I don’t know if you can be in a better place than you are right now. But in 20 years, you’ll be able to give yourself gifts. Thinking about the future is suddenly important.
Love, R. ♡
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Thinking about the future
-
Never announce yourself
And never explain yourself.
Love, R. ♡
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Fast automobile
Get yourself the Porsche. Past 257km/h, you won’t be hearing your husband whine.
Love, R. ♡
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Dream big
There is nothing wrong with Nissan. Except you don’t dream about it.
Love, R. ♡
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University
The intrinsic value of university is less important than what it signals about you.
Love, R. ♡
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The biggest TV channel
10 years ago, YouTube became the biggest TV channel, and no one noticed. Think backwards. Reverse engineer. What does the world need in 5 years?
Love, R. ♡
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Great ideas
If you can’t take a risk at your idea, then it’s not a great idea. Great ideas come not from creativity, but conviction.
Love, R. ♡
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Play the long game
Don’t be like a circus roadie. Play the long game.
Love, R. ♡
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The power of your writing
The power of your writing is not inversely proportional to its scope.
Love, R. ♡
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Become the writer you never thought you were
It is far more exciting to become the writer you never thought you were than to become the writer you always thought you’d become.
Love, R. ♡
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You are the person you tell yourself you are
If you set yourself out to run 20 km, and you get a cramp at the 12th, you must limp the last 8. If you set to write 20 pages and your right hand fails you at the 8th, become ambidextrous for the remaining 12.
You are the person you tell yourself you are. To the world, you must be who you say you are.
Love, R. ♡
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1746 weeks
That was the length of Jesus’ life. It took 3 nails to end it.
In comparison, 50 Cent survived 9 bullets.
One is a miracle worker, and it sure ain’t you Jesus.
Love, R. ♡
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What is greater than a king?
A hero who knows the boundary of no kingdom. Unless a king is a hero to his people, he has no business being a king.
Love, R. ♡
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May the rules of writing shape you, and may you break out of them
An artist breaks the rules that they sought to respect—an inevitable part of the trade. They must let the rule enter them to break out of it. How do you break out of a rule that hasn’t sought control over you?
It is the same with writing. You have to parley. You cannot shape literature if literature hasn’t shaped you first.
Love, R. ♡
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The sheltering sky
Because we don’t know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can’t even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, or five times more? Perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all seems limitless…
-
Turn off your phone today
You’ll realise it’s still 1997 outside.
Love, R. ♡
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In the realm of all hypothetical possibilities,
I would have loved to live forever.
Love, R. ♡
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Be a kid
There are aspects of my personality and character that I made sure remained childish. A conscious choice.
Kids stand on a slope and slide. Adults look at their skis, frozen in overthinking. Kids are curious. Not afraid to ask. A lot of problems can be solved by the grace of asking a simple first question.
When was the last time you questioned life around you like a kid?
Love, R. ♡
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People are not afraid of falling off a cliff
People are not afraid of falling off a cliff. They worry about jumping. Give yourself something “more” to do.
Love, R. ♡
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Your 20-year-old self
What would you tell your 20-year-old self that would have helped you live a better life, and that would have spared you so much pain?
Love, R. ♡
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Others’ happiness
You don’t get to call the happiness of others. Others’ happiness is not your responsibility.
Love, R. ♡
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Use language inventively
Encourage yourself to be creative. Be exuberant. Unconventional. Include puns. Entertain with wordplay. Create words. It makes your writings more memorable.
Love, R. ♡
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Make it easy for what’s yours to find you
What’s yours inevitably finds its way to you. No matter how much you try to run from it; no matter how much it seems to be out of reach, impossible, unfathomable.
Stay true to yourself. Be fully expressed. Follow your intuition. In other terms, make it easy for it to find you.
Love, R. ♡
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I love Brian Cox
He’s got the rare talent of explaining rather complex concepts in easy words. Unlike the Bible.
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AI and consciousness
Do we need memory to consciously experience happiness? Is free will a sensoral illusion?
Are LLMs truly conscious or are we projecting our consciousness onto them?
Love, R. ♡
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Writing and film
There can never be enough footage.
You can’t erase from a blank page.
Love, R. ♡
-
It’s not the whiskey
it’s the label.
-
Great ideas
…never start with an adjective.
Love, R. ♡
-
Enjoy yourself
It’s already too late before you’ve realised.
Love, R. ♡
-
Understand the value of someone’s curiosity and never diminish it
Don’t be a prick.
Love, R. ♡
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Monsters are friendly
I am a fan of science fiction and storytelling.
I love how it pushes me to have an introspection of myself.
It pushes me to ponder if I am missing a dimension on how I might behave on the edges myself.
Monsters grow with us. Kids have their own. Adults, too.
We see SCI-FI monsters doing superhuman feats scaled up to size. We imagine that if they’re bigger than we are, then they are more amazing and powerful.
Physics prevent that. A flee can jump over us. In our size, it falls to its death on the floor. It won’t jump over the Empire State Building—just saying.
That doesn’t make monsters less cool!
Monsters are friendly until placed in an antagonic environment.
We isolate because we are afraid of what we have created. Because what we created survived and adapted.
To be lost and to be found, that is the lifespan of love. You may be my creator, but on this day forward, I will be your master. Here we are. Spent and done. No more to give or take. I will bleed. Ache. Suffer. You see, it will never end. While you are alive, what choice do you have but live? Rest now, Father. Perhaps now, we can both be human.
What makes a monster? What makes a human?
The brilliance of Scooby Doo is that it showed the real monsters are humans.
Logging in to YouTube to a suggested episode of Charles Liu x Neil deGrasse Tyson on StarTalk is a major green flag for the YouTube algorithm.
Love, R. ♡
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170,000
Joanie LeMercier wrote:
170,000 years: this is the average time it takes for a photon to escape the core of the sun and reach its surface. Outside the Sun, the photons will then travel the 149.6 million km distance to the Earth in under 8 minutes.
The light that warms and illuminates the world today was created 170,000 years ago in a nuclear fusion reaction, deep in the heart of the Sun.
I say:
If the past is manifesting physically in the present moment, is there anything called time? What incidence does it have on how you are planning your future?
