The Middles

Edition 45: I still don’t know what I’m doing, most of the time. You’ve already made it, stop faking it. For a long time, I would just tell people to “fake it until you make it.” That was the antidote for Imposter Syndrome, right? That or “Do it with the confidence of a mediocre white…

View this email in your browser     Edition 44: I discovered a hole in my pants during a meeting yesterday   Get things done, sort of This newsletter is supposed to be about emerging leadership, managing, self-care and “work-life balance.” I’m going to admit to you right now that I actually think work-life balance…

Always be hustlin’ A month or so ago, I started another side project. I have this, some consulting, and now The Hustle, which is a Slack community for women journalists who consult in content-adjacent roles. I started working when I was 14, bagging groceries. When I was 16, I started working at Barnes & Noble.…

  The things that scare you It’s Halloween, one of my favorite holidays, and not just because of the candy, though I do like candy and I support candy corn. It’s a day for being frightened and being something you are not. Maybe a good time to address fear as a leader. It’s good to…

Ask about it. I’ve been job hunting for some time now. I have the privilege and luxury to be able to take my time and consult while I look for the right fit. That’s not possible for everyone, and honestly only possible for a little bit longer, but that’s a topic for another newsletter. As…

What “difficult” means “Stop the rhetoric that a woman is crazy or difficult. If a man says to you that a woman is crazy or difficult, ask him, ‘What bad thing did you do to her?’” Natalie Portman said that at an event recently and it brought up my complicated feelings about the word “difficult.” Most women…

A list of my favorite things. A reminder I’ve been traveling so this is shorter than usual. Back to long rambles next week. My favorite travel cup: This Thermos cup has some weird thing that makes hot liquid not spill out at a mouth-burning rate. It also does well with hot or cold liquids. My favorite journal: The Traveler’s…

A playlist for getting sh*t done (I’m off this week and next, visiting family and taking care of a few things, so this newsletter is a little shorter and less essay-ish than usual.) I split my time in weird ways these days. I spend part of it mentoring, part of it writing, part of it…

Work ≠ family If you Google “Work isn’t family” you come up with a bunch of recommended articles along the same line: Coworkers aren’t you family and they shouldn’t be.  The NYTimes explains it this way: “It often means that boundaries get violated and people are expected to show inappropriate amounts of commitment and loyalty, even when it’s…

Harnessing the energy Last week I went to the Online News Association conference, one of my favorite things every year.  Almost always, I get home from a conference or a really great brainstorming session and I have THE ENERGY. All sorts of things that I’ve learned are floating in my brain, and I have no idea what…