Hello everyone,
This is just to let you know that I’ve paused all subscription billings for Only Connect.
I am going to take some time to think about what I would like to write and share, and I don’t want to take payment from anyone while I do this (obviously.) This isn’t the first time I’ve paused newsletter writing, so in the interest of not irritating you all with on-again, off-again content, I also want to properly work out whether Substack is the right place to be.
It’s my birthday next month and, as often happens around birthdays, I am reflecting on what I want to do with the year ahead. Connections - with each other, with the wider world, with different peoples and cultures, with nature and our rapidly changing climate - still feel vital and a key part of my work’s purpose (I couldn’t find a way of writing that which didn’t sound hideously grandiose, for which, apologies) - but I am considering again what that work looks like. I don’t think that writing about connections is enough, and nor is discussing them via current affairs on social media. I feel very disillusioned with politics and I miss being a journalist. I think that I am consistently failing to manage a healthy relationship with social media and its 24/7 suck. I want to connect offline, with new ideas and new research, do new work and exploration, and make more real, in-person connections with people.
I’ve got into the habit of writing polemics, of sharing decisive opinions and of starting fires (and of starting sentences with ‘I’.) There’s a lot to be cross about, a lot of idiocy to point out, and a lot of unpleasantness to challenge. I’ve always been impatient and short-tempered. But it’s tiring to exist in a semi-permanent state of accusation. I am starting to notice more and more how unhappy it is making me, how unhappy many other people are, and how rapidly what starts as truth telling, or holding facts up to the light, can become judgemental point-scoring. I am bored with myself, often. I want to sit and stare out of the window for longer without worrying about CONTENT.
I think - for now at least - I have lost my appetite for argument. (My husband will laugh at this.) I don’t accept media requests any more because it seems impossible to discuss what I think are reasonable points, without being put up against people with whom I really, really don’t want to hang out. But I don’t think the answer to a fulfilling life is to avoid other people or other points of view. Nor, despite their proliferation, do I think podcasts are the answer. I want to connect via reading - the kind that takes hours and lots of time and space - and thinking - ditto - and conversations away from platforms where everyone is watching. I want to write more, for myself, as well as for different audiences, eventually. I want to have thoughts that I can learn to keep to myself and maybe smoke or stew or pickle them over time into something that can last and fortify me. I want to take photos without wondering how they’ll do on Instagram and instead think about how lovely they will be to look at in the future as a reminder of time when I was engaged with the world around me instead of worrying about what strangers thought.
What I really want to do is go and live a hippy life by the sea somewhere and walk barefoot and gracefully and meditate and write long, long books, and grow my hair grey and to my waist and be a font of wisdom for my children as they go out into their adult lives, instead of being a short-fused menopausal woman in bobbly jumpers, shouting at and being shouted at by strangers on the internet and worrying about whether her writing is good enough. I want to be free of the immediate gratification and adrenalin spike of likes, comparison and critique. I want to shake off the dismay of realising the time wasted writing articles because I feel I ought to, that say far more about me than I want them to (HELLO) - or totting up again the hours of tap ‘n’ scroll.
The hippy ideal may need to wait a while - though at least it’s nearly the season for those nice flowy dresses that let us pretend for a while. But I can start right now with a better contemplative practice that I hope will result in a more rewarding life of connecting, writing and having conversations. And thus, in deeper connections.
Thank you for your interest to date. It’s been lovely.
I’ll see you,
Sophie
I'm sad to read that you are pausing as I have only just discovered you in this corner of the internet and feel we have much in common, and in the same breath I totally respect your decision and must share that so much of what you say resonates DEEPLY with me. Wishing you all the best on your journey to somewhere better Sophie (and when you've found that place can you look me up and let me know how I can join you there please?!)
Sounds like a plan. Enjoy. X