimp) as a medium for distributing them was taking its toll on my time and energy, without really offering much in return. For all the hours I spent frustratingly formatting letters, I never really felt adept at using or satisfied by the platform.
So I've made the switch to Substack! I'm already finding it easier to navigate and easier to focus on writing. I also like that the platform collects past posts in a way that makes it easier for you to find them. I'm slowly migrating the Essence of Toast archive over, but there's plenty of good stuff to check out already. (Landing page is here; these letters will be sent from siloh@substack.com, if you want to add it to your address book.)
This change has all around felt positive. It's also got me thinking about the relationship between form and content from a slightly new angle: my own engagement with digital tools, and their intrinsic (but sneaky) overlap with sales and marketing.
Making the shift to Substack is one way I'm simplifying my digital life, though it stings that "simplifying" here also means setting up something new. Over the past few years I've switched between at least three new "personal information management" systems and opened a dizzying number of new accounts and platforms through which to share "content" and creative services. It makes me feel viscerally unsettled and cognitively drained to think of. It's also overwhelming to actually inventory what's fallen through the cracks as I've oscillated between shoving things into all of these different digital locker rooms.
My desire to simplify things is aspirational (the desire to shed clutter and unnecessary burdens) and practical. This weekend, an outdoor spigot popped its cap, spewing a spreading pool of water by our garage. Our house, which I recently moved into, lacks (or has very well hidden) an easy water shut-off point. Before our kind neighbor lent us the tool we needed to cut the supply off, I frantically crawled through an overstuffed digital file folder for info I'd hidden from myself about emergency repair services. I eventually found what I needed, but only after discovering an entire batch of unrelated (and misplaced) documents.
That moment reassured me that reckoning with my digital clutter is worth the trouble…that it is not exclusively a meaningless hurdle I've placed between myself and a more robust creative practice. At the same time, I'm predictably wary of the redemptive promises of self-optimization that frameworks for resolving "information overload" tend to be soaked in. A project of "trying getting my stuff together" has paralleled the project of this newsletter, and my reading/listening log for this stretch of years includes a decent portion of books about self-care, organization, or some combo of the those topics. In the past month alone, I've read or listened to Atomic Habits by James Clear and Spark Joy by Marie Kondo. I just started listening to Building a Second Brain by Tiago Forte. It's mildly embarrassing to admit how much I'm drawn to a genre often accessorized with the syrup of hyperbole. Some part of me feels like I should read these things purely as cultural artifacts, but I'm still acquiring the skillsets required to create the kind of life I want to live day-to-day. I don't always know how to throw things away, where to keep things, and how to translate lofty intentions into tangible, sustainable steps. Even if I have to brush aside the redemptive reflex which books in this genre usually include, I pretty much always end up with something helpful I can weave into the bird's nest of tips and strategies which have, indeed, begun to make my life easier.
(As a side-note, one of my favorite books on this topic is ADD-Friendly Strategies for Organizing Your Life by Judith Kolberg and Kathleen Nadeau. First published in 2002, the syrup of redemptive hyperbole is largely absent from its pages. There is, however, plenty of cool clip-art.)
All this connects in my mind with content marketing, in the sense that so many (though not all) of the framework from which I've pulled threads are packaged as programs or are otherwise heavily branded.
I don't know what exactly I want to say about content marketing, except to say that it is weird to exist at a time when so many things we read/receive (or write/create) are driven by this particularly deceptive imperative to produce. This is an exhausting imperative to be driven by, especially when it accompanies a manufactured or overly curated identity. It's exhausting, also, to be on the receiving end of so much content, at least without having way to effectively filter out a sense of obligation around what one should take in.
I don't think the sheer volume of media is the only source of exhaustion; it's also the "hook" that comes along with it, that expectation that one should give something in exchange for what one receives, or receive something in exchange for what one gives. Because creating and sharing things is delightful, and so is receiving them. I also really don't mean to cast shade on the work of representing one's skills and offerings, or to try to make money through creative means. But it hasn't worked for me to treat sharing things on the internet as primarily a marketing strategy, especially when that's mean I've spent time making Instagram posts when I should be taking care of my health or wringing out shredded attentional capacity to format a newsletter. I’ve enjoyed (and found meaningful) both the outcomes of this labor and what I’ve learned through it. But there has been something taxing and imbalanced within it.
I do want to make and share things, but I don't want to hide any hooks inside of them. I don't want to hide myself underneath any shiny surfaces, pretending to be more together than I actually feel, even if that cogent identity is one with a curated edge of dishevelment. How I actually feel is tired and worn down. I don't have any "hot takes" on that, but I'm curious about what's to be found on the other side of that admission. Curious about what admitting that may, in fact, open up or make possible.
I wanted to say a bit more about how literature and other kinds of art also provide guidelines about how to make a livable life, and that books heavily peppered with bullet point lists don't have the whole self-help thing on total lock and key. I also wanted to write something about this dream I had where I was telling Phoebe Bridgers (who, for whatever reason, so often appears in my dreams as an archetype of a younger, creatively successful person against whom I feel mundane or under-accomplished) that I am invested in writing my book, but I just really need to deal with all of this clutter I've created because I have ADHD. But in the holy name of not mashing my brain putting together a newsletter, maybe that's for another time. One quick thing, though: I do think I may have been lying to myself via an apparition of Phoebe Bridgers, and there's probably a good amount of chaos to leave undone if I am to get really back into the swing of writing.
Culture list
I already spilled my guts about all the self-help/organizational guidance I've been consulting lately, but let me go ahead and share a few other notes…
My friend Alissa Tu's book Confessions of a Modern-Day Kumiho was just published by Blue Cactus Press! Alissa is a powerful writer and thinker, and I think you would enjoy her book.
I'll be at AWP (an annual conference of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs) in Seattle next week, March 8-11th. It will be my first time attending IRL, and I'm going to try to not get too overwhelmed. Will I see you there? I hope so. We can remind each other to drink water. Since reading Times Square Red, Times Square Blue by Samuel Delany earlier this year, I've been waiting for the opportunity to quote him on writers' conferences:
"At the pleasant and chatty cash bar reception closing out the first day of panels and workshops at the writers' conference, it may look like a friendly and sociable gathering. At precisely the socioeconomic level (Symbolic, if you will) where the class war occurs, however, you have a situation analogous to a crowd of seventy-five or a hundred beggars pressed around a train station in some underdeveloped colonial protectorate, while a handful of bourgeois tourists make their way through, hoping to find a taxi to take them off to the hotel before they are set upon and torn to pieces." (Delany 136-137)
Offerings
Writing in Unknown Shapes — A course for ambitious writers working in ambiguous forms
Practice Space — Drop-in guided writing sessions ~ currently on hiatus
Experimental Practice podcast — Conversations about cross-genre and interdisciplinary work, culture, writing craft, and creative practice
Follow me on Instagram — I’m there sometimes
Read more Essence of Toast — Archive of past letters