[DIGEST] Gaslighting yourself...

Your weekly stackable roundup

February 24, 2024

Hi friends,

I was talking to somebody last week who was very stressed about their very stressful job.

They kept trying to play down their stress. Eventually, I asked them why they were trying to gaslight themselves.

The truth was their job was very stressful. They had stepped into a new role at a new company and tasked them with building a whole department from scratch.

That’s a lot for anyone, but their specific job takes a lot of time to see results even in the best of times.

The stress existed and it was valid. Trying to hide it didn’t help anything but cause their eye to twitch uncontrollably.

Instead, we talked about what kind of metrics we could track to determine their success, but at the end of the day, we had to face a hard truth.

Sometimes time has to happen. Last year my company started a conference from scratch. The whole year was a stressful mess. We wanted to have success immediately, but we simply had to do the work.

We had to talk about it enough and prove our team was capable enough to get people to come.

My publication started less than a year ago and I keep wanting it to lurch forward, but I know that more often than not, time has to happen.

It’s one of the hardest lessons while you’re going through it.

Maybe there are ways to shorten the time or make it easier, but often time just has to happen.

If you want to share how you are doing this week, then there are two ways to interact with this post.

1 - If you don’t want to say anything, or bristle at identifying yourself, then you can reply with this nifty poll.

2 - If you’re feeling very brave, then reply below and tell us how you are doing right now on a scale from 1-5.

WHAT WE WROTE ON SUBSTACK: This week, I told you why and how I fell back in love with advertising.

Additionally, showed you how to quiet down your negative self-talk.

Dad stumbled down the streets of Plockton, using the lamp posts and edges of houses to steady himself. I thought he would vomit, and twice he stopped to dry heave, but he was able to hold it back.

“I have to admit,” Blezor said, trying to keep Dad upright. “I thought a demon would be able to hold their liquor better.”

“That—that was Fyre—” Dad hiccupped. “Brewed in Hell. I only—only use it on special—special occasions—” He smiled at me. “Like seeing my da—my daughter—”

“It would have been nice if you remembered it,” I said under my breath, but loud enough for him to hear. “Instead of getting blackout drunk.”

“I’ll rember—remember—” He poked his forehead. “Mind like a—steel—Oh god—” He heaved again, leaning against the side of a quaint cottage that didn’t deserve a drunken expectoration from a demon. Blezor rubbed his back until Dad slapped him away. “Get off—I don’t needyer pity—I’m good."

“We don’t pity you,” I said, grabbing him by the arm. “We pity ourselves for having to put up with you.”

“I pity him,” Blezor said. “I mean, look at the guy. He’s clearly in pain.”

“What do you know?” I asked.

“I’ve dealt with my own unrequited love from you.” Blezor wrapped Dad’s other arm around his shoulder. “I know about pain.”

“Enough!” Dad flapped his arms and fell backward away from us. “Whadid—What did I say—no pity for me.”

I pressed my fingers to the bridge of my nose. “Are we almost there?”

All chapters of The Godsverse Chronicles are now free for all subscribers. You can read the whole series from the beginning right here.

You still only get access to a bunch of free books and stories from my back catalog by becoming a paid member. You can start your membership with a 7-day free trial.

UPCOMING ARTICLE: Next week, I show you why and how to do a roundup, one of my favorite things about The Author Stack.

I talked to a very nice human recently who told me they already have a roundup of things they like, but weren’t highlighting people in their industry doing work on Substack.

So in short, they missed the point.

The point of a roundup is to create community and highlight other people on Substack that your readers should also read to help you grow your network and your publication.

Or, if you want to grow on Facebook, or Linkedin, or wherever, then who’s doing work on that platform instead.

You should be sharing articles by people working at your level, above, and below you. Then, everyone in your industry will want to subscribe so they can stay informed on the important news of the day and connect around them.

You can’t just share the biggest stories, because everyone will likely have already seen those. You have to get good at finding the hidden gems everyone needs to read but aren’t getting enough attention, too.

This is how you can shine a spotlight on smaller publications. People really want to read those articles, btw. Those are the ones I hear about all the time. I rarely hear about the viral ones because everyone’s already read those.

ROUNDUP: Here are some of my favorite articles of the week.

Business-y:

Publishing-like:

Culture-ish:

Find anything you loved enough to swoon over or hated enough to make your blood boil? Let me know.

If you like what I’m doing around here and want to check out the archives, you can do that with a 7-day free trial, or simply go straight to being a paid subscriber. You also get access to my horror comic, One Damned Good Thing.

One Damned Good Thing is a one-shot horror comic set in the Hospice universe about a terminally ill prisoner who is given a reprieve to live out his final days at a beautiful hospice. He quickly finds out that this hospice is more sinister than he could have ever imagined. 

Paid members can access the entire archive of this series from the beginning, along with 650+ exclusive interviews, courses, articles, and more.

If you are not a paid member, you can read everything with a 7-day free trial, or give us a one-time tip.