I don't want to wait for life to be good

I came across My Analog Journal on YouTube an hour before sending this issue and had to share it. I instantly fell in love. It’s a channel where “MAJ and friends explore rare grooves around the world on vinyl.” This was my introduction to the channel:

A few others that caught my eye: Hawaiian Grooves with Roger Bong, Brazilian Samba Grooves with Batukizer, Kollywood & Bollywood Disco, Funk & Boogie with Mera Bhai. There are so many I’m excited to listen to.

🎧 For My Chemical Romance fans and elder emos, I was a guest on Black People Love Paramore, a humorous podcast hosted by Sequoia Holmes about “the seemingly random, underrepresented interests of different niches of Black people.” You can listen to or watch the episode to hear us chat about MCR’s impact, our favorite and least favorite songs, the band’s reunion, and more.

And as always, the Thank You For Being Here playlist is there to enjoy.

A tidy home helps my brain a lot.

Do you have a cleaning schedule? Mine is set up in a Notion database for weekly, monthly, quarterly, and biannual tasks. It has a table and calendar view. And instead of a simple checkbox, which never helped me remember when I’ve done something, I’m testing a new system by updating “Last Clean” and “Next Clean” dates.

Since we’re halfway through the year, I’m focused on these biannual tasks:

• Reviewing and filing important paperwork like car repair receipts (a lot this year 😫), insurance and tax documents, and greeting cards. Then we toss or shred whatever we don’t need to keep. We try to stay on top of this throughout the year because being unable to find an essential doc when we need it is a pain. Doing a deeper review twice yearly helps ensure everything is in order and easy to find in our filing cabinet.

• Decluttering and organizing our two walk-in closets (one for our clothes and the other for miscellaneous items). My current rule for clothing is if I haven’t worn it in a year, I’m donating it. I’m amid an extremely slow wardrobe revamp and am considering cataloging all my clothes with this AI fashion assistant app.

Off the Line

To feel more connected with myself and my life and lower my anxiety, I’m continuing to work on spending less time on social media — a thief of time and self-confidence. I’m experimenting with taking one day off of social media each week. Sunday felt fitting because it’s typically a reset day at home, where we get ready for a new week and lounge.

As a bonus, this micro detox puts me in a mindset to be on my phone less throughout the rest of the week. During the first week, my screen time decreased by almost 50%. Hopefully, I can keep it down most weeks.

My new website is officially done! I redesigned and rewrote everything and did a celebratory dance after I hit publish. It took many, many hours — across several months — of soul searching, business planning, drafting, editing, and some skill-building to get to this stage as a freelance writer. This evolved direction is an extension of myself — in an “I’m showing up as me” way, not a “work is my entire life” way. I hope to attract cool, compassionate folks who need help with content and copy that makes people feel right at home.

Few things are better than feeling like we belong, and that’s how I want my clients and their clientele and community to feel when I write for them. I’m making a little commotion for joy by working with brands, service providers, nonprofits, artists, and publications that enrich lives. They comfort people, solve a problem, make beautiful things, or offer a moment of escapism.

But when it comes to communicating how awesome they are, they are overwhelmed, wrestle with words, and feel bogged down with other tasks. Does that sound like you or someone you know? Get in touch.

Client Work

One of my proudest moments of 2023 so far was working with Balanced Black Girl. BBG is an online platform dedicated to amplifying women of color in the wellness space. Founder and host Les Alfred approached me to refresh her DIY website copy with timeless, airy, conversational language.

After a simple alignment call and Les completed my brand clarity worksheet, I wrote copy emphasizing community and expansive possibilities through friendly and inclusive messaging. I also switched the first-person point of view from “I” to “we” to support BBG’s evolution as a media group.

The Brand Doula executed a gorgeous brand and website redesign for BBG. I supported the redesign with copywriting for the home, about, podcast, blog, and newsletter pages. View it in action.

Is your website not inspiring your target audience to make a purchase, join your group, or take another action? Tell me about it.

