We were blown away by this...: The Delights of Distraction No.98

Honestly, we thought after our hiatus and the dozens of new newsletters that have sprouted over the last year (founder-led newsletters were abuzz in late 2022), that enthusiasm for adding more to your reading list would have considerably dwindled.

Boy were we wrong!

Your response to our last newsletter has been overwhelming, surprising, reassuring and humbling.

Not to mention re-affirming of how thoughtful, kind and attentive an audience of readers you are.

The votes were almost unanimous: more art, literature and poems. And not so much entrepreneur advice which most of you get enough of on Linked-In, at varied levels of cringe-inducing self-promotion. 

And then, almost unanimously, you told us to bring on the vulnerability, the personal journeys, the behind-the-scenes storytelling. Thankfully none of you thought we came off as a couple of whiny middle-aged wimps whenever we revealed all the crazy junk under the hood.

It dawned on us how similar we all are even if come from vastly different backgrounds.

How similar in basic human desires.

We all want to feel loved, safe, valued and free in our choices.

And we suppose thats's what sharing our tough moments, our messy, unplanned, raw and unfiltered successes and failures can do.

When we allow a glimpse into our flawed inner workings, we're telling you, Alex that there is nothing to be ashamed of. There's no need to posture or bury your insecurities deep in the graveyard of your conscience. They can bubble up and announce themselves because all of us are working through a lot of the same things.

And because we are like you, you root for us. You cheer us on. 

And while connection comes through shared experiences, the real magic happens when we allow ourselves to connect through shared struggle.

That is a powerful connection.

We learnt just how powerful when we read all your emails. It's a connection that we don't take lightly and will continue to drive us to show up in the best way we can, through our stores, our work ethic and this letter to you. 

And now, to proceed with our regular programming, our links and loves of the week:

Life Hacks 💪

Emotional health:

Learn to say “I don’t know” more.

You do not need to have a take on everything.

Drop the fear of appearing dumb and just ask someone to explain something to you. 

The smartest people we know are hyper-aware of the limits of their knowledge.

So just say "I don’t know" 

You’ll keep your ego small, learn something, and give your conversation partner the opportunity to improve your worldview. 

Housekeeping:

If you are looking for something in your house and you finally find it, when you are done with it, don’t put it back where you found it. Put it back where you first looked for it. It will save you hours of time sunk into looking for that second car key. 

Quote of the Week 🌺

"The process of becoming yourself is not a corporate desk job, and it is not homework, and it is not an unticked box languishing on a to-do list. You do not have to treat your flaws like action items that must be systematically targeted and eliminated in order to receive a return on investment. You have no supervisor; you should not be punished when you fail. Your job is not to lock the doors and chisel at yourself like a marble statue in the darkness until you feel quantifiably worthy of the world outside. Your job, really, is to find people who love you for reasons you hardly understand, and to love them back, and to try as hard as you can to make it all easier for each other. "

 -- Rayne Fisher Quane, from this essay on the dubious side of self-help

Words we ❤️ on love and alone-ness

WAIT

do not leave yet.

Let me rearrange the world

for you.

- Faraj Bou Al-isha

I am a lover

without a lover.

I am lovely and lonely. 

I belong deeply 

to myself.

 - Warsan Shire

For excuses Why we Failed at Love

A Russian Word

There must be a Russian word to describe what has happened

between us, like ostyt, which can be used

for a cup of  tea that is too hot, but after you walk to the next room,

and return, it is too cool; or perekhotet,

which is to want something so much over months

and even years that when you get it, you have lost

the desire.

– Barbara Hamby  

Letter to a Lost Friend

I had two longings 

and one was fighting the other.

I wanted 

to be loved and I wanted

to be always alone.

 - Jean Rhys

Wide Sargasso Sea

One of the most requested features of the newsletter was that we end it with a poem. We scrubbed the poem from our last edition because we thought it made the newsletter too long, but apparently you lovely folks can't get enough poetry, so we're placing it back here.

This particular poem is very special as it speaks so exquisitely to heartbreak and loss. A heartbreak that sinks you to the bottom of the ocean floor like a ship. Like the narrator of this poem, you are trying to carry all the joy and gratitude you can, while grief and loss come hurtling towards you. And yet the ending... the beautiful, hopeful ending of this poem melts that iceberg of your heart and opens you up again: to love, to life, to each other.

The poem begins with the narrator diving down to the ocean floor to have a conversation with the Titanic. And after a few exchanges, she gets to the heart of the matter:

On This the 100th Anniversary of the Sinking of the Titanic, We Reconsider the Buoyancy of the Human Heart

by Laura Lamb Brown-Lavoie.

(Note: For brevity, only excerpts of the poem have been pasted here.  You can read the entirety of the poem here.)

To be honest, I told Titanic, My honey’s leaving town
soon and I’m afraid it’s gonna wreck me, so I dove
down here.

Well come on in, Titanic said, but I’m not sure I’ve got what you’re looking for.

So in I climbed, through a window between two rust
stalactites, and began to pace her great promenade.
(Which should have been awesome, by the
way—walking by the ghosts of all those waving
handkerchiefs—except that I was in that feeling-feeling-sorry
for-yourself state where every hallway is the hallway of
your own wretched mind, every ghost your own ghost,
so I didn’t take a good look around.)

When I got to the Turkish baths, I sat on the edge of a
barnacled tub and watched weird crabs scrabble at my
feet.

I was hoping you’d teach me how to sink, I said. You
who have spent a century underwater with 1500
skeletons in your chest.

I don’t know, said Titanic, I’m kind-of a wreck.

Exactly! I said, Me, too! I’m here to apprentice myself to
wreckage. I’m here to apprentice myself to you! Great
bearded lady, gargantuan ark, you floating hotel. With
enough ballrooms in you to dance with everyone I’ve ever loved.

My heart has an iceberg with its name on it, I told
Titanic, so I need your advice. Tell me, did you see the
iceberg coming?

I did, Titanic said.

And you sailed right into it?

It was love, Titanic said.

And the band just kept playing? And the captain
stayed at the wheel? What did it feel like to swallow
seawater? Tell me, Titanic, how did it feel?

It felt like a hole in my side and then it felt like
plummeting face first into the ice-cold ocean.

She’s a straight talker, the Titanic.

The trouble with you humans is that you are so
concerned with staying afloat. Go ahead, be gouged
open by love. Gulp that saltwater, sink beneath the
waves. You’re not a boat, you can go under and come
up again, with those big old lungs of yours, those hard
kicking legs.

And your heart, she said, that gargantuan ark, that
floating hotel. Call it Unsinkable, though it is sinkable.
Embark, embark.

There are enough ballrooms in you to dance with
everyone you’ll ever love.

That’s what the Titanic told me this morning, me, lying next to her on the ocean floor.

There are enough ballrooms in you.

Thanks for reading, and for being here,

Viv & Ami