State of the 'stack #1
Celebrating my one month anniversary on Substack!
Thank you so much being a paid subscriber to my Substack. I will never forget your support in this endeavor, and especially at this time! Each one of you is like a star in my sky, helping me navigate this new territory. I think of you *very* often as I write and hope to make you proud of my efforts.
Here is a short update on how things have been this first month:
I have 44 total subscribers and 5 paid subscribers. As most Substacks can count on about 5% of subscribers becoming paid subscribers, I’m doing really good at about 11%!
I’ve written 10 posts, many of which took a lot out of me psychologically, likely due to writing about Korea. But I feel like it’s helping me get to the core of my writing identity, which might actually be a huge relief since I do like a lot of different things about the world and can sometimes feel pulled in multiple directions.
I’ve submitted my writing to fellow Substacker Rob Henderson’s call for submissions, and I think my piece on comfort women will be on his site in the next month (he publishes everyone’s submission). He and I have a lot of identity parallels (he’s a half-Korean, half-Mexican former foster kid who graduated from Yale and Cambridge), so I’m hoping that he might be interested in my content besides just wanting to support newer writers. It would be really great to meet him someday.
I’ve also contacted a mommy friend named Anna Ghosh from the kids’ preschool days in SF. She’s a literary agent that has worked with a number of Asian-American writers, and we always talked about exchanging our work when the kids were younger. I’m hoping she’ll get to my website amidst her stack of manuscripts!
Looking forward to meeting with my friend Bert Seow tomorrow to talk thru the business end of things. On the one hand, it’s great for that I have found something that involves both my heart and brain that I might be able to sustain. On the other hand, that thing is *writing.* So I have to think of someway to earn an income, but in a way that conserves most of my time and energy for writing. He’s a great soundboard for that sort of thing. His wife Stacy also recently designed the plants for our new yard! Will post pictures next month. :)
I’ve always known that pivoting to life coaching would make a lot of sense for me, especially after my counseling gigs. I will likely earn my certification next week, which will be a nice addition to my resume. I’ve launched a “Meet with me” section already, but I’ll likely expand it to include more coaching language after I go thru the training process. I never thought I fit the executive- or success-oriented life coach, but I think I can slowly find my niche. Or I might just go total MIRIAM HYUN: CHEERLEADER! With the exclamation point!
And finally, I’ve been trying to think of ways to say “thank you” in a more meaningful way. Thus I am launching a new paid subscriber perk: A PHOTOGRAPH OF YOU by me!!! I will be in the Bay Area in a few weeks and hope to snap a few of you there. We might get to LA at some point during the holidays. And Portland peeps, look out for a text from me to schedule a time soon!
Thank you all again, for everything.
Thank you for visiting.