Everybody is starting a newsletter these days.
Whilst I’m sure there are a lot that do it for the eventual promise of ‘passive income’ (best of luck!), I think there’s one standout reason for me - it’s a forcing mechanism, compelling you to write and clarify your thinking. As a side effect, I think it might also improve the writer’s content filters in a time of information overload.
And you know what? I also want to become a better thinker and improve my filters. Maybe the best way to do that is to share my thinking in written format with strangers on the internet.
Maybe some of those strangers will become friends, which would be a welcome by-product.
Now what to call it? I have a funny hesitancy about naming things, because it’s so easy to get lumped into a stereotype. (Maybe I’m afraid I am the stereotype? I’ll let you be the judge.) So instead, I’m calling it a “muse”-letter: a (probably) irregular, undirected dump of thoughts.
You’re welcome to subscribe if you want this in your Inbox. I would be honoured. And if you want some information to help decide if you want to filter me, here is a cryptic narrative of how I view the world, told through a complication of song lyrics:
I'm a monkey in the jungle.
Watching a vapor trail
Caught up in the conflict
Between his brain and his tail
What I know, is that I don't know
And now I dance and I sing and I live full
I give it all to the call of the unknown
Hou op om fokken rond te kyk
Jy's hier om te dans
(Stop f'n looking around
You're here to dance)
'We hold the light we overcome
We are the power
We are the legends
We are in a beautiful place'
That's the birth of responsibility
Because otherwise
You can always look over your shoulder and say
"Well, I am the way I am because my mother dropped me
And she dropped me because she was neurotic
Because her mother dropped her"
And way back you go to Adam and Eve
Or to a disappearing monkey or something
We never get at it
Confused? Don’t worry, me too.
But I’m learning to live with that.
I’ve put this blog together to capture some thoughts on this rich and sometimes scary experience of life. I’ve been hesitant to share my writing historically because I’ve been afraid of what people will think, but then I realized that I don’t need to care what people think. Life is one long lesson, if nothing else.
Anyways, one thing I can say is that I hope you find some value here. If you do, drop me a mail - it would be great to hear from you 👋🏽
