Tell me your hopes & dreams!

because I'm telling you mine & I think we should all shout our dreams from rooftops

Oh man, I need to turn off this Emma Chamberlain podcast & write. Side note: does anyone have, like, insider info on Emma Chamberlain? I don’t know anything about her besides that I kind of enjoyed one of her podcast episodes. And that she’s 21 with 16 million Instagram followers, a coffee company, and a beautiful house… What times we live in!

Anyway. I guess Emma is kind of a logical segue into what’s on my mind today, though I didn’t plan that. I, like Emma, want to be self-employed. I have no desire for the 16 million followers, but I, too, want to chase my creativity down its rabbit holes day in and day out and have autonomy over my time. Don’t most people? I’m probably not saying anything unique. It’s exhausting trying to be unique, and I’m honestly not trying. Dreams aren’t about uniqueness.

Unique or not, I may be able to pull this self-employed thing off. There is much privilege in even being able to fathom it. I am writing down my goal here explicitly so that it is permanent and public. Because I find that telling as many people as I can about my hopes and dreams—and listening to theirs, too!—solidifies it as real in my brain. It’s motivating and inspiring to speak our dreams out loud. I hope you speak your dreams out loud. Feel free to respond to this newsletter with them. For real.

Here’s my goal (dream): in the next 1-2 years, I want to make my entire living off of my own projects. Projects include: books, poetry classes/workshops, writers’ retreats, custom typewritten poems, and my Patreon. Oh, maybe a podcast, too (keep an eye out for more about that in the near future, maybe! ;) ). Making my whole living off my own shit means… getting to spend all my time on my own shit! More specifically, it’ll mean connecting with more folks, putting poetry into the hands of more people, creating more opportunities to bring people into the world wide web of words.

I still feel a stigma in my head surrounding the discussion of creative careers and making money. Do you? Like it’ll make me less “authentic” to talk about wanting/needing to make money from my art?? I want to destroy capitalism, duh, but in the mean time…. I have to pay $750/month in rent!

I find myself wanting to convince you, reader, that I am worthy of this dream. That I am worthy of your support. Yet, you’re already here, on my email list. Yet, I believe everyone is worthy of their dreams—I am not unique. Instead of trying to convince you of either of those things, then, I’ll say: thank you. For being a subscriber, for telling a friend about my work, for sharing a post or newsletter of mine on social media, for joining my Patreon, for buying my asynchronous poetry class, for signing up for my upcoming live class. It all matters so vibrantly to me; when you do those things, it’s like you’re saying, here! Have your dream! Do it, I dare you! There is nothing more gorgeous than championing each other’s dreams. And to not pursue our dreams in whatever capacity we’re able? I think that deprives the world of a little more shine.

Tell me your dreams. They’re not selfish. Do it, I dare you!