Love, R. ♡
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Pick what you are enamoured with
Happiness finds its way, so naturally, so un-forcibly, into the palm of your hand.
Love, R. ♡
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Safe writers are miserable writers
Safe writers write booklets, pamphlets, and all sorts of boring things.
Don’t be safe. Safe is not for writers. Not for anyone who is serious about their endeavours.
Safe writers are miserable writers. The muse doesn’t visit, because she doesn’t care for your pitiful safety.
They people please the client then go home, sit like empty potatoes and drink cheap burbon because they think this is what a writer should look like.
Not you.
Write. Write until you no longer care for your crappy job that is leading you nowhere; until writing becomes what you do.
Drink coffee at 10 p.m. Wake up at midnight. Write until the break of dawn.
Write short stories; write poems; write scripts; write novels; write plays.
Get them out. Get it all out to anyone who will read them. Get it all out even if no one ever reads them.
Write so prolifically that you don’t bother reading the rejection notice.
Write. Write. Write.
Real writers spend their time refining their writing.
They don’t care about safety. They throw themselves at sea.
They crave danger, the unknown, the wicked tide.
So, if safety is what you want, don’t write.
Love, R. ♡
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Things that are not alive fascinate us because we are alive
For instance, we don’t know what happens after death.
In Angel and demons, they tried using X-Rays to see if something leaves the body after we die.
In The Walking Dead, you have to be not so dead that your organs could not be harvestable.
Carl Sagan’s The Demon Haunted World is a parabol, a moral lesson, a philosophical lesson, about the context we live in.
If we are destined to become a zombie anyway, why stay human?
Love, R. ♡
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Love is a practice
Love, is not nearly an emotion, a fleeting feeling, a whim. It’s a day-to-day exercise that carries with it consciousness, awareness and a great deal of efforts to step over our pride, our ego, but also over our sorrow, pain and disappointment. It is a remarkable witness to what deeply motivates us and moves of forward, what stirs us, and what is going on inside of us, where no one else goes. It molds the tremendous force that binds us despite our divergences, despite the gruesome past we share and the hurt we endured. It is a discipline that brings up to the surface the best of what we are, the good in who are.
Love is a practice.
Love, R. ♡
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Getting paid for your creativity is a real flex
Finishing the race is worth it.
Love, R. ♡
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Take yourself seriously
Prioritise your writing.
Reserve time for reflection.
Resist comparing yourself to others
Tolerate uneven quality.
Take pride in having written.
Love, R. ♡
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Find your purpose in writing
The purpose of your story, of what your write, of why the story you want to tell sticking in your mind, on your heart.
The answer brings such a layer of rich meaning to your writing process, it’s almost unbelievable.
This is how you tell your story effectively.
You won’t know before you go out and actually do some of the writing, sit in the story for a while, and soak in its themes.
It is worthwhile to reflect on:
The impact telling your story could have on the world and the people around you, and if that impact is going to be a force for good in the world; if you are certain about it; if you subscribe to its purpose; if you recognise yourself in it; if you have a deep sense of connection to it.
Do not fear the eye-opening path.
Venture in it.
Sometimes—and oftentimes—we learn through trial and error.
Go seeking.
Chase that answer.
Try to wrap your head around it.
Love, R. ♡
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If you are not embarrassed by the first draft, you haven’t written well
Well, Reid Hoffman did mention this in a different version about launching products too late. Don’t wait for your product to be flawless before you launch.
I’d apply this with caution. Not to writing, though.
If your first version looks too polished, you’ve probably spent too much time perfecting it instead of putting your thoughts out there.
Think less. Write more.
Love, R. ♡
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The simplest things and the most profound results
5:21 am.
I sit face to face with my notebook, occupied by what I love more than anything in the world. Writing.
I have rarely come upon a word that fully describes what I feel when I write. It’s like a bite of Turkish delight.
I trust my instinct. I write with integrity.
I write about all and nothing. I just jot it down.
I knew from an early age I was a good writer because I didn’t mind fixing what I wrote. I understood it was all in the “post-”. There is no such thing as too much written; only removal. A good writer puts it all down and skims the unnecessary.
We all want to go beyond what we can achieve. We all picture ourselves in big moments, our ego off the roof, reaching for that prize. Most probably why we never end up grabbing it.
The simplest things, done consistently, yield the most profound results.
My mornings are a thrill because I know I am going to write. The night before, I fix all the small details: tidy, de-clutter, rest my notebooks and their respective pens on the table, plug my low light, wipe my glasses clean, place the rakwe on the gas burner. At 5:21, I am already writing.
To be good at something, to enjoy it fully, you have to live for the boring tasks.
No fast results. No speed. No despair whenever it dawns on you that it takes time to achieve.
To hit that fucking mark. To look behind and recognise you’ve done it.
Have the guts to go above and beyond.
Put those running shoes next to the door. Put that pen on the table. Write in your head before inking it on paper.
Be out in the open.
Commit.
Love, R. ♡
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The power of persuasion
Priming in copywriting sets the stage for a message by subtly influencing readers beforehand. Framing in copywriting shapes how information is presented to influence your perceptions and decisions.
For instance, research showed that framing an option as a loss is more persuasive than framing it as an equal gain.
Our decisions are consciously or subconsciously influenced by the perceptions, opinions, and actions around us.
Learn how to use subtle priming and framing techniques to shape your choices every day.
Love, R. ♡
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Copywriting
is one industry where (nearly) everybody says the (almost) same thing—like a cassette on repeat.
Love, R. ♡
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Boarding
There is poetry in leaving Riyadh with one more thing to do—the magical thing you are going to postpone until next time. One more hasāwi cookie from Wacafe; one more peek at the galleries in Jax; one last stroll around Bujairi, one last mouthful of marqoq carried in the palm of the hand into the mouth.
There is a lot of poetry in one-more’s. In postponing.
There is also hope. That we will come back. That the story doesn’t end here. That bits and pieces collected here and there are hints of an encore. People we met; open-ended conversations; lands to explore; smiles to throw at one another from one end of the room to the other.
Uncertainty inspires the most unexpected yet surest results. It is when you don’t know what you’re up to that possibilities open up.
Creativity is that which makes the possible probable.
On repeat, it is, oddly, a satisfying loop.
