Writing is a habit. Habits build character and facilitate growth.
I learned this over 18 months of writing a newsletter every week. Here’s the story.
I was spending my time managing sales for my business, hopping on to LinkedIn to track conversations about helping industrial businesses with their expansion into Africa.
On twitter, I was living the degen life.
Buying and selling NFTs. I thought I knew what I was doing. On the outside, it seemed like I was all over the place. By the end of 2022, crypto was crashing. Inflation rates were spiking. My clients were trying to “do more with less.” Deals dried up. I found myself, face in palm – asking “what’s next?”
As the new year rolled around. I searched for clarity.
On twitter, I saw a post that changed my trajectory.
It was from an Australian writer that I follow called Tim Dennings.
He said: “write a weekly newsletter for 12 months and watch your life change.”
I thought I’d try it for 18 months. I learned a lot
“Slow money” is better than “no money”:
A lot of people want validation right away.
It’s the way we’ve been trained. You learned it in the school system, struggling and fighting for their standardized grades.
The best get the recognition.
The best go on to the best companies.
The best rise in the companies.
Validation and gold stars in the form of grades, promotions, and awards.
Soon enough, you become addicted to validation.
The uncertainty of doing anything new, which does not guarantee an immediate return becomes outlandish.
Even though you have interests that have been tugging at your heart for years, decades for some, you bury it deep down.
Hiding it underneath the cloak of fancy overthinking, convenient procrastination, and bountiful distraction.
The reality is that: it’s all resistance – the tiny invisible veil that’s between your life now and the “unlived life” within.
The only way forward is through action.
Action gives answers, in the form of feedback.
You have to develop patience and detach from the immediate need for validation.
Because when you prioritize action, you get feedback that allows you to take more informed action. This cycle repeats itself.
The truth is that resistance never disappears, you just have to learn to show up and push through it.
This takes practice.
The thing you want most in life will not come from the outcome itself but the process to get there.
The journey is all that matters.
Learnings From 73 Consecutive Weeks Of My Newsletter:
When I was 19, my friends and I were at the NSBE (National Society of Black Engineers) conference. We had all printed out our resumes and found a way for 4-5 people to share a two-bed hotel room. (We were on the come up)
As a chemical engineer, I had my target.
I wanted to work for the most valuable company in the world, at that time. The dark side of oil and gas – Exxonmobil. But I was going to pitch them my renewable energy research.
I walked around the conference, circling the Exxon recruiter, handing my resumes to other companies, practicing, and then like a shark, went in for the ultimate pitch.
“I will be able to assist with your alternative energy department.”
She nodded.
“I know this is a priority for Exxon.”
She read my resume as I spoke.
I babbled on.
Then she looked up and said:
“Exxon is going to stick to the traditional forms of energy for now, thanks for your interest” she said as she handed me back my resume.
(Shivers…cold-blooded. I still remember that rejection as I write today).
I learned a very important lesson that day. You can never be TOO ready.
You get rid of perfection by becoming a practitioner. You do this by simply focusing on the process at hand.
When you focus on the process, you learn more about yourself, you foster personal growth, and you find useful ways to contribute to your community to live a more well-rounded life.
Here are a few things I learned from writing my newsletter every week for 18 months:
1. Learning my interests
Writing is just another habit.
And just like any habit, you begin to learn more about yourself. Over the last year and a half, I’ve written about a variety of topics that I find interesting. Although they might seem all over the place or eclectic, looking back there’s a thread of storytelling, personal growth, and entrepreneurship that ties it all together.
If you think you need to know yourself to take on a venture. Go the other way around, use the venture to learn more about yourself.
2. Knowing what it takes
It’s easy to plan.
It’s hard to do.
It’s even more difficult to do, consistently.
I started a substack newsletter in 2019. I wrote one post. The second post I wrote was all the way in 2023. Imagine I stuck with it for those 4 years.
A lot of things happen this way, you want to start a store, a business, a magazine, you plan, then plan, then plan but nothing happens. You become a chronic planner, instead of learning what it takes to get it done.
Over the last 18 months, I now have a better sense of what it takes to write a newsletter every week.
Now I can really plan better.
Instead of planning to learn, use the activity to learn how to plan.
3. Building assets (Notes, website, followers)
In 1.5 years, I’ve:
- grown my subscriber list by 45%
- increased my twitter (X) following by 2000+
- built a repository of 1100+ notes to write an infinity number of unique articles and books moving forward.
- thousands impressions on LinkedIn
- and yeah, Chuck D (from Public Enemy) and I are now homies on X (not really but we follow one one another)
This process has allowed me to learn about myself but has also pushed me to share what I know to attract like-minded people.
These are all valuable assets that I can leverage to continue building whatever I want.
The most important asset is the connection to people and developing a sustainable system to nurture those relationships.
I’d encourage you to start building yours.
4. Getting feedback
You can’t improve what you can’t monitor.
You might have received a message from me over the last two weeks, bugging you to fill out a feedback form. And if you didn’t (here it is again). Now that I have consistently produced something that people receive, I can ask for feedback to find out what resonates and what can be improved.
I got tangible data
I noticed some trends.
I’m looking forward to implementing them.
I could only get here with consistency.
The goal to venture is to steep yourself in the process and detach from the outcome. But do it with the hopes of getting feedback, so you can improve.
Evolution:
Growth is a process.
It is stimulated by nurturing self-awareness, developing expertise in the process, and building on valuable feedback.
None of that will happen if you keep your ideas in your mind, waiting for the perfect reveal to the world just because you want immediate validation.
Be patient.
Detach from the outcome.
Nurture your internal world through practice and use it to build valuable connections.
Yours truly,
Nifemi
