Resolutions and Writing in 2025

This year, I’m trying this new thing where I let myself evolve and let go of some impossible expectations. Starting with my newsletter.

In 2024, I wrote twelve newsletters. Each one contained a short story I’d written, a song suggestion from my current playlist and a book recommendation. I wasn’t sure what I was doing. I yelled into what felt like a void and hoped the words would land somewhere.

I started because every writing article and podcast I devoured insisted that I needed to have a mailing list to ever have any hope of becoming a successful Author. I set out and diligently did the things I thought would get me set on the path to some kind of literary success. Except for finishing the manuscript swirling around in my head, of course.

But a funny thing happened as I yelled into the darkness. Eventually, the words did land. My sentiments were echoed back to me. I received the most kind and incredible feedback from real people, some of whom I didn’t even know personally (Every good newsletter starts with twisting the arms and inputting the emails of our nearest and dearest, surely?). Other writers commented on the process. Readers told me their favourite part of my silly stories.

Writing and being a Published Author are different things.

The act of creating a product intended to be sold or otherwise distributed demands a vastly different skill set than writing as a purely creative pursuit. Publishing words for compensation or acknowledgment is entrepreneurship. Writing purely for personal pleasure or reflection is journaling. It’s a lot more complicated than that but on a most basic level, this is how I understand it.

In 2024, I began putting the cart before the horse. That is to say, that instead getting lost in imagination and letting the thoughts spill onto the pages the way I always had, I focused on learning skills. On craft and technique. I set very clear targets. I missed most of those targets, but did manage to send all twelve short stories to the humans who asked to see them. I treated writing as a pursuit with an end goal. Which to be fair, it really still is. (I will eventually finish the project of my heart.)

I took part in challenges, courses and seminars. The newsletter became testament to my commitment. I posted things on social media. I debated long and hard about my digital footprint. I imagined one day down the line being asked about something silly I’d put online in these precious early years when I finally decided to take myself and ‘this book’ seriously. My progress slowed and the words dribbled from my brain. Imposter syndrome crept in, and I doubted whether I even had the right.

Then I stopped posting and followed the contrary advice that insisted I should disappear and show up fully formed.

But that’s not really how life works.

Writing in Community is Essential

My end goal is and has always been to finish writing a novel. Hopefully more than one. But I won’t get too far ahead of myself.

It would be spectacular to sell a book one day, especially to someone who shares my vision. But I have to write from beginning to end before it can exist in the world. I need to bring something to begin with.

In order to achieve this goal, eventually, I need to let people into my space. Whether that be beta readers who can’t follow the plot that seems so clear in my mind or an editor who can’t stand my long, sometimes rambling sentences that ignore correct composition and my sometimes shocking grammatical and spelling errors (whoops).

If I took anything from 2024, it’s been the real connections I’ve made with humans who love stories as much as I do. From email subscribers who reach out to me to a room full of writers with only our love for telling stories in common – writing has been the connector I didn’t know I needed.

I’m still deciding how I want to show up in the world and how much of myself I want to give to the public domain (Imagine the audacity to think that anyone even cared). Perhaps the newsletter content will be repurposed and make its way here into my little corner of the internet (work smart, not hard). A test of the waters before diving headfirst.

No matter what, in 2025 I’m writing. But I’m not doing it alone.