What's New: Major Updates to The Messy Middle!
Read this to learn how you can benefit more from my Substack!
Babelas, gorgeous beings, divine creatures and weird wild humans!
I am eternally grateful to each and every one of you for being here. Hot damn I love ya. Being a self-employed mental health writer is full of fury sometimes, and there are days I want to throw my laptop and metaphorical pens (remember when pen-pals were a thing?) at a wall. Time and time again, I open up my cookie-crumb-covered laptop (I gotta stop eating in bed with Netflix) because of you. You are the pal to my pen, and because you are here, I keep writing.
Thank you.
December was my first month on Substack and I spent it experimenting with how to show up. After several weeks I started to get a feel for how other writers use this space, what I find most enjoyable writing, and what you respond most to.
After polling you in last week’s post, I learned y’all want more tips & tools for living mentally & emotionally well, monthly journaling prompts, and stories of humanity.
With that in mind, I have re-structured The Messy Middle.
🥁Drum roll please, are we ready kiddos?
🥁drum
🥁roll
🥁let’s
🥁go….
The Messy Middle now has “seasons.”
Say WHAT?
Rach, when you say seasons, do you mean like winter/spring etc? Or like, Grey’s Anatomy season 1/2 etc?
Excellent question my dude.
I mean the latter: The Messy Middle will exist in seasons, somewhat like a television show. Together we will follow a three-month season with one-week breaks in between. I get a vacation, you get a vacation, everybody gets a vacation! [insert Oprah GIF here].
Each season will have a new theme. There will be four consistent components of each season that will maintain their unique purpose (like tips, stories, or journaling prompts), but the content of each component will change to reflect the season’s theme.
Each season of The Messy Middle will include:
The Monday Messy (a weekly newsletter with tips/tools, Rach’s recommendations of the week, & one or two journaling prompts)
Mess Hall (chat forum & community connection)
Monthly Journaling Prompts (end-of month prompts for reflection/intention around the season’s theme)
We Met in the Middle (stories of human connection, heartfelt conversations, and the mystical phenomenon of opening up to strangers)
Why Seasons, Miss Rach?
One focus. One topic. One thing at a time rather than all the things all the time. I’ve found that healing has become an overwhelming job, rather than an opportunity. I feel inundated with all the traumas/parts of self/behaviors/attachments/inner children I have to heal, and despite being in therapy for 18 years I get wildly overwhelmed with what to focus on.
My hope is that by narrowing down this space into seasons, we get to feel some relief in knowing that many areas of healing, living, and human-ing will be covered without the overwhelm of trying to do it all at once.
Relief.
A seasonal approach will allow you to follow stories weekly, like episodes of a TV show (p.s., I’ll probably recommend some banger shows and would love to hear what you’re watching in the comments). One overarching theme per season will inform weekly tips & journaling prompts. Our Mess Hall chats will center these themes, allowing us to really dig deep and move through themes together, rather than facing a cluster-fuck of varying topics.
So, without further ado, let me introduce you to: Season One of The Messy Middle.
Season One of The Messy Middle
Season one will run from January 8th to March 24th.
Season One: Presence.
The theme of this season is presence.
Some questions I will be asking us and writing from this season:
What happens when we radically commit to the here and now?
How can slowing down actually help us create more of what wants to be born?
When we show up fully invested in the present moment, how do our relationships (to self and others) change?
What do we gain by releasing the need to do it all at once?
Why Presence, Raquel?
I love when you call me Raquel. Or Rocky. Or Big Papa. I’ve had too much caffeine and I may be deliriously jet-lagged. Nonetheless, onward!
After the furiously fast December season, I find myself burned out. There is a rapidness to the holidays. A whooshing wave of preparation, socializing, moving parts and moving minds. January has always felt like trudging through mud to me. I find myself thinking, “if January is supposed to feel like a beginning, why do I feel exhausted before it even starts?”
Just as I have in past Januarys, I already feel the undercurrent of must dos and fresh-starts and giddy-up & gos. It’s as if December says, “give everything you have,” and without any time to recharge, January says, “run as fast as you can.” And I’m already tired.
While I enjoy a sense of momentum, running on empty only leads to resentment and fatigue.
This January, I’m focusing on presence to try and mitigate that rushing sensation.
By focusing on just this moment, I’m experimenting with how slowing down might be a better option to speeding up.
This season, you can expect:
The Monday Messy (weekly newsletter sent, as you surely gathered, every Monday):
Practical tips for how to stay present
Rach’s recommendations for podcasts/articles/music/videos on presence
Stories of how I’m practicing presence (or struggling with it)
Mess Hall (chat)
Icebreakers to get us jiving/chatting about our struggles/triumphs
Your ideas on how to stay present (collective idea pot!)
Supportive community to help eachother out
Monthly Journaling Prompts
3 Months of prompts for harnessing presence
Writing prompts to reflect on how presence is helping/challenging us
Intentions for why we may want to be more “in the moment”
Reflection on growth, change, or discovery over the three months (y’all gonna grow I know!)
We Met in the Middle (weekly stories)
Honest stories from my personal life about anxiety, fear, and all things struggle-bus about slowing down (like really honest. I am notoriously transparent)
What happens when I show up radically present (for better or worse)
Strangers I meet and conversations born from being present (remember the story of the man I met on the train in Scotland? Like that.)
Stories that build on each other weekly (like episodes of a reality TV show—I don’t know where it’s going to go, but we will find an end together.)
» If you’d like to access ALL components of this season’s The Messy Middle, please consider becoming a paid subscriber.
Subscriptions are only $5/month (the price of one coffee!) or $50/year (two months free).
Subscribe below for a wee $5/month to get present with us (and a little messy doing so):
» For folks who want to stay connected (and present!) but a paid subscription is not an option this month, that’s ok! I will make sure you still have access to some (but not all) of this season’s messy.
Free subscribers will have access to:
Mess Hall (chat forum): All Access!
The Monday Messy (newsletter): One/month
We Met in the Middle (episodic stories): One/month
Not sure whether you’d like to be a paid subscriber or not?
I got you! I’ve made a free 7 day trial for you below. No matter what, I’d be honored to have you join us in the messy middle.
Click the cute button below to join us in The Messy Middle for a week free:
As always, I am so grateful you are here.
I’m excited to begin Season One of The Messy Middle, and to have you join me on the journey.
If you have any questions or feedback about the new messy structure, drop your comments below the P.S. at the bottom👇🏽
See you on Monday my loves.
XX
Rachel
I’m not interested in the befores or afters: show me the messy middle.
P.S. If you don’t already, I’d love to have you get messy with me on instagram! There are plenty of free ways to connect with me & other pretty humans there, plus video versions of my stories for my visual folks (like the Scotland story I mentioned above!) www.instagram.com/rachel_havekost