How to let things die when it’s time
Creativity, anxiety, and what’s ahead in 2025
In two days, it will be a year since I started this Substack. It’s been a joy to have your company as I’ve sat with my own thoughts and articulated many a concept that will show up in my presentation at Seabeck later this summer.
It was only ever an experiment, though. I wanted to learn — do I enjoy this? Can I, after years of dedicated absence from social media of any kind, engage with a platform in a way that feels healthy & nourishing?
The answer, at least as far as Substack is concerned, is unfortunately: no.
For a while this summer I went quiet because some huge things had happened inside me and I needed space to process them before sharing with the world. But even after I’d got my feet back under me, I found myself averse to visiting the Substack website. Its Notes format forces me to encounter strangers’ opinions on all kinds of subjects, some of them quite emotionally intense, the instant I log onto the site. I’m learning that this leaves me deeply unsettled. It feels, to my body, sort of like being thwacked on the nose with a rolled up newspaper as a first-thing-in-the-morning morning alarm clock.
I don’t love it.
And I’m really, really over forcing myself to do things I don’t love.
So I’m going to wrap up this experiment. But if you know me, you know that I’m constantly experimenting. If you’d like to keep up with where I’m headed next, the best place to find me is now on Instagram @voraciousautodidact.
“But wait,” you might be thinking. “Didn’t you just say you don’t like being smacked in the face with strangers’ opinions…?!”
You’re absolutely right. For all I know, this experiment too will fail. But in science, as Peter Grant is always saying, a negative result is almost as good as a positive one, because it’s still information about what to try next. It turns out that Instagram has introduced a lot more features for filtering one’s feed; obviously, I can’t completely curate the content I encounter there — ads are still an annoying fact of life with everything Meta owns — but I can be relatively confident that the first things I encounter when I log in will be beautiful things I’m excited about from people I know and care about. That, I’m learning, makes a huge difference to my body’s willingness to engage with a platform. Substack doesn’t meet that bar. Instagram, weirdly, does.
I’ve also learned that long-form writing starts to feel like pressure for me after a while. The time it takes to sit down and really think something through is a major investment. It turns out I don’t enjoy putting that kind of time in when there isn’t much relational connection happening. In the last few months, I’ve started corresponding with some new friends — some by email and some, yes, by actual physical letters. With stamps and everything! They do still exist!
I’m absolutely LIVING for these correspondences. They bring me so much joy. I’m happy to sit down and give those exchanges all the time and concentrated attention they ask of me, because I’m getting the same degree of thoughtful attentiveness from the other person in return. Even if it takes a month or more to get a reply, because everyone’s pressed for time these days, I have material evidence that that person considered what I said as carefully as I considered their words. That feels great. And honestly, I love(/hate) the enforced slow pace of postal mail.
On the other hand, putting my thoughts on the internet and getting radio silence in return (even though that’s also my own choice, because inviting the opinions of random strangers doesn’t feel great either!) hits at some long-entrenched abandonment pains that I’d rather not be constantly activating. So I’m going to stick with shorter-form reflections via Instagram captions, because a smaller investment feels more sustainable if I’m getting no response.
I’m also going to be brave and (gasp!) test out allowing comments.
That feels vulnerable as hell, for me. Having had a thoroughly nasty experience of just how violent the internet can get, I’ve been solidly disinterested in inviting the opinions of strangers into my life. But I’ve learned some valuable lessons this year about what kinds of things I can confidently invite sharing around — and I’ve also learned that how I show up in a space significantly affects the way others will show up. If I show up with kindness and maturity, I can’t guarantee everyone else will too, but it makes it a whole lot more likely. I’m sturdy enough now that that’s a risk I’m once again willing to take.
Like I said, it might all be a flop. I might get three months into this and go, “NOPE! Not for me.” I’m giving myself permission to try it anyway, just to find out.
It’s all just information.
If all that wasn’t reason enough (and a flat “I don’t wanna” would be reason enough) Martha Beck’s newest book “Beyond Anxiety: Curiosity, Creativity, and Finding Your Life’s Purpose” dropped this week. Before reading it, I would have told you with a straight face that I had extremely low anxiety. I still think I have low anxiety compared to my fellow Americans at this moment in history, but “lower than bordering on a panic attack” doesn’t actually mean LOW, it turns out. Now that I understand several of the things I’ve been struggling with lately as coping tools for dealing with masked anxiety, I’m far better equipped to deal with both the coping methods and the underlying anxiety.
Seriously, everyone I love is getting a copy of this book for birthdays this year. GET THEE TO A BOOK STORE STAT, MY FRIENDS.
Anyway, at one point in the book Martha cites a study showing that offering someone even a single dollar in exchange for their work precipitously reduced people’s creative capacities. Apparently, the moment someone offers us money, we get caught up in anxiety about the end product — and that anxiety spiral significantly inhibits our access to innovative thinking. That resonated hard with my experience of Substack. As much as I treasure the humans who’ve put their faith in me by supporting my work financially, it’s left me measurably anxious about putting the “right” kind of content here for you. What will you think of it? Will I be “worth it” to you? What if you unsubscribe because I said the “wrong” thing?
That kind of anxiety just plain kills creativity. It’s time to try something different.
So thank you for a marvelous run, my friends. Thanks for trusting me with your time & attention. Thanks for expressing interest in my ideas and encouraging my work through paid subscriptions. It’s meant SO much.
If you’d like to stay in touch, consider joining my Monday night Lectio Divina gathering or my Saturday morning Create + Conspire co-working sessions. Both are free events!
You can always sign up for my everyday (massively infrequent) newsletter at www.januaryjaxon.com if you want to be updated when other new projects launch. You can also follow me on Instagram @voraciousautodidact. And you can, with all goodwill and cheer, wave goodbye and wish me well if our time together is at a close.
It’s been an honor.
Eternal God, the hours of both day and night are yours, and to you the current darkness is no threat. Be present, we pray, with those who labor in this time of fear, especially those who watch and work and weep on behalf of others. Grant us diligence in our waiting, faithfulness in our service, courage in danger, and attention when all we can do is be present with someone in pain. Help your children to meet the needs of our neighbors with confidence and compassion; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.