How do you drown out the voices?

And a Goop Translation

Hi,

To those of you who are new to my newsletter, thank you for subscribing. To those of you who have been subscribed for a while, thank you for sticking around. Do you know I’ve been writing So Very since 2015? I know. Surprised me too.

Let me reintroduce myself to you: I’m a journalist and YA writer. This is still new to me, being a young adult writer. My debut only came out last October. I’ve been just as fascinated by the dynamics of teenage girls since I was a teenager. I love that I’ve been able to write YA books and get paid for it.

I just had a discussion with my agent about possibly submitting a new book as an adult book and it made me feel sad. I’m not sure why. That should be what everyone wants, right? To be an adult literary writer. But what if that’s not me? What if I’m not meant to do that? What if YA is where I’m supposed to be?

During the past two years, since I got my book deal, I’ve met the best, most loving, supportive people in the YA community. Plus I have a second book, THE FALLING GIRLS which comes out October 2021. (All I can tell you right now is that it’s about friendship breakups, co-dependency and a cheerleader who gets murdered).

How can I turn my back on that?

Sometimes when I first start a new project, I lose a sense of my identity. I question who I am. I think that happens when you first step into the muck of creativity. I talk about this with my sister-in-law, Melissa who is my creative brainstorm partner. She’s a fashion designer and so it’s nice to have someone who is in a totally different field to bounce ideas off of.

How do you start a new project and how do you know where it’s going? What if sometimes - or all the time - you don’t?

I think that’s the fear of creativity. That’s where I feel the most anxiety. When I’m starting something new. Okay, fine. I have a lot of anxiety through the entire project.

So I start small. I start by jotting ideas down. I start by just writing a few lines down on a document. You can translate this to anything in your life really. I can’t drown out those voices of mine. Where I doubt myself. Where I convince myself I’m the worst writer. That I can’t finish anything. They’re there. I have to hear them and then I have to keep going. It’s not that you ever stop fearing failure. It’s that you just continue on anyway.

Back to this new book I’m writing. It hasn’t been sold. I haven’t gotten a deal for it. I sent 20 pages to my agent and soon I’ll hear back to see what she thinks. And we’ll have the discussion. YA? Adult?

It’s a new year. And I want to push myself to try something new. So here I go.

Hopefully you will too.

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There are two ALI GREENLEAF events coming up this month!

Wednesday, January 20 @6:30pm EST: Montclair Public Library virtual chat with Kiara Sarner, Sexual Violence Prevention Specialist from SAVE of Essex County. Please register here. The discussion will be followed by a Q&A.

Tuesday, January 26 @6pm EST: Instagram LIVE chat with Trauma Educator & Victim Advocate, Me Too Many Voices.

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GOOP TRANSLATIONS: All-in-One Super Nutrient Face Oil

Goop: “After four weeks of use of All-in-One Super Nutrient Face Oil, 100 percent of women showed significant improvement in skin texture, and 97 percent showed significant improvement in the reduction of fine lines and wrinkles.*

*Based on an eight-week third-party consumer-perception and clinical study conducted on thirty-three women ages thirty-five to sixty-five.”

Goop Translation: I asked 33 of my celebrity friends and Goop sycophants to try my new $98 face oil. They all go to high end dermatologists who charge $850 just to walk in the door. They get facials once a month, microdermabrasion every 6 weeks, and Vampire Facial Treatments, like my good friend Kourtney Kardashian. What’s a vampire facial? They extract your own blood and needle it back into your face.

In other words, their skin texture is already perfect.

When I gave them the oil, they put it at the back of their medicine cabinet and told me they loved it. If it’s in a medicine cabinet, that’s “clinical” right?

Thank you for reading,

-Hayley