The Inaugural Newsletter
Hi friends,
Can you believe this is my very first newsletter EVER? By the end of this, you might be thinking: “She decided to start her newsletter like thissss?”
Yup, sure did, because no matter how hard I attempt to mask and pretend everything is great, I can't help but be a realist.
So, where do I start? The good? The bad? The ugly?
The good is as great a place as any! Life lately has been weekend jaunts with a bestie. Long days at softball fields and volleyball courts. Farmers Markets and Hugo spritzes. Margaritas on King St. and so many other fun memories with friends. From near banishment at a Rosé tasting because we made a face over a particularly egregious smelling wine, to yapping about books and bookstore browsing, to nights ending in tears of laughter and stories to last a lifetime.
The bad: As always, the photos I share on Instagram are simply a highlight reel, and I have none to represent the lowest parts of my life. My brief respite from social media and the book world over the last few months has been twofold. I found myself getting an infinite amount of time back in my life. I found I didn’t miss what was happening on Instagram nearly as much as I anticipated, and even came to the point where I would dread opening the app and replying to messages, for no other reason than it’s hard to act like everything’s fine when you feel like you’re dying inside. (Note, I don’t feel this way all day or even every day. Mental health is not linear nor black and white.)
Which leads me to the ugly: I have been down. For nearly two months now. I am jaded. I have contemplated giving up writing a hundred times a day. I’ve grown to the point where I’m simply jealous of others' success, and it eats away at my insides because, in my eyes, I am not a success. That’s a hard thing to admit about yourself, but it’s true. I am a failure. I am failing—every. single. day. But if you watch Survivor (I know, corny af but stick with me), then you may remember the ever-handsome Jeff Probst spreading wisdom about failure in the pursuit of greatness.
And while I am trying to refashion my mind and will it to start thinking this way, I’m still in the weeds of giving up. (Which I am not giving up, btw.) It just has me reframing what success means to me and what my goals are. Because the big dreams keep inching further and further out of reach. I can practically feel the full weight of delusion pushing my dreams out of existence. “Don’t be ridiculous, Beth. You’ll never be like them.”
So, taking a step back, I've asked myself if another version of me is proud as I struggle to find esteem in myself in the now, and the irrevocable answer is YES. Past Beth and future Beth would look at me now and be proud. Not by how many books I’ve sold or written. Not by how many bestseller lists I haven't made. Not by a big flashy contract from one of the big five that doesn’t exist.
No, simply because I tried. And what’s more, I tried and showed up as me. The real me. I didn’t write the cowboy romance about 20-year-olds that flies off bookshelves. I did not write a literary masterpiece. I wrote what I wanted, how I wanted, for me. Authentically me. And that is something one should always be proud of.
I am not giving up, but if I’m going to pursue success, greatness even, I’m going to do it in my own way, the same way I write: authentically me.
And who knows, you may just wake up one cool, wintry day to find Emmaline on your Kindle…
xoxo,
Beth
(The fact of whether or not I’m a failure might be debatable to anyone who isn’t in my shoes. But take a step inside my life and mind, and you’ll find the barriers and trappings that make me so. I won’t bore you with the self-deprecation that would be required to explain, and additionally, it’s private.)
p.s. I'm hopeful future newsletters won't be so grim.
p.p.s. If you have any newsletter special requests, send them my way.
