You guys,
I have a new website!
It’s not completely ready but it will be an iterative process and I was too excited to get it live before the next cohort of Write of Passage starts tomorrow!!
My first site was slapped together in February 2020 when I first joined WoP. It was bare-boned and boring. I didn’t mind because I was laser-focused on publishing weekly essays and creating a library of content. But as the year went on and my audience slowly grew, I wanted to welcome readers into an online home I was proud of.
A new website became my top priority for 2021, but I had absolutely no idea how to do it.
That’s the beauty of Write of Passage. You meet people who become your accountability buddies, source of inspiration, support system, and eventual friends. Or as Brent Beshore tweeted: “That’s how deep relationships form - randomly, then intentionally.”
I developed one such relationship with talented designer Nate Kadlac who worked with me to build a completely new, badass website that I can’t even believe is mine. I love it so much.
If you’re interested in creating a website you love and don’t know where to begin, check out Nate’s course on Approachable Design.
Essay of the Week
When I was a student in Write of Passage there was one lesson that resonated with me over the rest, and that was POP Writing.
POP is an acronym for Personal, Observational, and Playful. When you combine all three elements, you elevate your writing.
But it was difficult to implement how to do it.
So about a year ago I started working on an essay to help others incorporate the framework into their writing.
Unfortunately, by writing an essay about it, I quickly learned I didn’t fully understand each pillar.
So I kept learning and kept writing essays and kept finding examples and kept iterating and finally, I’m starting to get it.
Here’s my essay on How To Make Your Writing POP.
Starstruck
Sam attended Capital Camp last week, which was basically Burning Man for Twitter nerds.
He called me the first night to let me know how dinner went: “I saw Jim O’Shaughnessy talking to SuperMugatu.”
I responded, “Wait, you saw them? In real life? They’re like famous people!”
The next night, Sam met David Perell.
They were actually supposed to meet in December 2019 but David had a schedule conflict. Shortly after, I signed up for Write of Passage and Charlie Bleecker was born.
So I know David. We’ve never met in person but we’ve had a bunch of Zoom calls and I STILL get intimidated by him because he speaks with such authority and such gravity. If you’ve seen any of his YouTube videos it’s just like that except more impressive because there’s no script. He just talks like that normally, people.
Needless to say, Sam was intimidated, too. He called me the next day from his hotel room to let me know how it went and was whispering in case David was staying in the room next door.
We are such losers.
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Until next week,
Charlie