Love, R. ♡
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People who stick with one idea
have never been on an adventure.
Love, R. ♡
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Back when tigers and dragons used to smoke
is a reminder that every culture has its own doorway into storytelling, and mine begins with a tiger and a dragon puffing on a pipe.
Love, R. ♡
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Sunday
Afternoons with the family wrapped in a heavenly apple pie.
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Kiss the world a grand goodbye
One of the most fascinating truths we know about the entire universe is that the stars die, the galaxies die, the planets die.
People die, too.
In the humdrum of life, we forget to live. We focus on the pain and forget that it fades. We live at war and we fight battles that are not our own.
Then, one day, we go on inspiring such love in us that we are never able to express it properly…
…and kiss the world a grand goodbye.
Love, R. ♡
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To be a good writer is an express act of freedom
A good writer is not afraid to be honest, all-cards-on-deck, brutal. This might, actually, have a lethargic therapeutic effect, which puts into discomfort the reader who needs to face-to-face their very own self.
A good writer is not afraid of being accountable to anyone about anything—that is, should this conversation present itself in the first place. They do not justify, they do not explain, or get into rabbit holes of swirling excuses. They are debauched when it comes to the text. They are not afraid to offend.
To be a good writer is an express act of freedom.
Love, R. ♡
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Je crois que nous partons tous
Je crois que nous partons tous. Nous finissons tous par nous en aller, loin, loin de cette terre. C’est juste une question de qui s’en ira avant. C’est toujours une course pour s’assurer que ceux qu’on aime restent plus que nous, persistent plus que nous, perdurent plus que nous. Jusqu’à même défier la logique : nous souhaitons que nos parents vivent aussi longtemps que nous, à nos côtés, ici. Que papa fasse le café, raconte des histoires ; que maman nous roule une tartine, nous prépare à manger. Et nous oublions que nous sommes dans le temps – il nous est impossible de le figer, bien que nous nous bornions à lui donner une multitude de noms : des secondes, des heures, des mois interminables. Nous oublions, que le temps est en marche et nous emmène avec lui : il nous emporte sans le moindre répit. Et quand le temps vient nous les réclamer, nous vivons dans un compte à rebours vers le passé, dans une atemporalité éternelle, à jamais dans l’entre-deux. Au meilleur, nous nous en allons vers eux, ceux que nous aimons ; nous courons hâtivement à leur destinée ; nous sommes dans l’impatience de ces retrouvailles, là où les champs de blé sont toujours couleur d’or, là où le ciel est toujours bleu. Nous nous étalerons alors sur le même sol qu’ont béni ceux qui nous y avaient déjà précédés, là où la voûte céleste est éternellement obscure que l’on entend l’univers nous parler et ses histoires infinies nous chuchoter, pour joindre nos voix à ceux qui ont longtemps quitté ce monde – là où étoiles ne cessent de briller.
Amour, R. ♡
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Respect your own ideas
Nurture them.
Don’t dilute them by overusing or monetising them too early.
Creativity is sometimes about risking who you are to discover who you might become.
Love, R. ♡
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Switch to the left brain
Routine is the end of everything.
In your lifetime you will have one idea, if you’re a genius, two. The idea you are afraid of is the thing you must pursue.
Pursuing the unknown and coming face to face with your fears is the one thing that you should do to break the routine.
Marina Abramović talks about creative mastery.
Mastery can lead to stagnation.
Comfort becomes a trap.
Once your process becomes automatic, you’re no longer exploring.
You’re just repeating.
Routine kills creativity.
When you’re too good at something, it can become lifeless.
If your right brain has become too good at something, switch to the left brain.
Love, R. ♡
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Accept social injury
Every time you decide not to risk whatever it is you think could happen, you abandon yourself.
Is there any greater risk than that?
Perfectionists in particular have such a hard time accepting the unavoidability of risk because of how riddled with imperfections the process is.
Risk requires you to accept failure as a possibility, where perfectionnism requires you to do everything in your power to remove all and any possibility of failure.
There is great comfort in taking a “leap of risk”. Everything you ever wanted could be on the other side of risk, waiting for you to cross and get it.
It is also quite liberating. Those who risk being laughed at have no fear, no place for peer pressure.
Risk requires you to take yourself seriously.
There’s a harsh truth here: No matter how hard you try, no matter what you do, or to which extent you protect yourself and your experiences to be as safe as it can be, you will be faced with risk whether you like it or not.
So, if risk is unavoidable and also makes the goal worth striving for, then at a certain point, you’re going to have to just risk it. Risk looking like a fool; risk being dead wrong; risk failing; risk the fucking inconvenience; risk the worst-case scenario.
Ultimately, you won’t have any other option.
Accept social injury.
Love, R. ♡
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You’re mortal
Stop postponing things that matter. Prioritise. There isn’t enough time.
Love, R. ♡
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You are bigger than what you have
A pen is just a pen, until Murakami writes with it. Until Miyazaki draws with it.
A space is just a space until Marina Abramović stands in it.
A camera is just a camera until Christopher Nolan stands behind it.
Anything is any thing until someone with “this” unique talent uses it.
Understand you are always bigger than what you have.
Love, R. ♡
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Be old-fashioned
Crave real interactions.
Write on a peace of paper.
Write with your pencil.
Write with your fountain pen.
Write. Scratch. Erase.
Tear the paper.
Do it all over again.
AI is costing the planet
more than all printing ever would have.
So go old school.
Sit in a real space.
Talk to real people.
Engage in real conversations.
Write about them.
Ponder. Wonder and wander.
Be nostalgic.
Have a vision.
Love, R. ♡
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The most beautiful word in the world
Ever heard of “eingengrau”?
It’s a visual phenomenon created by our eyes and brains when we close our eyes. It it literally born from perception; an illusion created by our eyes in total darkness. So, it isn’t real, and it isn’t found in any palette. A rough translation would be “intrinsic grey”. It’s unique to every person. It isn’t repeated. Which makes it very personal. It’s the intimate moment when you close your eyes and see the static.
Eigengrau tell us that even in absolute darkness, we see something.
I’ve told you about it, because I keep asking myself: What’s the most beautiful word in the world? It’s probably one that hasn’t been created. It’s most probably one that you will create. One that reflects your imagination, inner strength. It is exclusively made for you.
