No more hustle
Happy "Me"-day!
You probably know that I'm referencing Taylor Swift's latest song that was released today, but it's also fitting for what I want to talk about today.
I have been more absent from my blog and social media than what's "normal" for me, and I've been feeling guilty about it. Not because I think people are impatiently sitting at the edge of their seats, breathless with anticipation for when I'll release my latest piece of brilliance - I know nobody does. But it's one of the things I expect of myself, right along with doing yoga and posting about it, and when I don't do these things I feel guilty.
But I've been fighting this thinking for a long while now. And when I try to work something out, I usually write about it. So, if I haven't been writing about it on the blog, where have I done all my writing??
I'm glad you asked. Because I have been working on a new book, and I'm getting close to finishing it! For the past 9 months I've been working on it, and I switched into overdrive during April because I set myself a deadline: April 30th. I may not quite make it, but I'm doing everything in my power to get there!
I don't have a publisher yet, just an idea (a dream!) of whom I would like to publish it with. I will approach them when I'm finished and let you know more once I know what's happening.
Writing this book has been a dream. It took me a while to find the right way to say exactly what I wanted to say, but I have found it. Oh, how I've FOUND IT!
The new book is all about quitting the hustle. I burnt out last year. After my husband's prolonged illness, the stress of publishing my first book, and some personal problems, I needed to take a break from life. I accepted a job that would take me away from my life for a week at a time, and away from it I slowly pieced my life back together again.
At first, I spent an extraordinary amount of time lying on my bed, watching Gilmore Girls and Grey's Anatomy for hours. I needed to completely check out of my life for a while. I had never done that before: lie down in the middle of the day when I wasn't sick. It felt wrong, but tantalizingly so. I felt like I was breaking the rules - and I liked it.
I had put a lot of unrealistic expectations on that book release. In some way, I thought my life would change forever: either I would become famous, or I would be ridiculed. While I was hoping for the former and fearing the latter, I wasn't prepared for what happened: that nobody outside cared much, and that the people in my life cared so much.
Sounds insane? It is. I was completely unprepared for it all. The people in my life were so much more supportive, invested and in my camp than I was prepared for. To be honest, my ideal scenario would have been for strangers to order my book online and leave a nice, non-offensive review on Amazon. I realize now that's not how it works. But while I'm proud of what I write, I find it extremely difficult to talk about it with real people. Typical introvert-mistake.
So, with everything going on last year, I jumped on the chance to run away for a while. After all, that had always been my solution even as a kid: when in doubt, run.
I ran away last August, and only now am I finally brave enough to poke my head above water. I am preparing myself to end this experiment at the end of the summer and return back to my own life full-time: annoying neighbours, people-who-have-read-my-book, demons, animals, husband and all, 100%.
I am ready. And I am also so very grateful for this escape.
It allowed me to do a lot of thinking. I wasn't a wife, which is what I have identified with the most over the last 14 years - I was just me. Miriam. A conflicted, overwhelmed woman who had done what she had set out to do - and didn't know how to handle it.
Anyway, more about the new book!
It's all about how I believe that the hustle lies. It sets us up for failure. Our culture keeps trying to convince us that we are not good enough the way we are, that we have to be slimmer, stronger, more successful in order to be worthy. I bought into it. You probably did, too.
Here I was, having a good job, a great marriage, a life I loved - yet I was still convinced that I didn't have enough. I thought I needed to turn my hobby - writing - into a side hustle. Because all the "influencers" I followed told me so.
The hustle will always tell us that what we have is not enough. It will attempt to persuade us that we will finally be happy when we have the body of our dreams, the perfect spouse, a successful career (preferably our own business, because aren't we all supposed to be #girlbosses?), and a gorgeous house. After all, shouldn't we reach for the stars? We should never give up, right? And if that means sacrificing sleep, our sanity and our social life, so be it.
I wrote about what I think of the diet industry (=nothing at all), the insane beauty hustle, and how fulfilling my big dream was nothing like what I thought it would be.
I wrote about the fallacy of happiness, and how none of us know what we are doing.
I wrote about how any one of us can create a happy life right now, amidst the messiness and imperfectness of our life.
I reminded all of us that we HAVE to stop apologizing, for Chrissakes.
I'm really, really proud of this book. I will do everything in my power to release it into the wild soon.
This time, I won't need to hide for a year. I will shout its message from the rooftops:
We are all good enough the way we are! No hustle required.
Love you,
Miriam
If you find this letter useful, feel free to forward it to someone who might need to know more about the no-hustle lifestyle.
Vol. 65