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#146: Black Lives Matter

I would like to extend my deepest condolences to the family of George Floyd and the families of the countless other victims of police brutality systematically targeting people of colour.

Thank you to everyone who’s been taking part in the peaceful protests in and outside of the US. Clearly, not being a racist yourself isn’t enough. We need to do more to fight the bullies and those who turn a blind eye and allow this oppression to continue. We need to rally against companies like Facebook who give a platform to hateful ideologies and help launch them into the mainstream to sell more ads.

It works because mindlessly scrolling through content channelling hate at your scapegoat of choice is easy. It’s easier than facing your own demons and solving your own problems.

If you don’t want to fight for people of colour, for the LGBT community, for refugees, for immigrants, then fight for yourself. Because when we allow hate to fester in our society, it will eventually come to you.

Do you see something happening to someone in your community that you wouldn’t want to happen to you? What can you do to help?

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Writing Update #32

Well, this was exhausting. We took a red-eye back to London, landed at 11, got home around 2 p.m., and I passed out on the sofa straight away. But I’m back up now to write this post!

New York was a fantastic experience. My activity tracker tells me that we walked more than 100km over six days. We saw so much, yet we barely touched the surface of all the things you can do and see in the city. We bought books, went to museums, drunk coffee at _many_ different places. I had a blast.

I grew up with a poster on my wall that was very close to that photo. Now I was able to shoot a photo like that myself! 

Despite having only about 400 years of history, New York is a treasure-trove of inspiration. I’m coming back for sure if only to walk under the towering skyscrapers again (and to spend more time at the Strand bookstore). On the other hand, the city has many problems which made me appreciate London even more (seriously, MTA, get your act together).

In terms of writing, I only managed to squeeze two writing sessions into my hard-core exploration schedule last week. Sadly, I couldn’t get anything done on either of the flights. I’m now almost there with Dark Forest, and I will be getting back to the novel tomorrow.

Because I missed my goals (sad times) over the past couple of weeks, it made me reflect on how I work, and I’ll be implementing a few adjustments into my routine going forward.

Over the last month or so, I tried chipping away on short stories while working on my novel, and I learned that that’s not the way to go. I can only focus on a single story at a given time—switching back and forth makes me procrastinate. Trying to do too many things at the same time leads to not finishing anything. In the coming weeks, I’ll be focusing more.

Oh, and I bought and am currently reading this beauty:

I’ll talk to you guys next week—with some better news and perhaps more coherent sentences. Have a good one!

-Radek

Past Writing Updates

#31, March 2019

#30, March 2019

#29, March 2019

#28, March 2018

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Writing.coffee Newsletter Goes Out Tonight

The story is edited, the essay is ready. Boom! This time the thing might come out on time. Another month has gone and it's time for another edition of the Writing.coffee Newsletter.

So what’s coming?

ON WRITING: Facing the Music

I spent the first few months of 2017 not writing, and I hated it. Lately, I’ve been trying to figure out what happened. Why it took me months to get back on track? What was stopping me? And how can I prevent that from happening in the future?

SHORT STORY: Bad Day

Ben was working the entire night. He only got an hour of sleep before getting the call to come back in for an urgent briefing.

Nora spent her night out, trying to help a friend instead of writing her essay. The assignment is due in a few hours, and she’s severely hung over.

They both head down to the local cafe to alleviate some of their misery with coffee. Some days just suck. But don’t they say that all bad things always turn into something good?

The email will go out today at 8PM BST, sign up before then to get it.

Subscribe here (it’s free!)

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A little evil jubilee for writing.coffee 😈