And if you haven’t thought of it yet, it is waiting for you; so why don’t you think it through?
Love, R. ♡
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Before seeking advice from others,
ask yourself:
How much time have I taken to sit with how I feel? Is my truth or part of it in that endeavour? Am I taking the advice of a person that has been in this situation? Am I seeking clearance or validation?
Sit in a quiet space. Hear yourself. Converse with yourself.
Asking others about our art and life is subconsiously projecting their desires, limitations and aspirations onto ours.
Advice is not a replacement for your self-trust.
Your true power is connected to the potency of your intuition.
Love, R. ♡
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Be the best version of you
Disciplined. Confident. Unshakable. Passionate. Ambitious. Determined. Creative. Steadfast. Persistent. Tenacious. Brave. Bold. Curious. Daring. Open. Inspired. Motivated. Dedicated. Driven. Grateful. Adventurous. Fearless. Intuitive. Resilient. Optimistic. Focused. Committed. Powerful. Innovative. Visionary. Resourceful. Unyielding. Fearless. Enthusiastic. Dynamic. Courageous. Persistent. Proactive. Unwavering. Unstoppable. Fierce. Strategic. Unrelenting. Empowered. Fierce. Driven. Relentless. Uncompromising. Unbreakable. Bold-hearted. Resolute. Passion-fueled. Grounded. Purposeful. Agile. Trailblazing. Independent. Spirited. Strong-willed. Focused. Vision-driven. Unfaltering. Fiercely determined. Vibrant. Unconventional. Unyielding. Invincible. Empowering. Motivating. Unstoppable.
Be yourself.
Love, R. ♡
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Love what you do / Do what you love
The thing is the point.
Do not maximise the things that make life worthwhile. Experience them.
Do not input your ideas into GenAI under the pretext it saves a lot of time and creates stories for you. Instead compare the enjoyment of writing to reading books.
People who enjoy reading books don’t read a summary. They take their time to read the whole thing.
Same thing when you write. Let the ideas evolve and enjoy the journey of bringing them together.
This takes time.
The so-called ‘geniuses’ of tech don’t write / don’t read / don’t edit. They’re lazy.
You can’t offload a skill. You can’t offload thinking.
People with real skills will rise again.
Love, R. ♡
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You’re complicit
Writing isn’t a passive nor a neutral act. Every collaboration either challenges or reinforces the dominant narratives. Every click, every recommendation participates in a system of visibility.
Language is not neutral. It carries ideologies, assumptions, and histories. Anthropologies.
Resist cultural biases. Challenge the default perspective. Shape how you think. Frame your meaning-making. Watch which narrative structure you are adopting.
Question the metaphors you use. Question the assumptions about human nature, morality, or truth, that are baked into the text you read and write.
It’s all part of the attention economy.
Be conscious. Prioritise substance over virality.
Read to understand. Write for reflection.
Love, R. ♡
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Give your writing a face
Great copy uncovers the part of you the market can’t ignore. This is your unfiltered positioning.
You got three faces. Every human on this earth does.
The first: The one you show to the world, how you want to be read. The second: The one your family—and probably good friends—know. The third: Who you really are.
The “third face” is your brand essence.
Your writing has a face, too. It’s your writing fingerprint, its “personality”.
How would you write if you knew that no one will ever read? Who are you, when no one is reading? What is your mystery?
No one is happy with who they aren’t becoming. Sport the face you are so afraid to show the world. This is the “true you”.
What is the cost of becoming your fully expressed self?
What would you be willing to pay for it?
Love, R. ♡
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Do not produce writing
Be present in it.
Do not write for the sake of it. Do not stack word upon word. Instead, make your every letter count.
Keep it simple. Simplicity wins hearts over.
Overcomplicating things is a by-product of extremely bad writing; and, ending up with nothing is a by-product of overcomplication. I like to call that exponential decay.
Don’t use presumptuous words. You can have the best product or service in the world. But if your ad sounds like a transaction, you won’t sell any of it. You will end up with nothing.
Write clearly, genuinely. Write with emotion. Write with your reader in mind. Write to communicate well. Write to maker the digital space a better place.
Love, R. ♡
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If you write to please the client…
…you are not writing the best ad.
The single one mistake a copywriter does is to write for themselves and forget the audience.
Push these out of your mind: brand awareness, like, reacts, shares, comments, engagement.
It’s called copywriting for a purpose. And that purpose is to sell. The only way to gauge if your copy is good, is to weigh it against the results. The results being more sales, more incoming calls, more inbound emails.
Forget about the vain metrics. Your most-paying clients probably won’t like your posts anyway. Challenge the status quo.
Love, R. ♡
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Be a goddamn good writer
Become a voracious reader.
Write what you want to read. Read what you want to write. Observe people.
Practice. Every. Single. Day.
Always carry a notebook with you. A pocket notebook.
Think critically. Get your first draft out then edit it. Figure out what you don’t know.
Don’t compare your work with someone else’s. Start with short pieces. Write for fun and for passion. Stay confident beyond reality.
Write with feeling.
Break apart the sentences you can’t write. Find all the ways you can write them. Figure out which one works for you and stick to it. This is your writing style.
Be consistent. Write at least for one hour a day.
Gauge your emotions.
Do not be ashamed of how your imagination works. Understand you are more than your writing.
Love, R. ♡
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Be a fucking storyteller
Success in all things creative flows as a consequence of a good story. No amount of abstract theory can get you anywhere near where a good story will. There is no triumph, conquest, prosperity, without a good story.
Vision alone is not enough; it must be narrated, lived, and publicized.
Please, don’t fucking be lame. Tell something extraordinary; something people discover with eagerness.
Think of fairytales. What’s yours? What’s your dream?
Have a writing style that mirrors your personality. Make it seen, manifest.
Be proud of your story; tell it with no shame.
Love, R. ♡
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Be resilient in writing
Be resilient in writing.
Start with an act of rebellion. Take on a challenge to alter the bridges that were once carved in stone.
Drive against the idea that “more means good”. Be enough; in the moment. Drive into a the void and fully expect a the light to shine because that is how much you trust the process.
Write when no one is willing to read, and pursue your craft until someone is willing to read.
