Cruel Compendium #86 💭
Doing the bare minimum, junk journaling, and why I should be your editor
Hello from the far side of February, and a sunny week in Austin after yet another deep freeze.
Many of you may be familiar with
, the author of the bestselling book, Real Self-Care: Crystals, Cleanses, and Bubble Baths Not Included, and her wonderful newsletter of the same name. Pooja recently introduced me as her Newsletter Editor, and I wanted to share that news with all of you! We’ve been working together since August, and it’s been a wonderful partnership and work I truly enjoy.Pooja says:
Every week Jillian and I get together to talk about Real Self-Care’s content calendar, direction, and growth (it was Jillian who introduced me to the content calendar! All this time I’d been just winging it when it came to my content on social media, lol). Behind the scenes, Jillian helps me work out ideas, draft posts, edit my thoughts, and format everything so it comes to you in a timely fashion.
I’d love to expand my work as a newsletter editor and creative consultant this year!
If you, your business, or your company need someone with 13 years of media and content experience who’s deeply enmeshed in the newsletter world, I’m it, baby. (Fun fact about me: Outside of the Substack realm, I’ve written a birding newsletter for an organic bird seed company since 2021, and edited a VC-focused newsletter for a startup media brand.)
How could we work together?
Develop your newsletter and/or personal project and LAUNCH IT
Smash your imposter syndrome and help you gain confidence
Organize your ideas into an actionable path to get you where you want to go
Create a content calendar and brainstorm ideas
Design a manageable and exciting creative schedule that’s just right for you
Develop your brand identity and voice
Work on simple growth strategies that utilize your natural talents and your genuine connections
Book a free discovery call with me today! If those times don’t work for you, just reply to this email and we’ll schedule something soon!
My first byline for HuffPo is live! I wrote about the nebulous work of detangling your digital life from your ex’s.
Last week, I wrote about the last mystery I solved: rescuing my grandfather’s lost phone just in the nick of time. So satisfying. Now, if only the many other mysteries in my life could feel as good.
Be sure to click “View entire message” at the end of this email so you can read the whole post in your browser. On to the links!
What I’m reading for life, love, and creativity:
How to do the bare minimum Artist’s Way from
Less can be more for a 12-week program almost no one finishes, including me! (I made it through nine.)
Julia Cameron on writing for guidance by Hurley Winkler
The Artist’s Way author (plus 57 other books) always has something to teach me.
I think the answers come pretty quickly. But my belief in them comes more slowly.
Find the place you love. Then move there. By Arthur C. Brooks
Where do your “synesthetic tendencies” take you? Mine take me straight to the Southwest.
My city made a change to its trash pickup service. So why am I so sad? By Amanda O’Donnell
Love this Austin tale of what was lost when the cty took away a twice-yearly bulk pickup and switched to on-demand. Buy Nothing hive assemble!
The beautiful failure of being a man by
Poignant thoughts on why trans men and cis men have more in common than you might think.
Venturing into the wilderness of offline dating by
A topic near and dear to my heart! Written by a fellow Austinite. I left all dating apps for good about a year ago, and I never, ever miss them.
What I’m reading for These Times:
How to stay sane AND informed by
I’d argue that reclaiming our attention — and rebuilding our media diets to withstand this environment — is both an act of self-care and a moral imperative. Self-care because, obviously, it does our bodies, minds, and lifespans no good to live in a constant state of stress. A moral imperative because understanding threats to democratic systems is a prerequisite to defending them.
Wokeness is not to blame for Trump by Rebecca Traister
I believe that it’s we elites, who do not enjoy getting dogpiled on social media or having college students yell at us about settler colonialism, who are the most put off by the hyperwokeness of our era, while the vast majority of Americans don’t love but also don’t think that much about the use of “Latinx” or pronouns, and remain far more affected by the material wins — around racial and gender pay equity, hiring- and housing-discrimination protections, access to health care and education — that have been enabled by movements for both economic equality and identity-based protections.
You can’t post your way out of fascism by Janus Rose
But perhaps the greatest of these sins is convincing ourselves that posting is a form of political activism, when it is at best a coping mechanism—an individualist solution to problems that can only be solved by collective action. This, says Cross, is the primary way tech platforms atomize and alienate us, creating “a solipsism that says you are the main protagonist in a sea of NPCs.”
You do not have to consent to being flooded by
Why don’t I feel aligned with leftists? by
I want to engage in activism that holds the appropriate amount of urgency without defaulting to the very behaviors that threatened to destroy me as a child. behaviors that are currently wrecking so many leftist spaces from the inside out.
They are a minority by
We, the opposition, are the majority. Take heart.
