Audibles at the Line

an exciting new direction.

It’s often said that the only constant in this life is change.

I’d be inclined to agree.

The last three years penning this Substack have been nothing short of extremely enjoyable; a verifiable social experiment undertaken through the vehicle of creativity.

You learn a lot about yourself when you create for an audience, no matter the size. This leads me to another pertinent quote:

“When you’re good at something, people will let you know”.

This is also applicable in reverse, as anyone with a modicum of self-awareness is certainly privy to what they do poorly as well.

If I had a dollar for every time someone in my life became irritated with my inability to sit still for more than 10 minutes at a time or my uncanny ability to go off on rants and tangents, I’d be writing this article from a penthouse in Dubai gazing out at the Burj Khalifa.

We’re all dealt a certain hand of cards when we start this life, and how we choose to play them is largely up to us. Some of them are Ace cards, some of them are odd numbers out of suit.

We make do with what we’ve got. (I’m currently 4 minutes into the first 25 minute “sprint” of a YouTube video entitled “The Immersive Writing Experience”, a focus tool for scatter brained creatives. So far, so good).

When this began in the fateful late summer of 2021, I was coming off a not so great period in my personal life and was honestly quite fed up with the general public (and the government’s) reaction to the pandemic.

As someone who champions personal autonomy and freedom to a fault, it quite literally felt as if I was living in hell on Earth.

Sometimes our greatest trials lead to our best creations- I took to Substack and let the catharsis of the written word ease my troubled mind. Inevitably, this led to a largely political slant to the early writing, which was a bit all over the place in terms of positions and standpoints.

Nonetheless, I was able to determine (along with my new best friend, ChatGPT- more on that at a later date) that a lot of the early work was erring on the side of overly provocative and inflammatory. Empathy is a stronghold #2 to Freedom in my personal values (these articles do end “Written with love”, after all) and it just felt as if an aggrandizing tone betrayed what was in my heart as a human.

It was awfully fun to get this off the ground with “Three Years to Slow the Spread” and I also enjoyed talking about “300 lb Beach People”, but the overarching tone of these articles betrayed the size of my heart. Those two articles (and some similar ones) have since been archived, though (as always) I genuinely appreciate everyone that read them, liked them, and provided feedback.

That being said, it’s time to move in a new direction, but not before we discuss what got us here. I’m sure you’ll be able to relate.

American Politics Have Become Exhausting and Boring

Please, refute that point in any way, shape, or form. I triple dog dare you. I’m sure you’ll get lefties shrieking about how it’s so important because “our Democracy is at stake!!” and then their political counterparts will wail in unison about we’re fighting for our very lives, but the fact of the matter is I’m over it and just don’t care.

The truth about our feelings often exposes itself in our motivations and behaviors, especially if you’re part of the population (like I am) that’s very much “all or nothing”. It’s both a blessing and a curse to be this way, as the downsides can be calamitous.

However, it does provide a reliable North Star for personal and professional actions.

Let’s put it more simply with a fun analogy- we’ve all had the girl that we’ve been “meaning to get back to” just to leave the poor thing on read for 3 whole days, and we’ve also all had the girl that we’d drive to the airport in teeming rain if she needed it, if only just for the fateful few seconds at the “Kiss n’ Fly” (🥺) before you parted ways.

American politics, once part of the bedrock of this ‘Stack, has quickly become the cute but just not cute enough romantic interest that got her Friday evening text answered on a Sunday morning.

These feelings came to a head this week with the debate between Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.

Two years ago I’d have admittedly been swept away into the hype and likely would’ve written about it here.

How Kamala was poised and polished but didn’t say a word of substance about policy and actionable planning.

How it was 1 v. 3 with Trump up against not only his colleague, but the two moderators seemingly at her beck and call.

Instead, I found myself on my computer during most of the debate, doing my best to plan out another day in the guaranteed chaos of the commercial real estate world while also scoping out fall collections on Mr. Porter.

My only real observations about the debate were that Trump was up against the MSM (again), fell into traps a bit too often, and that Kamala’s blouse with the tied knot under the slim suit was a stylistic masterstroke.

When you find yourself checked out and forcing yourself to care, it’s a sign to take things in a new direction.

Zzzzzz….

The Sexy Networking Group

There’s a Tuesday morning networking group of professionals on Long Island that I’m a member of, and in a weird and unexpected way, it’s changed the course of my pursuits as a creator.

Also- no, it’s not called “The Sexy Networking Group”, we’re actually known as Premier Networking Professionals, though SNG was one of the choices when we were voting to rename our chapter after breaking away from a national group of networks that had sponsored us. (I was the only vote for SNG, sometimes I do fear if my antics wear thin on the group, but what is life if we’re not authentic?)

Long story short, each member of the group has a role to play in the weekly meetings, and I was assigned something called “Member Education”. Essentially, it was an opportunity to discus and provide lifehacks or methods of operation or mindset type content that helps everyone with their daily tasks and responsibilities in his or her professional life.

This soon became one of the highlights of my week and something I became passionate about.

I found the content I spoke to the group about got “further out and further out”, but it seemed as if the more obtuse I became, the greater the reception to the content at hand.

Tie this into the fact that The Art of Planespotting and Holistic Prescriptions for the Overactive Mind were my two favorite articles I’ve ever written, (and two of the best performing, as well) the writing was clearly on the wall for the direction we’re going towards.

Ok, So What Now?

I had considered burning it all to the ground or starting another Substack anew, but with this platform (hopefully) growing and becoming a force in the in the rampantly expanding digital realm, it felt foolish to abandon an established readership and the coveted “Created 3 years ago” tagline that lies beneath the title on the Substack homepage.

I’d like to think we’re out here filming YouTube videos in ‘06 or doing Tik Tok dances in 2019. (Maybe I’ll throw in a dangly earring for full effect.)

I’ll be moving this Substack in the direction of cultural analysis and methodology and frameworks for approaching the ever-changing landscape of modern American life. These are the articles with the greatest feedback, and the content that resonates the most both digitally and IRL.

As I opened with, “When you’re good at something, people will let you know”.

I guess the act of falling backwards into a niche unintentionally actually lends itself to the purity of the pursuit of it, in and of itself.

It’s a unique slant and a unique niche, but a niche all to our own.

I’m awfully excited about it, and we’ll get into some real craziness later in the week to get things restarted right.

In the meantime, be good to yourselves, and talk soon.

Written with love,

John Abbate

12.9.2024