Regardless of opinions. Be self-expressed against a world that is becoming void of expression.
Curate your words, be concise, straight-to-the-point—and sometimes, don’t be any of that at all.
Treat the pen as an extension of you—and thus, be entirely you.
Love, R. ♡
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AI is not taking your place
Neither someone who uses AI is. I know you’ll come at me for this, but hear me out.
AI will highlight the effort required to write/produce good content. So, be fucking good at your skill, at setting yourself apart from your competition. Have a signature style.
Most importantly, do not input it into AI—lest you want it to copy you.
And so long there will be madly passionate people about their craft, so long the human touch will persist.
For me, not writing is the most exhausting thing that could ever happen to me. I can’t fathom passing this down to a machine. I can’t fathom working with people who prefer an algorithm over a human being.
And so, just as there are machine “skills” on the rise, rightly do I believe real human skills will be on the rise, as well.
People who believe in their dreams will call on real people who believe in them, too.
Love, R. ♡
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Stay delusional
Lock the noise of the world away. You’re only delusional to the world when you haven’t made it… yet.
Do not be reasonable. Do not adapt. Reason only gets you to accomplish this [] much.
Be crazy. Change your fucking world—maybe you’ll have the chance to get out of it into a divergent kind of light.
Play a different game. Set different rules. With a little bit of discipline? Cross the border from the delusional into a fucking dream come true. A present state of being.
The human experience? A delusion. It’s your perception and beliefs that create your reality. Grasp the Universe with a little bit of madness. No human is every happy without some kind of it.
It’s all a dream within a dream.
Love, R. ♡
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Write with intention
All non-intentional endeavors of any kind should be placed under the short leg of your couch. Write with intention. Write as if you’re headed into a sure direction. Write with a goal in mind. Be obsessed about that goal. Be obsessed about the process. Be obsessed about your finality. All things are possible; but, not all things all beneficial. Intention will set them apart and you must choose the latter—absolutely. Be intentional with your thoughts, and your words and expressions will mirror those. Be selective, and be intentional.
Love, R. ♡
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Do not fear rejection
Ernest said, “Go all the way with it. Do not back off. For once, go all the goddamn way with what matters.”I love Ernest. Write yourself alive regardless of what people think.
Reinvent yourself.
Write for fields you are not qualified for. Write without worrying about the outcome.
Worst case scenario. You get a No.
Best case scenario. You get things that you couldn’t possibly, remotely imagine getting.
Bet on the winning 50%. Even rejection is a win when you consider it this way.
Spill the water. Do badly and do not care. Mess up while you’re true to yourself.
Love, R. ♡
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Write for the muse
Think of the person you have a tender affection for, and write for them. Write exclusively for this person.
Write for the one who makes you feel at peace when you are around them. Who makes you feel at ease. With whom you are least resistant. Among whom you don’t calculate your words. Among whom your ideas come naturally and your words flow instinctively.
Be true to your feeling around them and let your words be an extension of that emotion. All expression must flow from them. And if you can’t find a muse, be your own muse. Write for yourself.
And if you can’t write for yourself, get someone to write your dreams with you. With you ≠ for you. Someone is fond of you. Someone who translates it to all you do. With great devotion.
Love, R. ♡
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Write yourself a fairytale
Write yourself a fairytale. Be the hero of your own story.You don’t like the language? Create your own. Lift the curtains and do not put them down until you’ve fulfilled your destiny. Play that act. Make it grand.
I still can’t understand how people choose to be little when the stars are within our reach. You just got to stretch your hand. So stretch your fucking hand and grab some stars.
That carriage doesn’t have to turn back into a pumpkin at midnight. That horse doesn’t have to be white. Ride your dragons.
Do not ask for permission. Make it fun. Play.
Love, R. ♡
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Have some guts
Have you ever thought why some things work for some people, while for others, they don’t? It’s got less to do with the idea itself and a lot to do with having a shitload of courage. So, have some fucking guts.
Commit to your work. Find the things that exceptionally, positively, interest you, and the things that deeply, intensely, profoundly move you. Find interesting ways of putting them out into the world.
Fight yourself against the routine. Fight yourself against the noise of this world and against monotonous variations. Do not be repetitive.
You got one life to live. You can do it right. You can create massive impact. You got the power to do it.
Love, R. ♡
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Askholes
I learned some people are askers.
Ask about everything. Take everything.
No shame.
I call them askholes.
Love, R. ♡
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Death, quantum physics, and the absurdity of life
I have always been fascinated by time; always been amazed that each time we lift our heads up to the sky, we gaze into the past. A long-time past of fiery chariots that leave trails of stars behind them.
We all will, one day, leave for somewhere far, far away. Beyond this earth. Away from this material world. It is simply a matter of who leaves first.
When my granddad passed, I started wondering what became of his consciousness. It was the first time in my life that I lost someone so close; the first time I sat face to face with death. Mind you, death is a topic that lives rent free in my head. Should I count all the texts I have written, more than 70% talk about it. I know the exact figure because I counted my texts and did the math.
When granddad passed, I became aware that it was only a matter of time before grandma leaves too, then mom, then me. It ends with me.
A while ago, I asked dad, “What do you think of death?”
“I don’t.” He paused. “You don’t think about it until it’s here. It is just like growing up. You don’t know you are aging until you have.”
Grief comes uninvited, unexpected. When grief visited me after pops passed, I was lying in bed. His face appeared in my mind. A tear streamed down my face. I sat straight. I wanted to look grief in the eye. It was only then that I cried.
One of the many reasons why I fancy quantum physics theories is that they offer the most plausible explanation of what happens to us after we die.
Maybe—maybe—in the quantum realms of endless possibilities, my granddad never died. He is running in fields of gold.
You must understand that I was born and raised a Christian. The afterlife dogma sounds illogical to me. The resurrection on earth, too. Not that one is better than the other. That and, [G]od’s supposedly perfect and ingenious mind couldn’t come up with a better solution to our mortality but to hang himself/his son—depending on the denominational trip—on a cross.
I put [G]od on the bench to ponder on other solutions. Ones that don’t involve guilt-tripping and gaslighting.
