Feb 3, 2023·edited Feb 3, 2023Liked by Garrett Francis
“as I’ve pursued writing I’ve encountered a large percentage of what I’ve believed was my inner circle, well, not really caring all that much.”
I wrote a novella in the summer and found exactly one person to read it; no longtime friends; no family; just an awesome coworker-turned-friend who is also a writer. That’s why I made my Substack: to find an audience so that doesn’t happen again
Good for you. Really, I've found it hard to be proactive when faced with obstacles like the one you describe. I've done some productive work in changing that about myself, I hope, but I think I'm still prone to wallow a bit. Or, maybe wallow isn't the right word... Let's up that to "process" -- to want/need time to process the disappointment I'm feeling, to accept people and things for who and what they are, and then move forward.
And same -- I'm hoping that Substack can help in finding folks who are interested in my work. One thing that really excites me about Substack is that those who use it tend to not shy away from longer-form pieces. I'm sure some are more interested in bite-sized content all the time, but having that built-in interest is, I feel, a big advantage.
Thanks for reading & commenting, much appreciated!
Quite agree with you on the way to treat indifference. We probably all have friends where the indifference is a factor. It's somewhat of a downer, but that's okay. Not their thing, we can still hang out, talk about other stuff. I'm thinking of one person I know in particular, but it's likely a fairly common phenomenon. Onward is the only way to go.
Thanks for reading and writing, Victor. 100%, it's okay for it to not really be their thing. It has taken me a long time to be at peace with that (too long), and I think that it stems from my small town upbringing. There was always this layer of anxiety when it came to pleasing other people, and when that's present it's easy to take dislike or indifference very, very personally. (I mean, there were 2,000 people in my town, and 80 people in my graduating class; if you did displease or offend the wrong person, there did exist a chance that your social life would take a huge, irrecoverable-until-college hit).
I wouldn't say that has gone away entirely for me, but not living in a small town has helped start ridding me of that. So has being a committed partner and father. There just isn't time to stew over it. Or, rather, taking the time to stew over it means that you're sacrificing something very valuable and finite for something that, in the end, really doesn't matter.
“as I’ve pursued writing I’ve encountered a large percentage of what I’ve believed was my inner circle, well, not really caring all that much.”
I wrote a novella in the summer and found exactly one person to read it; no longtime friends; no family; just an awesome coworker-turned-friend who is also a writer. That’s why I made my Substack: to find an audience so that doesn’t happen again
By the way: nice colour scheme
Good for you. Really, I've found it hard to be proactive when faced with obstacles like the one you describe. I've done some productive work in changing that about myself, I hope, but I think I'm still prone to wallow a bit. Or, maybe wallow isn't the right word... Let's up that to "process" -- to want/need time to process the disappointment I'm feeling, to accept people and things for who and what they are, and then move forward.
And same -- I'm hoping that Substack can help in finding folks who are interested in my work. One thing that really excites me about Substack is that those who use it tend to not shy away from longer-form pieces. I'm sure some are more interested in bite-sized content all the time, but having that built-in interest is, I feel, a big advantage.
Thanks for reading & commenting, much appreciated!
Quite agree with you on the way to treat indifference. We probably all have friends where the indifference is a factor. It's somewhat of a downer, but that's okay. Not their thing, we can still hang out, talk about other stuff. I'm thinking of one person I know in particular, but it's likely a fairly common phenomenon. Onward is the only way to go.
Thanks for reading and writing, Victor. 100%, it's okay for it to not really be their thing. It has taken me a long time to be at peace with that (too long), and I think that it stems from my small town upbringing. There was always this layer of anxiety when it came to pleasing other people, and when that's present it's easy to take dislike or indifference very, very personally. (I mean, there were 2,000 people in my town, and 80 people in my graduating class; if you did displease or offend the wrong person, there did exist a chance that your social life would take a huge, irrecoverable-until-college hit).
I wouldn't say that has gone away entirely for me, but not living in a small town has helped start ridding me of that. So has being a committed partner and father. There just isn't time to stew over it. Or, rather, taking the time to stew over it means that you're sacrificing something very valuable and finite for something that, in the end, really doesn't matter.