[This is an excerpt of my June 28, 2025 newsletter]
In August 2015, I attended a $350 blog seminar, where the four of us strangers showed up at our instructor’s apartment with a credit card and a laptop, got on WordPress, and created a blog from scratch in one intense afternoon. Our first and last homework assignment was to go home, publish a post that night, and send everyone else the link to our first post. We all sent and received. Ten years and 900+ articles later, I’m still posting. It’s changed my life.
Two and a half years into my blog journey, a gentle reader spotted me at a random, single-session craft workshop in Tokyo. She was a fellow student. We’d been in the same room for less than twenty minutes when it happened. I post lots of photos on my blog, but not of myself (except for one with my face the size of a rice kernel). I don’t post audio, so she didn’t know my voice either. This reader recognized me just by how I interacted with people. Oh, people. Whose mouths were gaping open as we shrieked with joy, running to each other, then embracing each other like two long-lost siblings reunited. And it was a reunion. My favorite thing about having a blog is this feeling of congruence.
Around that time, I started offering coaching packages to blog readers. I created a simple static page with descriptions and logistics. Someone signed up, and I met my first reader-client. I thought that was the most outrageous thing. I was wrong.
I’d been sending this newsletter for a couple of years when someone pledged $80 on Substack. THIS was the most outrageous thing. For days after, I felt sick to the stomach. Here’s the thing. I’ve been coaching for a long time. I know my coaching is good, whether it’s delivered in English or Japanese, it doesn’t matter. But writing is different. English is my non-primary language. I can’t tell for sure whether what I write at any given moment is good, bad, or something else. I’m okay with putting my words out there, not knowing. But the pledge made me feel like someone is watching over me, and that I am safe in my cluelessness. So it is my pledge back to you, to keep writing, not knowing.
today’s special
This post is dedicated to my friend and guardian angel Angela.
something new: AC repair
something read: Ryan Holiday “The Daily Stoic,” a little bit of
週に一度、メールマガジン「チーム馬の骨ニュースレター」を発行しています。無料で購読できます。くわしい内容は『
4年半「チーム馬の骨ニュースレター』という記事を、バックナンバーを読みたい方は『アーカイブ一覧』ページを見てください。
~~ やり方~~
1．左側の Type your email.. と薄く文字が見える欄にメールアドレスを入力する。（メールアドレスを入力しはじめると、Type your email..の文字は自然に消えます）
2．右側の Subscribe ボタンを押せば完了。
受信トレイに見当たらない場合は、迷惑メールのフォルダを探してみてください。見つからない場合は、連絡フォームからお問い合わせください。ではニュースレターにて！