Now in quantum theory, if you take a piece of paper and burn it, it vaporises into thin air. Only in theory, you could assemble the ashes and constitute the same paper again. I love Brian Cox. I love him more than I love [G]od. He’s got the rare talent of explaining rather complex concepts in easy words. Unlike the Bible.
Time never becomes our friend. Endless, marching forward, carrying us along. With no respite. The same time that binds us, liberates us. It is just a matter of time.
When time claims our loved ones, we run a different kind of race. We try to dissociate, imprisoned in-between what was and what is. At best, we end up crossing over to meet those we love; hastily running towards the same destiny, ragingly impatient to reunite with them. We lay in the same ground that has blessed those who have already left.
But then, where do we cross over to? The nothingness of time.
It is all absurd. What happens to all the stories we tell? The loves we experience? The emotions that bind us? Does it all go away?
That’s it? We disappear into oblivion like an evanescent pillar of smoke.
Niel deGrasse and Brian Cox are becoming my best friends.
The vault of heaven is eternally dark; the universe whispers infinite stories to our ears; the stars never cease to shine.
I wish I could live forever—but I won’t. Will someone remember I ever existed?
Eat with your shiniest silverware. Sing and ode to the absurdity of life. Fields of wheat aren’t forever the color of gold; the sky isn’t always blue.
Love, R. ♡
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Who’s your ideal reader?
Mine is somebody who wants me to keep them up reading after midnight.
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Game recognizes game
Loud pays loud.
Silent pays peanuts.
Your choice, darling.
Love, R. ♡
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An express act of freedom
A good writer is not afraid to be honest, all-cards-on-deck, brutal. This might, actually, have a lethargic therapeutic effect, which puts in discomfort the reader who needs to face-to-face their own self.
A good writer is not afraid of being held accountable to anyone about anything—that is, should this conversation present itself in the first place. They do not justify, they do not explain, or get into rabbit holes of swirling excuses. They are debauched when it comes to the text. They are not afraid to offend.
To be a good writer is an express act of freedom.
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Sometimes a banana is just a banana
When we win, it’s skill. When we lose, it’s luck, or the weather. We’re angry. We blame our luck on everyone: parents, clients, partners—except us. Sometimes, it is about forgiveness. Are you forgiving yourself enough? It is easy to blame others for how we ended up. Self-serving biases are defense mechanisms. It is easier to walk with surrender. You cannot write good on the grounds of grudge. Most of life is luck. Sometimes a banana is just a banana. It’s not your mom, Karen. Get on with your life.
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Bubbles of glass
Bubbles of glass form in the air. The air is so thin I touch it. I grab a piece and it cuts my finger off. Red. Red everywhere. My ceiling is a horizon. The orcas sway. They’re scarlet purple, color of blood. They transform into waves curling up on top of each other. A great white whale swallows me. I lodge myself in its transparent heart. The air is psychedelically dusty. I bathe in its droplets. I find myself again below the horizon spreading out in my room. I dive horizontally and the waters cover me. I am full of scales. I push my body upwards with my fins. The surface is powdery. Finely lines alined one behind the other, and stainless steel spoons. Branches crack the ground. I cut off a piece and plant it in place of my missing finger. I put salt on it. I put salt on it.
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The final act of love to your writing
is that it becomes something you won’t be able to recognise.
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Ditch the first draft!
One key thing to understand about copywriting is that the first draft of any advertisement is rarely impressive. The real craft lies in refining that initial version—editing, rearranging, expanding, or even removing parts until the message resonates.
I often told my students that if everyone in the class were tasked with any kind of writing, their first attempt would likely rank among the weakest. The difference comes in what happens afterward: the revision, the polishing, the careful shaping of words that turns a rough draft into compelling copy.
When you write your first draft, your aim isn’t perfection. It’s to get your ideas, your emotions, and everything you want to communicate about your product or service down on paper. Don’t get caught up in how it reads—just capture the raw content. Once it’s out of your head and onto a page or screen, you have something tangible to refine and improve.
Copywriting is fundamentally a thinking process. It draws on your personal experiences, your expertise, and your capacity to process and organize information in a way that persuades. The final result is the translation of that mental work into written words designed to sell.
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Of morality, belief systems and negotiating with oneself
Religious convictions affect political behaviour and allegiances.
The world might soon come to an end, but jasmins won’t grow as fast, and the grass won’t sprout hastily. It all takes time and it seems the world is in a haste to be over.
People don’t fathom how substantial the manipulation of religion is. It is grandiose. Belief systems are gearwheels. By the time it is impossible to breathe, a person becomes too weak to make their way out.
Plans schemed around a person must be rejected. They don’t allow room for negotiations (and I have taken upon myself to not negotiate with [g]od).
A sort of inner political reform.
Believing in strict, immuable loyalty revolving around one person, one deity, a one-way to govern all, reflects in political choices that deny questioning.
Hopes and fears built around one persona discourage personal challenge.
To think that leaving a system for good causes only loss is a biased, pre-convinced idea humans are conditioned to accept so that they never imagine they could ever leave [insert system here].
To thrive, to reach the height of happiness, a customised belief system is of the utmost importance. Happiness depends in a large percentage on loving what is being endeavoured daily; to be in sync with what one believes in.
A good belief system is, therefore, constructed. Assertion by insistence. A belief system is ownership.
A new belief system, a system one strongly identifies with, and which has been created, consequently implies a modus operandi. A system that requires constant negotiation against oneself is not a good system.
Morality—which humans pride themselves to uphold and possess—becomes questionable. In our imagination, humans create dilemmas that need not exist in the first place. Humans place themselves in dire positions that they can spare themselves from. (Re-read the past two sentences in the first person singular.)
In the Trolley problem, the driver is unable to stop as the break lever is damaged and as a result, can either tilt the trolley to the left or to the right. Either/or causes the death of innocent people who happen to be located on the railway at the time of the event. The difference is that either of trajectories can generate a more/lesser amount of deaths.
Whose life would you spare? Who would you kill?
This is where imagination comes in handy. It questions the reason this scenario exists in this particular form. It also posits the possibility of its non existence.
Hence, logic asks what comes first: morality or ethics. Morality isn’t in the Bible. The thought precedes the text. The thought is within before it is learned to be read and interpreted in the (holy) text.
Negotiate with yourself. Cogitate the ideologies through which you interpret reality.