I’ve returned yet again to the question of how to have hard, loving conversations with those we disagree with lately. The answers I’ve re-discovered include deep, uninterrupted listening, showing compassion, and cultivating local community.
If you care sufficiently for yourself, then you care about not radiating pain to somebody else.
Bits and bobs about freelance writing.
My first byline for HuffPo: How to detangle your digital life from your ex’s
My latest for Tribeza: Explore Artist Candace Hicks’ Unique Embroidery at Ivester Contemporary
My final January invoice total: $10,367.50!!! This is probably my highest invoice month since 2021, and I’m proud to see this number. I’m also proud of how much writing I did in the first two months of the year. CELEBRATE your wins!
I love Kat Boogaard’s freelancer valentines
Such a cool idea: Using Tarot as a memoir tool by
Ann Friedman’s Disapproval Matrix
“When you receive negative feedback that falls into one of the top two quadrants—from experts or people who are engaging with and rationally critiquing your work—you should probably take their comments to heart. When you receive negative feedback that falls into the bottom two quadrants, you should just let it roll off your back and keep doing your thing.”
Moving abroad for success from . Inspo for planning my nomad work!
Rebecca Aguilar’s updated journalism jobs list for Feb. 2025
Causes I care about and actions for change.
Texas is Killing Women: On the Deadly Consequences of Inventing a Sacred Fetus by
Project 2025 tracker: 36% implemented. Terrifying.
In this episode of This is Uncomfortable podcast, stories about the unanticipated ways money affects our lives: a woman talks about how she was fired from medical residency at Texas Tech for being obese — and ultimately lost her case in the Texas Supreme Court because weight is not a protected disability (yes, you can legally be fired for being overweight in most places), because we still view obesity as something that can be individually controlled, and should be punished.
Proud Boys lose control of their name to a Black church they vandalized. We love to see it!!!
LA fire relief actions:
Help Omar’s family evacuate Palestine
Follow his journey on Instagram.
Winter is a quiet house in lamplight. A spin in the garden to see bright stars on a clear night, the roar of the wood burning stove and the accompanying smell of charred wood. It is warming the teapot and making cups of bitter cocoa. It is stews magicked from bones with dumplings floating like clouds. It is reading quietly and passing away the afternoon twilight, watching movies. It is thick socks and the bundle of a cardigan.
📓 Junk journaling. This TikTok trend fascinated my mind a couple years ago. My own junk journal with simply never look like this or this, but I did print out a bunch of photos from 2024 and am making a collage book of memories. And I am collecting physical items more carefully this year to make a book next year!
✍🏻 100-year-old woman has journaled every day for 90 years. Morning pages goals right here.
🏠 The Lost Home Project: Drawing homes lost in the Eaton and Palisades fires.
👁️🗨️ Recess’ 2025 Creative Playbook: Creatives around the world share their tips and tools for creativity
🔹 ’s free resource glossary. VERY cool and inspiring offerings here.
💄 Drugstore beauty recommendations from
🗓️ My life in weeks — an amazing visualization
📅 Stretch My Time Off calendar calculator
♻️ Find out how/where to donate any kind of item in Austin through Heartening
👻 TabBoo adds random jumpscares to sites you want to avoide
🗽 Today’s reason why I miss NYC: “A Century of The New Yorker” opened at the NYPL this week. Go see it for me!
🧠 The Telepathy Tapes, a podcast about possible telepathy in neurodivergent or disabled children, has been so divisive! But it’s a fascinating listen any way you slice it:
😎 I listened to Pale Jay’s album a lot this winter:
📔 People using notebooks (absolutely me)
🧱 What you clicked on most in the last Compendium: 10 practical things to do to prepare for the Trump presidency by
Support for the week ahead from your higher self.
A new moon in Pisces arrives Thursday at 6:44pm CT. The year is almost 1/6th over. Are you ready to stop holding your breath? Are you dreaming of something far ahead that still feels urgent to you? Are you letting go of someone who wasn’t loving you in the way you need?
New Moon guide — Knight of Wands
Ambition, risk taker, action oriented
Calling In — Six of Wands
Victory, validation, acknowledgment
Letting Go — Temperance
Balance, patience, synergy
Happy 3rd birthday to my Pisces angel cat, Dusty. You ruined your sister’s life, but I’m so glad you joined us.
thanks for sharing my essay! I'm doing Hurley's 12-week New Year's writing nights right now and a few weeks ago when she said she was interviewing Julia Cameron we collectively squealed! Been reading the Creative Independent a lot more lately :)
Thank you so much for sharing the Small Joys post! So happy to be included. 😊❤️