These are the books I read in July:

• Panic in a Suitcase by Yelena Akhtiorskaya (2 stars): I discovered this novel at Half Price Books and was excited that it was written by a Ukrainian woman born in the same city as Vadym and raised in Brooklyn. The story revolves around an immigrant family struggling to adapt to the rules of the American dream after living in the Soviet Union. The novel spans two decades, with the first half focusing on an uncle's visit from Ukraine and the second half on a niece's visit to Ukraine. However, the book differed from its description, and the writing often felt unstructured, random, and confusing. By the end, the plot and character development seemed to be non-existent. I wish I had stopped reading it instead of powering through the reading slump it caused me. 🛒 Bookshop.org | Amazon

• Being Texan: Essays, Recipes, and Advice for the Lone Star Way of Life by Texas Monthly (5 stars): I picked up a copy of this book to celebrate our first anniversary of living in Texas. Written by contributing Texas Monthly writers, it offers a wonderful mix of informative and entertaining pieces about the people, customs, land, art, and cuisine of Texas. The book is fair in addressing the state’s flawed past and present while highlighting its charm, contributions, and diversity of culture, thought, and lifestyles. It proves that Texas is much more than the cliches people are familiar with. 🛒 Bookshop.org | Amazon

• Stay True by Hua Hsu (5 stars): Hua Hsu, a staff writer for The New Yorker, won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize in the Memoir or Autobiography category with this book. I absolutely loved it. Even his most casual sentences seared through me, conjuring up memories I hadn't thought of in years, some joyful, some painful. The book felt familiar as it's set in the Bay Area, where I grew up, chronicling the messiness of adolescence and young adulthood from the perspective of a son of Taiwanese immigrants. Hsu rebelled against mainstream culture by creating zines, obsessing over records, and studying Marxist theory in his search for self-understanding and a sense of belonging, all while determined to appear as an outlier. His memoir discusses friendship in a raw, hilarious, and beautiful way, particularly after an emotional gut punch when a friend is murdered, and Hsu's grief and unexpected need to move forward ensue.🛒 Bookshop.org | Amazon

I'll earn a tiny commission if you purchase a book from the above links. Thanks for supporting authors, bookshops, and me!

Extra! Extra!

• How to Plan a Meaningful Staycation When Everyone Else is Vacationing (The Good Trade)

• The Age of Average (Alex Murrell)

• I Learned to Talk Less and Listen More (Shondaland)

• The HR-ification of Marriage (Bustle)

Movies

Joy Ride. Watching this was a silly goose time. I laughed, cringed, and even shed a few emotional tears. The story follows Audrey, an adoptee, on a business trip to Asia that takes several unexpected turns. With the help of her childhood best friend Lolo, college friend Kat, and Lolo’s cousin Deadeye, she goes on a journey, with a few explicit shenanigans, to find her birth mom. Throughout the experience, she learns lessons on self-worth, cultural exploration, and found family.

🎥 We participated in Barbenheimer opening weekend. It felt like a cultural event because of how much buzz surrounded the release of two blockbuster movies. AMC had its best week of ticket revenue in its 103-year history because of it. We watched Barbie on a Friday amongst a sea of people in pink ready to dismantle the patriarchy. The set design, costumes, and doll mannerisms were a delight. Margo was the perfect “stereotypical Barbie,” and I was happy to see Ryan Gosling in a comedic role again. Then we saw Oppenheimer, a biographical drama about the father of the atomic bomb, the following Sunday. I was in awe of the movie’s editing and sound design. The morality aspect of the story made me think of Studio Ghibli’s animated film The Wind Rises.

Series

Outlander. I’m still obsessed with this show and recommend it to anyone I talk to. I finished season 5 on Netflix this week and downloaded the Starz app to watch the next two seasons. They recently announced an 8th and final season, and I just learned about Sam Heughan and Graham McTavish’s travel show Men in Kilts. A second season is out this month.

New Girl. I recently introduced Vadym to this sitcom. He’s totally a Schmidt, and it’s hilarious to realize their similarities — ridiculous and big-hearted. The first time I watched New Girl was in college, so rewatching it while I’m the same age as the characters is a different experience.

YouTube

I loved Jay Shetty’s podcast episode with Tom Holland about Tom’s sobriety, mental health, and relationship with Hollywood. Both are so grounded, humble, and down to earth. I wish all celebrity interviews were like this.

⚾ air-conditioned baseball stadiums
🎸 dancing at a Paramore concert
🍉 watermelon lime mocktails
💅🏽 painting my nails and not messing them up immediately
📚 reading any book by Emily Henry (although Happy Place is probably my least favorite of hers)

Thank you, Diane U., for your generous 🍵 contribution in July!

I’m already grateful for you being here, but if you’d like to support in other ways:

• Buy me a matcha latte to help fuel this free newsletter. Venmo: @jenayzhyrov

• Forward this email to a friend with a recommendation to subscribe or post about TYFBH on your socials