Hi Y’all!! As I mentioned in last week’s newsletter, I am starting a writing club here on Substack for any of you who are looking to write more, find humor and meaning in your day to day life, fight writer’s block, or maybe you just love to journal? There’s lots of reasons why you might want to make lists—if I didn’t mention your reason, please comment and tell me why it inspires you!
How it works
Making lists is easy!
You do not need to own What Did I Do Today? in order to make today lists (though hey it wouldn’t hurt…). Lists can be made in any fashion, on any paper! For me, a Today List is a bullet point run-through of my whole day—everything I saw, felt, heard, did from when I got up, to when I’m back in bed. You do not need to write an essay! You do not need to be poetic! You do not need to go into great detail! Did you cry on a subway? Just write “cried on subway” Did you eat a great sandwich? Write “Great sandwich, turkey” Did you watch two bees have sex while your dog tried to chase them around and you were screaming “Leave them BEE!” ??? Write it down “watched bees have sex.” It’s that simple!
Tuesday Meetings
Every Tuesday, I’ll start a chat thread with a prompt for paid subscribers to share a recent list they’ve made that week. Obviously only share what you feel comfortable sharing, and feel free to cross out anything digitally that you don’t want to discuss (like getting in a fight with your best friend Susan over her boyfriend’s shitty personality). We can then all discuss possible ideas to glean from these lists, maybe there’s something that could be expanded into an essay? Maybe there’s something worth drawing?
Feel good!!!
Making these lists truly has had a wonderful effect on me. I started doing this in 2019 and I have gotten so obsessed with it that now when something wild or interesting or silly happens I’m like “Ok that’s going in the list.” Plus, it’s really helped me strengthen my voice in my work. Tapping into thoughts, experiences, reactions that are wholly yourself is a great way to workshop ideas and discover work that only you could make. The reason I made What Did I Do Today? was also to fight the idea that we all need to be more productive all the time. It’s fully untrue. You’re already doing enough. You just need to look at your day and go, wow, even though I didn’t leave the apartment, I actually got a lot of thinking today. It’s ok to do less! (More on that by my friend Jason Chatfield who is writing about November on
).Need some examples? Here’s a few lists from me to get us going…
Can’t wait to chat list making with you all!! See you in a chat… momentarily…