Susan Cain

a professional or personal responsibility to read.

So it's lots of magazine articles and, and, and Substack newsletters, but my groaning shelves with thousands of books are looming over me at all times.

And, and I've, I have an increasingly guilty relationship or even, uh, just greedy and, and, you know, I, I'm concerned it's degrading into this bittersweet relationship where like, when am I going to find the time to make the progress I want to make through my own library?

I know exactly what you mean.

And for me, the guilt of that relationship is embodied in the fact that I used to just know exactly where every single book sat on my bookshelf.

Because I think I just spent so much time looking at the shelves.

Just looking at them made me so happy.

So I just memorized their placement.

And now I have no idea where any book is.

And I feel like that's really telling of how things have shifted.

But I do still have these moments and they usually happen for whatever reason when we're traveling or on vacation.

It could be business travel and it could be vacation.

I can focus much more.

There's something about removing the everydayness of life and the feeling of daily responsibilities where I can still get back into that state.

Which doesn't mean that I'm not still checking my phone more than I wish I were.

But I'm still really loving books.

And every time that happens, actually, every time we're traveling, I vow to do the same thing as soon as we get home.

And then it all flies away.

So in writing on Substack, is this a decision to go where the people are?

Or is it just you just like the demand you've placed on yourself to publish something without any friction on a regular schedule?