🎵 I'm Going to Try Defying Gravity...

But without the music, sets, makeup, costumes—or script

Cataloochie Ranch Panorama #2 ©Gemignani

Sometimes leaps into unknown, unchartered territories are necessary risks that must be taken.

Whenever I’m faced with risking vulnerability, I think of the scene in Indiana Jones and The Last Crusade when Indie stands on the precipice, looking across a vast abyss to the next ledge he must traverse to get the Holy Grail and save his father.

He checks his dad’s journal, whispers the words, “Only the one with faith will pass,” and steps out into nothingness. As we gasp, the invisible bridge becomes visible and he continues on his quest.

Not that I’m comparing my journey to one so noble.

However, having blind faith that support will emerge when I take an untested path is very similar to how I imagine Indie must have felt at the moment he took a step forward, risking everything.

Leaping without an instruction manual

Unlike Indie, I don’t have a little black journal with instructions.

For me, it’s quite the opposite. I receive invisible messages and then write what I receive in a journal.

And when I don’t adhere to the messages I receive, it’s a bit like falling into an abyss. It hasn’t been been fatal, but it’s not fun either.

So there comes a time, like for Elphaba in Wicked, when risking it all is the only way.

Something has changed within me
Something is not the same
I'm through with playing by the rules of someone else's game
Too late for second-guessing
Too late to go back to sleep
It's time to trust my instincts
Close my eyes and leap

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My original Substack title was Shelley Writes… some may say that’s generic, but it was quite specific. It told you exactly what I do.

Was it good SEO? No.

Was it click bait? Hardly.

Did it encourage anyone to explore further? I have no idea, but probably not.

The title did not tell you what I wrote about and, according to engagement experts, that’s a no-no.

I agree that it did hamper discoverability. (When did that become a word, anyway?)

Originally, I wrote about my grief journey after losing the love of my life at the height of pandemic isolation.

As I turned my attention to otherworldly things in my search for meaning after Joe’s death, I was led down a path I had been treading on lightly in a much heavier, more determined way.

Some might say I drank the Kool-Aid, but I know that I connected with an Infinite Source so limitless that there is no “word” to describe it. And I am a Word Person, so if there were a word, I’d know it.

In my effort to share the nature of the insights I was receiving, I changed the name of the publication to Shelley (W)Rites.

And that truly described me and the publication better: A writer with an affinity for ancient, metaphysical, ancestral, esoteric connections to the earth and life.

Now the title furnished some indication as to Who I Am and What I Write.

But it still wasn’t pulling in throngs of readers. So I looked to the experts for answers. (Always a mistake, and I should know better by now.)

As so this publication evolved to Project 🔥 Intuition.

I followed a blueprint for structuring the new iteration of the newsletter. And the revised name does a “better” job of describing the subject of what I write about. Yet I find the rest of the recommended step-by-step formula for success is crushing my creativity.

And this writer can’t be contained in a box, no matter how well built. I just can’t.

What happens is I shut down. Go blank. Start to question everything. Hate everything I write because it’s stilted.

The writing is not insincere, yet it comes out fake, and so not me. The passion is ripped out of the words once I assemble them with an intention to fit a pattern, using a systematic approach to getting readers, likes, comments, and subscribers.

Sigh. Big, heavy sigh.

And then, the BIG aha.

I had gone down a rabbit hole so deep, the word discoverability took on a whole new meaning.

In my efforts to increase my discoverability, I lost myself and purpose to rules and algorithms.

Yeah, the irony.

In my efforts to become discoverable, I got lost. And had to rediscover myself.

The bottom line?

I’m too old to start following the rules of someone else’s game, and I’m not going to do it anymore.

With whatever time I’ve got left, I’m writing what comes through me as it comes.

Here’s My Manifesto:

Forget algorithms

Forget SEO

Forget tags (Something different on Substack than other social media, but I’m done with them all)

I am a writer

A real flesh-and-blood writer

I am NOT AI

I don’t care about lists

I didn’t make any Under 40 lists

Hell, I haven’t made it to any Under 80 lists either (but there’s still time for that…)

Forget that, too.

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There, I’ve said it publicly. I’m going back to writing for real now.

This is me: Shelley Writes in the Raw.

No, I don’t write naked. Eww.

Raw feelings.

Joan Didion was onto to something when she wrote, “I write to find out what I’m thinking.”

I write to discover (the original discover) what’s coming through me.

I’m not arrogant enough to believe it’s anything more than that. The messages are too important to be “my” thoughts alone.

I have observations. They connect to meanings.

Where does that come from? Hell if I know, but the messages feel too real to be impermanent like a human. They come from an Eternal Source that has no name.

Maybe that should be my new publication title:

The Source with No Name

Short Description: Channeled messages from a divine whistleblower.

Yup, that’s it.

Just kidding.

In truth, I have a new title. Or this publication does. It will be revealed shortly. And you’ll be the first to know.

Welcome to a new adventure in reading and writing.