To alter belief systems is to think outside the box—beyond the box.
It is paradoxical: we are taught to think outside the box, yet as kids, we learn to write within definite squares and lines.
Is it liberating to think without constraints, without a sense of urgency.
Next time you get a notebook, have it with blank pages.
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Of trends and digital lobotomy
The distinct human faculty called “thinking” is being outsourced. Humans are subtly trained to find alternatives for everything; to bathe in complacency?
It’s the era of trends. Of laziness. Of decrease in critical thinking. A lazy cognition. A silent reset. We are here. We respond; but, something is off. Humanity is losing depth. Dulled. Personalities are being erased. Intelligence is handed over. Unprepared. Atrophied. Lobotomised.
What will humanity regret, 30 years from now? Some decisions are better than others.
Thinking mustn’t be offloaded.
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Don’t think!
Overthinkers rarely ever get things done. Rarely ever are they present in the writing process.
Academia is quite dangerous to writers. Too much intellect destroys creativity.
I know so because I used to be an academic. Rules and frameworks are insufferable for imagination.
Creativity is a natural byproduct of feeling.
Stay with your own basic truth: Find out who you really are, who you want to be, and what you want to become.
You must write to uncover your thought—not the other way around.
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People don’t want you to hope
It matters that you write or talk in ways that inspire confidence.
People use words like, “Hope, between, should…”, and are surprised things fall apart. These words are weak. Not because they are inherently so; but, because, in a negotiation context where cards are being critically delt, they do not deliver.
People don’t want you to hope. They want you to go to war for them. There’s a simple truth to that: People don’t want passive optimism. They crave action.
You start winning when your words signal to the listener that you are capable of generating results, not betting on the odds to make it happen.
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What you notice but no one else sees
The act of writing is an endeavor to venture into a mysterious realm. Writing is your portal to an unseen world.
In terms of priority, inspiration comes first; you come second; the reader comes last.
Good habits create good writing. Your goal is to live your life in the service of writing should it be your lifelong goal to be a writer.
Zoom in and obsess. Zoom out and observe. You get to choose.
Your unusual north star: Look for what you notice but no one else sees.
Can it go deeper?
My equation is: get a pen, sharpen it; get any piece of paper; make sure you do not erase. Scratch your thoughts. Set distance between you and your ideas.
When you scratch, you assess objectively. When you erase, you create recurrent pathways for undesirable results.
You can write your story on your own. You can speak to an entire generation. You can outrage people.
You can bake the cake. And eat it too.
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Make it home
Turn the music on, the TV on, fill it with all the life you can. Just make sure your loneliness doesn’t get to you.
You are the winner in this fight. You cannot have it any other way.
Always be ready. Always be on your feet.
Life is too precious to let it go by; time, too precious to waste.
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Flour, water, salt, and olive oil
From the archives. 2015.
The man took flour, mixed it with water, salt and olive oil, and started confectioning dough. A few minutes later, he was knitting the dough, rolling it on the marble slab of his counter top. He then proceeded to cut pieces out of the mixture, flatten and roll them.A memory that I share with this man was of him in his small house, baking a mankoushe for me. We used to read the Bible together with his wife, sometimes my parents and my best friend present. He was her uncle. He died about a week ago. I didn’t pick up the phone. I didn’t call.
One of the strongest emotions for a human being to show is forgiveness. One of the hardest things I ever had to do is to forgive myself. I was brought up with the firm conviction that I shouldn’t go soft on myself. My friend couldn’t confess she wasn’t feeling as bad as her family. She felt guilty and, to erase her guilt, told me that before death, we all are equal, and feelings of resentment or anger are to be shut and repressed.
Growing up, we were instilled the ideals of forgiving one another, and feeling compassion for one another—ideals that are noble by all means. What we weren’t taught, is that feelings of resentment and anger are legitimate; that forgiveness goes through these before it takes its course.
To be able to forgive, is to go beyond your feelings of anger, to be aware of them, to acknowledge them, and to let go.
Through our 20-year long friendship, my friend expressed countless times how she felt about her uncle. He was a Jehovah’s Witness overseer, which ranks right above a regular congregation elder in the organisation’s hierarchy. Numerous times, he had the chance to make right by my friend, but chose not to. It was a conscious, aware choice, even in matters that encompassed daily routines, and extended to relationship matters and child abuse. Although she felt helpless and treated unfairly, she had a counter reaction at the time of his death.
Guilt is at the core of our doctrines, even if it isn’t explicitly showcased or highlighted. It is expressed in a passive-aggressive manner.
I remember a woman who was abused by her husband and hid it for long years, to preserve her reputation and, by extension, the Jehovah’s Witnesses organisation’s reputation. She shut down her feelings because she wouldn’t have been able to cope with the guilt she would’ve felt if she spoke out.
I thought of myself. I thought if I were a bad person because I wasn’t moved by this man’s death.
The god of the Old Testament expressed his anger on countless occasions. The laws of the Old Testament warned against the wrath of Yahwe should the Israelites disobey him. Yet, this anger was justified because it is expressed by [G]od. Ironically, the Bible itself says that we are created according to the image of this [god]. Why is our expressing anger denied?
My friend was unable to express her anger because she felt guilty—a guilt that was too much to bear had she naturally let her rawest feelings flow.
I, on the other hand, had a divergent point of view. My friends’ uncle had the chance to do my family right in legal and financial matters, yet, for the sake of the Organisation, decided to conceal his opinion and judgment for fear for Jehovah’s name. He had protected another elder who was infringing explicit laws. Yet, in decisive matters, he willingly chose to dismiss us and our cause—which was later vindicated by local tribunals.
Now that he’s dead, I don’t feel the slightest sorrow. Instead, I thought: Another witness of the unfair treatment towards my parents is gone.
I was able to forgive myself and be kind to myself. I didn’t feel guilty about it. Just as this man’s actions were legitimate to him, so were my feelings to me. In times of distress, the first reflex is to do good by others, forsaking how wise it is to do right by ourselves.
When this man died, my friend’s first reflex was to dismiss her feelings.
But, it is okay to mourn, even if that meant expressing feelings of anger, which are not arbitrary, but emanate from disappointment, deep sadness, unresolved matters and lack of closure.
