Holy little treats and holding space (for your work)
tending our flames so we don't melt down
It’s that time of year again! Feeling sad/SAD about the scarcity of daylight and bemoaning that night begins at 4:30 pm! (Cue “It’s the Most Wonderful Time…”)
I know I’m not alone in this, at this moment or historically, given how many light-themed festivals and holidays coexist in the last quarter of the year—Diwali, Hanukkah, and Saint Lucia’s Day (yes, I’m thinking about American Girl dolls) among them. I picture my ancestors checking their winter stores of canned and salted food, and facing down fifteen hours of darkness for weeks at a time, and I understand the holy importance of sparkle lights and indulgent little sweets.
Two years ago, I visited Germany and had the Christmas market—Weihnachtsmarkt—experience, eating part of a whole salmon smoked on a log in front of me, riding a Ferris wheel, and drinking tiny mug after tiny mug of gluhwein. The Weihnachtsmarkt is not a one-night thing, but a gathering space set up for weeks. Beyond offering gifts and knickknacks for sale, the temporary space feels like a cozy outdoor bar. On a list of recommended markets to try, someone commented something to the effect of: “It’s the terrible dark cold time of year again—we need these artificial lights and blazing fireplaces and hot wine so badly!” I liked that phrasing, that it’s not pointless carousing but a deep human NEED for cheer, more necessary when the atmosphere is bleak.
I want to know: What sources of light are sustaining you this autumn-into-winter?
One bright spot for me this fall was the first few minutes of each Book Club Workshop class, checking in human to human as each person signed in, and talking about our in-progress projects.
I think our lives and our creative work exist in symbiosis: feeding one part feeds the other. It’s easy to think that the creative part is not important, or that it can be the last priority—that we’ll get around to it later. But my life feels better, lighter, less unwieldy when I tend to this part of me. It’s that cheer-in-winter feeling: necessary. If you’re a person with the urge to create, you probably need to tend this flame, too, to feel fully alive.
That’s why I’ve created a virtual gathering space for us.
Are you a creative with great ideas but can’t seem to make time to work on them?
Are you a recovering people-pleaser who can keep appointments with other people but not with yourself?
Are you neurospicy in a way that makes a fixed routine (even for things you want to do) feel like a burden?
Does body doubling help you get shit done?
Then I made this for you!
Holding Space (for your work)
is a group for getting around to it now and it looks like this:
I hold the space and you show up, in whichever configuration of the schedule works for you. “Rise & grind” is not how my energy or creativity works, and is not the only way to complete a project. Pick one of the morning sessions weekly? Cool. Pick just the final half hour of both evening sessions? Also cool. Put Holding Space (for your work) on your calendar as a promise to yourself, and an excuse that protects your time: “I already have plans then.”
Each gathering is divided into pomodoro sessions: 25 minutes of working followed by 5-minute breaks. Gatherings will also include creative prompts, meant to be helpful if you don’t already have a project underway :)
Every week, I’ll pull cards for a Creative Work Forecast, a way of thinking about and through our projects and our relationship to creating that week.
I’ll post accountability and celebration threads each new moon and full moon, where anyone who wants to can share your creative goals and wins.
A monthly Q&A post will answer questions about writing, editing, publishing, staying motivated/curious, and anything else you might want to know about following creative rhythms and sharing work with an audience.
We’ll have a monthly visit from a special guest—an author, agent, editor, or other creative (filmmaker, visual artist)—on Zoom, with a recording for subscribers who can’t make it.
I’m soft-launching the group this month! You can sign up here. I’m not scheduling a guest this first month, so anyone who signs up in December will receive a discount for your first month as a thank you.
(Note that, because of some weird new Apple Store rules, subscriptions made through the Patreon app cost more than subscriptions made through your browser, so sign up through your browser!)
One publication I neglected to mention in my last newsletter was this: Northwestern University Press invited me to do a tarot reading for their fall season. You can read it here.
That’s all from me for now as I wrap up the year! I’m looking ahead to February, when Cosmic Tantrum will be out. Media friends, if you are interested in a review copy, let me know.
If you’re looking for feedback on a completed book-length manuscript, stuck-in-the-middle book-length manuscript, or individual story or essay—or you’re looking for accountability and feedback while drafting your book-length manuscript—I’d love to work with you. You can fill out my contact form here, or just reply to this newsletter if you received it by email :)
My lights this winter: Got to meet Adam Driver, and I adopted an awesome wizardly grey tabby.
I’m ready for dinner at 4:40pm……