Personal sovereignty
Doomberg on doing the work of your life [#187]
This temptation to grow, to do more, to get bigger, to expand can be a very dangerous one, and we have no need for it. We have more than what we need. We have abundance – in time, in pleasure, financially – and that is a gift.
When I’m on my deathbed, I will look back at the past two years as the fondest time of my life. This is the most thrilling, fun, rewarding, delightful thing we’ve ever had the privilege of doing. And if we can take a few years to savour it, that’s fine by me. Doomberg - The Active Voice.
My favourite quote from the plucky chicken’s chat with Hamish on building a new media business, out of nowhere, in complete anonymity. I heard him speak at a Media Society event: Newsletters: the new journalism? which inspired me to check out some earlier stuff.
Hamish said he’s talked to hundreds of writers over the years, but none has applied quite so much rigour to growing a media business from scratch as Doomberg. I agree, he left quite an impression on me. I’ve been mulling over what he said - on Brand, content, legacy media, social media, and staying lean. Yes, it’s finance so mega bucks, but us mere mortals can learn a lot from them ;)
He talked about Substack as a destination, not an origination (interview from 2022, so pre-Notes 2023). They built their business on Twitter, so I can see how that inspired Substack to create an internal social network. Notes is a game-changer – before it, we were in our silos, hopping between platforms.
Interesting to see they’ve quit X and gone all in on Notes now to make things easier for readers - it’s more user-centric, with no ads. They invested in the author-led fundraising round and are all-in on the Substack experiment!
We are now liberated to pour everything we have into one website, and our motivation has never been higher.
I love that. It goes against all the advice about not putting all your eggs in one basket (sorry) but it simplifies things for writer and reader.
On Brand:
The gut feeling you induce in your ideal clients when they interact with your product. Brand is not what you say it is; it's what they say it is. – taken from The Brand Gap by Marty Neumeier.
The gut feeling they want when people see a Doomberg email: “Oooh, I get to read this.” If enough people say that, then you have a brand.
What a lovely reframe for your writing, too: “Oooh, I get to write this.” I’m keeping that at eye level as a reminder to keep things light and fun here. If it feels like a chore, I won’t write it.
I also found it unsettling in parts. They manage their business through five pillars: brand, channel, tech, demand creation, and operations. They have a strategy for each and a mindset of continuous improvement. Makes sense, but it also feels overwhelming. I’m not good at all of it and can’t afford to outsource. It’s just me and Rob the butler (a very patient teacher/biz coach/therapist!).
He also talked about going all in on one thing. It won’t work if you’re half-focused, as people can sniff it out. But how do you do that if you’re juggling love and money work? If you have health issues or family stuff going on and can’t work on something full-time as it’s not generating enough income? The chicken and egg situation.
My approach here is little and often – tiny actions every day to move myself forward. I might not work on this full-time (yet!), but I’m always thinking (and talking) about it.
It’s also having a nest egg – a savings account with enough money to survive for six months while you write the book, do the thing. And reducing your outgoings. “I need to get back to the simple life,” as Joe keeps banging on about in Fake (have you seen it yet? Really fired me up - outrageous gaslighting).
Replay links below and my latest read. Just emailed him to say thanks and asked if he has any resources to share.
Nika
👀 Link About It
The Active Voice:
is willing to make some big calls. [Listen now]Substack and newsletters: the new journalism? | The Media Society. I’ve rejoined as some good events coming up, a new podcast and 25% off subs! [Watch now]
Subscribed by Tien Tzuo – “a step-by-step framework to rebuild your business around a customer-centric, recurring revenue model. In 10 years, we'll be subscribing to everything: IT, transportation, retail, healthcare, even housing.” [Read now]
Got a tip, question, or suggestion? Send me a note: nika@nikatalbot.io.
"He also talked about going all in on one thing. It won’t work if you’re half-focused, as people can sniff it out. But how do you do that if you’re juggling love and money work? If you have health issues or family stuff going on and can’t work on something full-time as it’s not generating enough income? The chicken and egg situation.
"My approach here is little and often – tiny actions every day to move myself forward. I might not work on this full-time (yet!), but I’m always thinking (and talking) about it."
The only decent school teacher I had used to keep on about this, calling it the "just 5 minute rule". If you have a hard problem that you keep putting off, you must get around that by telling yourself you will work hard on it for "just 5 minutes", then watch telly for an hour to recover! The idea is that 5 minutes of hard work on something will get you engrossed in it, so you'll end up spending the whole evening (or even the rest of your life) obsessed with that hard problem. I've found that this only works where you can become engaged within 5 minutes with the subject matter. It works if you pick up a good book on maths with some "hooks" that can get you interested within 5 minutes, but it fails if you get nothing but a headache within the 5 minutes!
The issue for me is to allow for the right side of the brain being spatially aware, creative and emotional, and the left side being analytical and logical. If one blocks the other, I get nothing done. Going for a swim or a long run tires out the right side, leaving only the left side in control which does calculations (normally blocked by the right side). If you over-use the left side by reading a lot of non-fiction maths or calculational physics, you shut it down and put the right side of the brain into control. So for a healthy lifestyle, I try to swing from using one part to the other and then back again. If I don't do this, I just get headaches and "anxiety" due to a conflict over what to do!