Bet on Yourself

All year, every year

Hi friends.

Good morning, good morning, what are your stakes with your writing for this coming year?

Are you starting something brand new that you think will change your life? Can you sense the thrill of the challenge waiting for you? Here you are, ready to show up for yourself.

Or are you finishing something you’ve been working on forever? You’re just so close to being proud of yourself in a whole new way. Finishing a creative project always feels incredible.

Maybe you’ll be wading knee-deep in the muck for months, in hopes of emerging at the end of it all with a rough but beautiful gem. All you can see is the work ahead but you got this, you can do it. You tell yourself this every day until it’s true.

I’m not asking you to make a new year’s resolution. We all know by now that we can start something brand new any time of year. There’s no guaranteed way to schedule inspiration and motivation. Wherever you are in the process is exactly where you need to be. What I’m asking you to do today is to assess your own personal state of the union about where you’re at with your work right now and where you want to take it next year.

I will be finishing a first draft of a novel. I will handwrite it in the mornings when I wake up and I will type it up in the afternoons and I will hack away at it until I get something good enough to show my readers and my agent and hopefully my editor, too. That’s what I want. That’s what I ‘m shooting for. That’s my state of the union.

What’s yours?

Here is what I know: This is the year I bet on myself. This is the year I go all in on me and my work, and I give it every last ounce of my creative self to make something fucking brilliant. I have other responsibilities, of course, like my friends and family and my community. And I need to be healthy and strong. But I know what it means to prioritize my work, and I am hell bent on doing it.

I’m betting on you, too. I believe you can accomplish whatever you set out to do. If you sit down every day or every other day or whatever works for you, and if you write regularly, then you will produce your work. Equally important: keep reading, keep communicating and connecting with other creative people, and keep your eyes and mind open to the world. Maintain your creative self and it will serve you well.

Starting Friday I’ll be over at the Mini 1000 for a five-day kickoff to the new year. It’s free and fun.

Come join the rest of us—there are nearly 10,000 people signed up now—if you want in on making your shit happen in 2025.

Happy New Year,

Jami

You are reading Craft Talk, the home of #1000wordsofsummer and also a weekly newsletter about writing from Jami Attenberg. I’m also on bluesky and instagram.