Cruel Compendium #30 🌸
Sabotaging your own Zoom, medication for mansplaining, and celebrating rebuilding season
I’m Jillian Anthony, and this is Cruel Summer Book Club, a newsletter about change, heartbreak and healing. In the Cruel Compendium I send out links to everything I’m reading, listening to and thinking about. ICYMI, last week I wrote about our collective languishing, and generally feeling bad. That seemed to resonate with many of you, so, I’m sorry you feel that way, but I’m glad we’re in this together. 💖
I’m reading
Advice on art paralysis from Beth Pickens, author of Make Your Art No Matter What, in Mason Currey’s newsletter
It’s scary to let ourselves grow as big and as wonderful as we are meant to be! That risk and vulnerability sometimes shows up in other familiar ways: procrastination, overwhelm, dread, avoidance, flakiness, lateness, and self-sabotage. Fear is at the base of all those, too. Fear is not something we have to conquer or vanquish; it’s just a human experience and our fear need not condemn us to any inevitable outcome. When we lovingly, compassionately contend with our fear, we can navigate around it, discovering that we have choices.
Why walking is the most underrated form of exercise by Brianna Steinhilber
But it’s not only your creativity that will benefit from the mental lift. The act of walking is also a proven mood booster. One study found that just 12 minutes of walking resulted in an increase in joviality, vigor, attentiveness and self-confidence versus the same time spent sitting. Walking in nature, specifically, was found to reduce ruminating over negative experiences, which increases activity in the brain associated with negative emotions and raises risk of depression.
Walking has also been shown to improve memory and prevent the deterioration of brain tissue as we age. Plus, psychologists studying how exercise relieves anxiety and depression also suggest that a 10-minute walk may be just as good as a 45-minute workout when it comes to relieving the symptoms of anxiety and boosting mood.
All-grown-up “disaster girl” (you know, the meme where a little girl smiles at the camera in front of a burning home) talks about memes taking control of their likenesses through the sale of NFTs. By Marie Fozio. This is extremely my shit.
Comedian Pat Regan’s first Substack post, Me and My Eating Disorder and My Eating Disorder Woman and My Gay Therapist and a Gay Doctor I Went to One Time. Pat has been my favorite comedian for a loooooong time and I laughed and laughed while reading this.
My eating disorder woman and my therapist are both younger than me and in that way we are an extremely MODERN family. We are an unconventional queer throuple that many feel goes against nature and even God. After all it’s Adam and EVE, not Adam and HIS TWO THERAPISTS WHO ARE BOTH YOUNGER THAN HIM.
Tressie McMillan Cottom on doing gentle, athlete-adjacent things, and getting a Peloton. Someone gifted me a subscription to Tressie’s newsletter, Essaying, (I don’t know who! If it’s you please email me so I can thank you!) and I’ve quickly become a devoted reader.
How to name your Black son in a racist country by Tyrone Fleurizard in Roxane Gay’s newsletter
Power should not tell the story by Lyz Lenz. How journalists can more responsibly cover police violence.
Return the National Parks to the tribes by David Treuer. A no-brainer, really. Treuer gives a great overview of the bloody, imperialistic creation of the United States’ National Parks, borne of land stolen from its original peoples.
I’m listening to
NPR’s Life Kit: Cutting back on pandemic drinking and How to set boundaries with family.
In Good Company: Guest Amy Fraser talks about building her company OKREAL, and how she rebuilt her life (and kept working) when she found out her husband had girlfriends around the world when she was five months pregnant. (!!!) Also, host Otegha Uwagba has the most beautiful voice.
National Park After Dark: How Not to Die in Yellowstone. I’m going back to Yellowstone with my mom soon, and this is a quick refresher on how to not be a complete idiot and get yourself killed there.
Questionable self-care advice
Support system
Vision board
Obsessions
💡 Is this thing on? (Love The Artist’s Way shade)
✉️ The simplest greeting card
🧠 Mindful art by Estefania Loret de Mola via Swiss Miss
🌿 Spend some serious time looking through the lush, captivating artwork on plant care site How Many Plants
⚡ Zoom Escaper: A tool that self-sabotages your audio so you can leave your meeting
🍿 Comedian Patti Harrison in her first starring film role! She’ll be in Ziwe’s new show too.
🚶♂️ I enjoyed this zoomout view of the growth of a creative project from Craig Mod, who’s built a following based on his walks around Japan. Jealous!
👁️🗨️ I didn’t know Stacey Abrams is a novelist! Read an excerpt of her new thriller.
☁️ Adam J. Kurtz’s new book, You Are Here *For Now, is out on October 19! Adam is a great friend and an artist I love for his honest outlook on life. Can’t wait to read. My most recent purchase from him was his pink tarot deck.
😃 The Atlantic is hosting a free digital event called “In Pursuit of Happiness” on May 20 with a bunch of amazing speakers, including Deepak Chopra.
💻 A free coworking Zoom meetup for Black women creatives to get shit done
✍️ A great list of writer resources from Erika Hayasaki
🆘 A big list of mutual aid organizations to donate to for India’s Covid relief
❇️ What you clicked on most in the last Compendium: A presentation to help you figure out what to do with your life
🗽 This thread of students’ artwork depicting post-pandemic New Yorker covers:
Minerva moment
Anthem
Check out the full CSBC playlist
Mood
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