[Photo by .M.Q Huang]
First of all, Happy New Year!
A confession: I’ve written and rewritten this newsletter so many times. I’d wanted to talk about my burnout, and creativity tips, and my New Year goals, and a bunch of other ideas…
But then I just decided, let’s delete everything and keep it short and simple.
So I’m just going to say two things:
a) Episode 4 of Stories of Yore is now up!
It’s all about Chinese New Year traditions and folktales this time, although, I didn’t manage to cover ALL the legends associated with this festival (there are SO MANY!). So maybe I’ll do round 2 next CNY!
You can listen to Stories of Yore on Apple Podcast, or Spotify.
Also, if you’re celebrating Chinese New Year: Gong Xi Fa Cai!
b) My word for 2023 is ‘REST’.
By the end of last year, I was sorely burnout. (Burnt out? Burned out?)
I still am feeling quite exhausted actually. So I’m making myself learn to rest this year. Take things easy. Readjust my own expectations. And learn to better manage things that are out of my control (Anxiety, I’m looking at you).
And when it comes to creating things – I have the tendency to be over ambitious and therefore over pressure myself to learn/improve/create/perfect whatever it is I’m working on. So this year, I’m going to keep reminding myself to relax. Play. Enjoy the process. Don’t be too hard up on the end result.
Do you have a word for the year?
Book talk
I’m currently making my way through Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way.
I’ve heard so much rave reviews about this, so I must say that my expectations are like this high. But, as it’s a craft book that’s designed to be read – and worked on – over 12 weeks, I’m going through it slowly.
In the past few weeks, I’ve also read:
More Than We Can Tell by Brigid Kemmerer
Lovelight Farms by B.K. Borison
Exes & O’s by Amy Lea
If You Could See the Sun by Ann Liang
And I’m just about to start Heart of the Sun Warrior by Sue Lynn Tan.
Have you read any of these books? Or, what are you currently reading?
Other bits and pieces
I might have shared this before, but I’m really looking forward to watching A Man Called Otto. It’s based on the book A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman, which I loved. Plus, Tom Hanks is the titular character!
It’s Chinese New Year – and for the first time since moving to Melbourne six years ago, we have a few CNY snacks at home! LOVE THEM.
If you’re celebrating Lunar New Year, have a good one!