I really enjoyed this and found it very relevant for me right now as I reflect on writing regularly for the last two years. Your post inspires me to set a cadence for reviewing the archives of my previous notes and passages. Thanks and best wishes for your workshop this weekend.
You've named something I have wrestled with for years. It is a habit I am actively trying to break. We systematically undervalue what we’ve already metabolized.
Once an idea has become part of how we think, work, or teach, it stops looking like intellectual property and starts looking like 'just something I know.' Meanwhile, someone encountering it for the first time may experience it as a revelation.
That makes the archive more than a repository of old work. It’s evidence of our own cognitive blind spots. I love that you are encouraging us all to remove the blinders and reach back into that gold mine!
I have wrestled with this as well. Evidenced by the plastic totes filled with my physical work (both documents and scribbles in notebooks)! Now, I am very excited to share this concept with others. It’s kind of like going shopping in your own closet!
Good analogy! It is just like shopping in your own closet! You and Magdalena are inspiring me to put a new task on calendar for next year: actually going through the stack of old laptops and external hard drives that have been collecting dust in my office armoire and panning for gold.
Aw! Thank you! I've been bringing your idea about this into some of my mentorship situations. I have a young artist friend I'm helping to build his brand and launch online. I'm trying to get him to warm to the idea of posting his work on Substack to start. He's got a healthy back catalogue, but tends to dismiss a lot of his work as irrelevant.
I invoked you tonight in my session with him. Thanks for giving me the language to do it!
I read this when @Casey Castille reposted it. I pondered it obsessively for an entire day. Then, it helped me unravel something that had me all tangled up. Thank you!
Excellent! That’s a wonderful endorsement for reposting. Happy to help a good idea circulate. (And @Magdalena Ponurska gave us a great idea here!) I’ve been thinking about it, too, all week!
I've had moments in the past where I found an old notebook or document on my computer. I've found myself thinking after reading it: this was really good. Why didn't I do anything with this? I recently discovered I have old audios on my phone, going back to 2020, with thoughts and ideas I never looked at again. Thank you for the reminder to look back and mine for gold, as I know it's there. And a reminder to trust that whatever I'm working on today, even if it's gotten too familiar for me to see how good it may be, that there's goodness there and to keep going.
Dear Marta: I love what you said here: "Why didn't I do anything with this?" this is one of the most common questions I hear from my clients! and love your aha moment of trusting what you are working on today! Cheers to creation!
This is fascinating. I've always felt like mining my old work is some kind of failure, going backwards instead of forward. My mind is now officially changed!
Dear Yannis: thank you for sharing this! That's a "gold mine" of brilliant ideas, topics and work! Like you said - in your archives there are "old articles that they are valuable to someone too." As you read and look through them, which one is going to be the first one that you share? Cheering you on! M
Another that lands on all four feet, right into the centre of my heart …Offf!
Maybe you have or will write about why, when I felt the same resonance with your 20 minute exercise, the one that introduced me to you, why the !@#$%! haven't I done it yet??? I keep scheduling it… and doing something else. Crikey! 🤔🫣🤪
I really enjoyed this and found it very relevant for me right now as I reflect on writing regularly for the last two years. Your post inspires me to set a cadence for reviewing the archives of my previous notes and passages. Thanks and best wishes for your workshop this weekend.
Dear Scott: I'm so glad that it resonated with you and that it inspired you to get into action! Cheering you on, M!
Excellent idea!
You've named something I have wrestled with for years. It is a habit I am actively trying to break. We systematically undervalue what we’ve already metabolized.
Once an idea has become part of how we think, work, or teach, it stops looking like intellectual property and starts looking like 'just something I know.' Meanwhile, someone encountering it for the first time may experience it as a revelation.
That makes the archive more than a repository of old work. It’s evidence of our own cognitive blind spots. I love that you are encouraging us all to remove the blinders and reach back into that gold mine!
I have wrestled with this as well. Evidenced by the plastic totes filled with my physical work (both documents and scribbles in notebooks)! Now, I am very excited to share this concept with others. It’s kind of like going shopping in your own closet!
Good analogy! It is just like shopping in your own closet! You and Magdalena are inspiring me to put a new task on calendar for next year: actually going through the stack of old laptops and external hard drives that have been collecting dust in my office armoire and panning for gold.
Can't wait to hear/read/see what you dig out! Casey - knowing you it will be platinum level (or titanium - whichever is more precious!)
Aw! Thank you! I've been bringing your idea about this into some of my mentorship situations. I have a young artist friend I'm helping to build his brand and launch online. I'm trying to get him to warm to the idea of posting his work on Substack to start. He's got a healthy back catalogue, but tends to dismiss a lot of his work as irrelevant.
I invoked you tonight in my session with him. Thanks for giving me the language to do it!
I read this when @Casey Castille reposted it. I pondered it obsessively for an entire day. Then, it helped me unravel something that had me all tangled up. Thank you!
Excellent! That’s a wonderful endorsement for reposting. Happy to help a good idea circulate. (And @Magdalena Ponurska gave us a great idea here!) I’ve been thinking about it, too, all week!
Thank you so much Casey! and I’m so glad that’s a great food for thought!
I've had moments in the past where I found an old notebook or document on my computer. I've found myself thinking after reading it: this was really good. Why didn't I do anything with this? I recently discovered I have old audios on my phone, going back to 2020, with thoughts and ideas I never looked at again. Thank you for the reminder to look back and mine for gold, as I know it's there. And a reminder to trust that whatever I'm working on today, even if it's gotten too familiar for me to see how good it may be, that there's goodness there and to keep going.
Dear Marta: I love what you said here: "Why didn't I do anything with this?" this is one of the most common questions I hear from my clients! and love your aha moment of trusting what you are working on today! Cheers to creation!
This is fascinating. I've always felt like mining my old work is some kind of failure, going backwards instead of forward. My mind is now officially changed!
There are many candidates.
Over 15 years I have journaled countless ideas many things that with some development can help someone.
I have old articles that they are valuable to someone too.
You are right, my best work is present and my mind ignores it.
Dear Yannis: thank you for sharing this! That's a "gold mine" of brilliant ideas, topics and work! Like you said - in your archives there are "old articles that they are valuable to someone too." As you read and look through them, which one is going to be the first one that you share? Cheering you on! M
Another that lands on all four feet, right into the centre of my heart …Offf!
Maybe you have or will write about why, when I felt the same resonance with your 20 minute exercise, the one that introduced me to you, why the !@#$%! haven't I done it yet??? I keep scheduling it… and doing something else. Crikey! 🤔🫣🤪
Saving this one too!