January Roundup

The Weight...The Song, The Month, The Country, & Of Words

I consider surviving January to be a big enough win, a performative brag post summarizing the check boxes from the month aren’t necessary.

The recent death of Garth Hudson, the last surviving member of The Band, made me realize I need to close out my top song list that I started in October. The Weight is my top choice and most appropriate for the current state of America. If you aren’t feeling the weight of the country, you aren’t in the right space. It’s not political, it’s human!

My friend sent me his podcast lineup and proclaimed "I had made it." I just got the theme of death from it, maybe the death of that which no longer serves me. Lots of writing, podcasting, and learning in January!

As I ponder¹ what curriculum standards will be written around this time in history, what educators will teach students, and what students will read 100 years from now, writers voices are more important than ever. I’ve seen an influx of people in my writing communities, both here on Substack and in A Writing Room, an online collective of writers. I speculate people are both trying to process feelings while documenting history. What we will never know is what will be left for them. Billionaire bros owning every piece of electronic content kinda makes me want to lock and bury all my journals in an underground safety box. Will everything we say on these tech platforms that don’t align with the mission be erased with one click? Let’s move on to a happier topic…snakes!

Everyone is trying to sell you something and everything just feels slimy so it’s appropriate that 2025 is the year of the snake. So far, transformation appears to be the word, not mine, of 2025, as it’s showing up everywhere. My friend

Meg Tietz

sent me this and I find it so appropriate:

The wood snake influence of 2025 could amplify this transformation by pushing you toward deeper self-expression, creativity, and long-term vision.

I have to keep reminding myself I’m playing the long game while avoiding activities that bring instant gratification!

Snakes are naturally introspective and strategic.

I really loath snakes, but the more I study and read the more I identify with them. I spent most of January setting up my systems and structures that lead to the work I want to be doing. Upon reflection, I actually accomplished a lot and I know it was due to the tiny actions I took each day to build momentum. Long game habit stacking while shedding what no longer serves me.

Playlist:The Weight Playlist

If you got nothing else out of this contemplative rambling, there’s a playlist in the link above. What constitutes making my top song list…it can be covered across genres. This is much different than my top five artists, which most of them actually cover The Weight. Most days Aretha’s version of The Weight is tops, buy Waylon gave one heck of a final performance. Drop a comment and let me know your favorite song…it just might make a playlist!

Events:

I like to think I’m a trendsetter I just hope someday I get ahead of the trend.

In the fall I participated in Harvard’s first cohort for Lifestyle and Wellness Certification. A small group of us continue to meet two days a week to further our knowledge in coaching practices, transformational lifestyle, and business growth. I led a well received session on personal and leadership identity and I’ll talk more about that in the coming weeks. The language we use and how we refer to ourselves carries great weight in how others see us.

As the pioneer I am, I am embarking on another excursion by being a Beta member of The Writing Room’s Book Camp. The goal over the next eight weeks on this maiden voyage is to complete a book while working as a group in community. My goals are to have a collection of essays ready to publish and move my skills forward to lead and teach the process to others in the future. If you see less content here the next two months, that is why because my focus is on the book writing process.

Read:

I have six books going right now so stay tuned. I read a whole lot and finished nothing other than some amazing Substack articles.

Bookshop Registry and Ebooks are here! Two points here:

• If you remember² the SATC episode where Carrie Bradshaw registers for shoes, then this is similar. I think it’s a cool way for a meaningful gift exchange for holidays, birthdays, etc… AY's Bookshop Registry

• There’s been discussion about leaving Goodreads. I totally get it and attempted to move to Storygraph last year but I struggled to get everything converted and it wasn’t where I needed my attention to be. The problem is in my quest to downsize, I have quite the compilation of books on my Kindle³ that I don’t want to lose. Bookshop’s Ebooks can be read on a tablet or iPad, not an Amazon owned Kindle, so moving forward I can use the iPad⁴ but it’s not an overnight solution.

While I fully support small businesses as often as I can, leaving the convenience of Prime doesn’t hurt the billionaire but the writers and creatives who survive on book sales because the majority of folks won’t go to Bookshop, they will just get another book that sounds similar and meets the need from Amazon. While sticking it to the owner, remember the writers! Support them somehow, someway and plan ahead so you aren’t caught up in needing same day delivery.

Watched:

Other than sports and a whole lot of webinars on podcasting, Shrinking, finally! My thoughts:

• Why is 80 year old Harrison Ford still working so much, he’s in everything lately! Not age shaming him, he’s great, but doesn’t he want to just chill?!?!

• We need more reality based therapists. One of the main reasons the field of psychology frustrates me is we can sit and contemplate all day long, at some point you have to get off the couch and get into action. Even if you make a mistake or it’s the wrong action, you did something⁵!

• TMS is still my favorite show from AppleTV and I can’t wait for season 4. It seems to track with society.

1. I spent a lot of time in January sitting in silence staring at snow or a blank wall.

2. Assuming since this is a “midlife” post folks get the reference!

3. Podcast episodes 2-4 talk about my approach around books.

4. My eyesight is horrific, I need a bigger screen so a phone doesn’t work for me.

5. Just don’t push someone off a cliff!