When we go through difficult times, we all desire to act unselfishly, avoiding being unfair towards a person, or acting wrongly. We bury legitimate feelings somewhere deep inside us, and we dismiss them.
If a person is unfair towards me, does it make them look good just because they died? Does the torturer become the victim? Isn’t this a load that has been lifted off of my shoulders? As much as I’d yearn to be empathetic, should empathy stand between me and my right to feel?
Emotions need space to manifest.
I didn’t pick up the phone to call. In my context, it would have implied that I was guilty and that I was giving right to the witnesses. Had I been disfellowshipped, the witnesses would’ve never have called or even expressed sympathy. For them, I would have been a poor woman who got lost on the way.
Forgiving myself meant to let go.
Love, R. ♡
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And what if [god] didn’t exist?
From the archives. 2017.
In 2016, I started my thesis project. One of the most fulfilling experiences I ever went through was my research residency in Montreal.
In Montreal, I spent a lot of time alone. The solitude brought to the surface questions that once troubled me: Am I a good person?
Attending Jehovah’s Witnesses’ meetings for over 25 years, listening to the speaker repeat that we were sinful human beings benefiting from God’s undeserved grace, had led me to think that I did not deserve the good things life had to offer me, and that I did not measure up to the word “good”.
At times, I didn’t ask the question to myself in a direct manner but I noticed, time and again, that my determination to ensure a faultless rendering in every task I started, was very evocative of an aspiration to do good. It was a conclusion that I disavowed because I was extremely convinced that I was not “good”, mainly due the teachings of the Witnesses.
One time, I was brushing my teeth and I thought, “Am I a good person? Am I doing things the right way? Do I have to be part of an organised religious group to be on the right path? And then I asked myself, what is the right way, anyway?”
I came to the conclusion that no matter how hard I tried, it was never enough; I was always falling short. I was aiming at perfection according to standards that weren’t my own anymore. I almost always crossed forbidden lines. We each live in our own conflict zone, and so always cross these same enemy lines. We set up our own weapons against ourselves.
We all have empathy, somewhere inside us. We do not admit it to ourselves because of guilt. We think and become convinced we are not enough. We allow the idea that we are so under-derserving to creep and settle inside us.
Distancing myself from [god] was aggressive. It was mortal. It was a long due mourning. I was literally tearing apart the walls that I built myself, that I lived in, that I fed on, that ended up feeding on me. The [god] I worshipped had no empathy; the easiest way he generated guilt in a person was in constantly reminding them they were “bought” by bloodshed.
Once [god] existed no more, I was free.
The sweet realisation that I broke free came upon me like the dew of the morning that settles on the green grass right before the sun peaks out behind the mountains––like the grass that sprouts from the hardest of soils, that which cracks the thirsty sand to burst life in it in all forms; like the first snow I witnessed from the window pane of my ground-floor apartment in Montreal, that made me forget how black the asphalt on the road was; like the breeze of the wind on a hot summer day, swirling in the palm of my hand as I slipped it out of the car window.
I was hurt, but I hurt no longer.
Writing this text, I am conscious it is all behind me now.
Love, R. ♡
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Why I write
From the archives. 2013.
I am infatuated with writing; with the crisp sound of the roller pen on the rectangular sheet marked with dark bold grey perpendicular lines juxtaposing to form squares; all were shades of grey but the margin—the margin was red, a kind of red that frustrated my obsessive compulsive attention. For the love of contrast, the shift, the opposing tones of colors, I chose black, and, with time, I swore to remain faithful to writing in only black—this kind of writing, not any other, I’m not talking about taking silly notes, but even those—I wrote in black, which is still the case today.
I got an italic handwriting which I made sure time and the fast requirements of short silly academic homework didn’t ruin. It leaned down touching the base of every single square, letters close to the ground of the quadrangle, in an ever-ending yearning to remain, not realistic, but in that other meaning of the word, pragmatic, this kind of handwriting that screamed my longing to belong somewhere, but I simply didn’t belong anywhere; I belonged to no-where. It will take me such years to realise where is my-where, where I felt at home, and I once came to the conclusion, albeit with all suffering and painful disgrace, that: Home is always a person.
I came to be conscious I indeed wasn’t the nomad I thought I was; I wasn’t an endless roamer with no fixed compass; I wasn’t a sailor with no geographical North. I longed for Home, and I yearned for a forever shore. A conclusion that didn’t draw itself out easily, but: the truth itself never follows the obvious path to reveal.
I pondered on happiness, how I let it escape, slip out of my hands one time too many, the times where I had the opportunity of making up my mind, take a step forward, make a decision, the times the ball was on my side of the field—and, I have never excelled at playing any ball, so what field am I playing on, what rules am I playing by, what players am I playing against—what destiny am I trying to change?
I decided to challenge every thing I had learnt and lived by. I decided to go beyond any obligation, to live in the now, the very now, to forget I had a past driving me, a tomorrow that will eventually come—to live in the present moment.
I was rotten. Rotten deep inside. Unwanted. Unprovoked. My existence had no meaning, and I tried several times to draw the finish line, but I have never had the courage to cross it, the courage to chant my last breath out of my dying lungs, to drawn into the oceans of bliss and forgetfulness one eternal time.
It was by that time that writing found its way back into my life. It was my locked summer. I had forgotten the last time I fell in love; even forgotten what was it like to be falling in love.
And I remembered—I remembered how I loved the arcades, the hanging points, how I admired the shapes and forms of letters, an aesthetic that created such confusion when I attempted to resist it.
Pick what you are enamoured by. Happiness finds its way, so naturally, so un-forcibly, into the palm of your hand.
Love, R. ♡
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Happiness
To have a home in my heart, in my mind, right before my eyes, unwavering faith and determination in the power of my dreams.
To have fought. To have ran the distance, to have “brought the kite” home.
To have someone watching over me, always making sure I was okay—I am okay, I am fine, thank you.
To have never given up. To have opened my heart.
To have set sail to the fringes of the Arctic Circle, to have seen the Midnight Sun.
To reaffirm my inner aspirations; to not knowing where I’ll be in a year or two, to not knowing what I am doing, but feeling in and pursuing it still.
To have lived fully and seen the person I have become.
Love, R. ♡
Rhéa, Rhéa. 