Mindful Mondays #16: Experimental Edition
Turkish coffee, housekeeping, forests, playing with format, and a poll
Good morning, and welcome to another edition of Mindful Mondays. I had a restful weekend hanging out with my sister, who was visiting the family here in San Diego.
On Saturday, we sat down at a rather bohemian cafe to catch up on things. This place specializes in traditional Turkish sand-brewed coffee, and is decorated with a mix of Near Eastern and Art Nouveau furnishings (photo above).
At some point, our conversation turned to this newsletter. I showed my sister, a talented writer herself, how I’d set up Mindful Mondays in Substack and how my audience had grown to over 500 subscribers since October.
But we also talked about the format of Mindful Mondays and how I’d been struggling the last few weeks to find interesting articles to share.
As regular readers will know, in this newsletter I typically share my own essays (when I have time to write them), three articles I’ve read, a podcast, and a quote. It’s a curation-style newsletter, modeled after inspirations like Tim Ferriss’s 5 Bullet Friday or Austin Kleon’s 10 things worth sharing.
But because Substack has good data, I know that only about 15% of readers will click on a link in any given edition. And a couple of people have told me that the part of Mindful Mondays they enjoy most is my own writing.
So, starting with this week, I’m going to be experimenting a bit more and playing with the format. As I begin to tinker, I’d appreciate knowing: what’s your favorite feature of Mindful Mondays?
Book I’m Reading
How To Keep House While Drowning. KC Davis, a therapist with ADHD, writes about how to keep your place in halfway decent shape while dealing with mental health issues. My biggest takeaway so far: think of care tasks not as something you “should” do, but as acts of kindness toward your future self. This was recommended to me by a client, and I’ve since shared it with several others.
Article of Interest
How Nepal Regenerated Its Forests: Nepal is a country near and dear to my heart, as I spent about six weeks there in 2018. This article from NASA shows how Nepal nearly doubled its forest cover after turning management over to local community-based groups.
Podcast of the Week
Dr. Matthew Walker, author of Why We Sleep, is back on the Tim Ferriss Show to answer all your sleep-related questions, including whether you should be taking melatonin and the benefits of “sleep divorce.”
Quote of the Week
“He who jumps into the void owes no explanation to those who stand and watch.”
—Jean-Luc Godard
That’s it for this week’s edition of Mindful Mondays. As always, I welcome your feedback. Just reply to this email or leave a comment on Substack to let me know what you thought!
Thank you for reading,
Chris Cordry, LMFT
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One vote for Chris's writing.