A Small Magical Space for Us

Writing for Creative and Sensitive Beings

From Kantori Ongaku

A warm welcome to new and old readers of Evolving & Enough.

Once upon a time I started a substack newsletter.

Scratch that. A long long time ago, I wanted to write. I wanted to cajole moody words into sitting next to each other and making musical sense. I wanted to show the world - this is me, these are my ornaments and this is my dance, look, this too is a fluorescent and fragrant way to grow and be in the world.

I wrote on social media for a long time. I left my last social media account in March 2019 (an essay for another day), to find a place to write on my own terms. By June 2019, I was sure I will write a newsletter, that it will be on substack, made of long prose, and “it will be like showing notes to a bench partner”, I promised my diary.

In January of 2020 I finally started the newsletter you’re reading right now.

This is long before our favourite writers arrived on substack, before it became for writing what YouTube is for videos. Today, writers have found thousands of readers on the platform, and readers have discovered incredible new writing.

In April 2022, I got this in an email from substack:

Yay! And today, as we move into season 3, Evolving & Enough has 158 subscribers.

100 and 158 are small numbers by many standards. Writers start their newsletters with at least 500 subscribers and then celebrate milestones of 5000 and 10,000. And yet, 158 subscribers over two years is still pretty special to me. I am more satisfied than I should be, perhaps.

The reason why it is special, is who these 158 people are, and where I found them. Where I did not find them, is social media. I don’t know if it is naive to feel proud of the fact that I didn’t promote this newsletter on social media, but I do. I find it oddly cosy.

In fact, I started by sharing this newsletter only with people I was thoroughly inspired by, magical people who I ‘followed’ in real life, instead of chasing an imaginary number of followers. These people were authors, filmmakers, poets, journalists, curators, musicians, dancers, designers, kickass educators, and if love is an art, super-duper lovers of the world. I started E&E by writing to 21 of such people, especially those who had encouraged or inspired me to write, and most importantly, people who had been vulnerable and creative themselves.

Over the last two years, I reconnected with old friends and made new ones and nervously sent them a link to the newsletter. They generously recommended it to their friends and specific people who they were reminded of while reading me. I joined writing groups and communities and exchanged links with some fiery writers and humans. I am so buzzed with joy when I go through the list of people who have slowly opened their inboxes to my words.

The space has evolved in other ways too. If the goal was simply to find an alternate space to write in Season 1, it evolved to finding more time to write in Season 2. With Season 3, I want to find YOU in a better way.

I will continue to write personal essays about evolving and growing and learning and shining — while pausing to accept that I am enough, just as I am. However, I am also curious to see what impact does such a narcissistic act have on YOU? How can it add value to your life to read about mine?

Let’s see. From your long replies to my essays, from the lines you’ve quoted back to me, from knowing some of your own parallel journeys, I was able to picture you all a little bit. During my break, I have been seeking you even more. Though you all are so different from each other, I keep investigating and guessing what is common in you all. And in me.

I believe I am writing to sensitive and creative beings. I believe I am writing about sensitive and creative beings when I write about myself.

It doesn’t mean that we haven’t been insensitive ever, and that we are always successfully creative. But, this is what best connects us. I want this to be a space where sensitivity is seen beyond inconvenience, instead praised as a power to be owned and honed. I want creative WIPs (works in progress) to feel companionship, instead of the hurry to be creative VIPs (very important persons). I want to trust myself as an awkward bearer of these two qualities and trust you when I can’t trust myself.

These are my hopes for season 3, and I hope you’ll stay until the end.