Showing up as you really are is the primary lever to pull in changing the quality of your life. It’s your fundamental service to the world.
I will explain this through today’s special edition.
In this issue:
The Genesis: How my world unravelled in a year
The past one year has been a rigorous personal odyssey, particularly relating to my career. It was the culmination of decades of restlessness and activity across various fields. I suddenly couldn’t endure being limited anymore. I wanted everything, and I wanted it now. That pursuit has led to many things, including having a newsletter.
When I started writing for the newsletter, I faced the same angst I have suffered at various junctions of life: What part of me should I express through this channel? An insufferable generalist, I do many different things. I wasn’t sure which to lead with, and having received a lot of business coaching, the word ‘niche’ was tattooed on my frontal lobe.
The word ‘niche’ being tattooed on my brain by all the business coaches I worked with
I followed their advice and worked hard to segment myself into different lanes. I sanded myself down into a tidy avatar, the kind they promised would gain traction. Niched down, chopping myself down into little boxes. It felt like progres, while gulping up a lot of resources. Ultimately, it led to no momentum, and a familiar frustration.
One of those lanes was Honest Believer, a dedicated newsletter for writing about Christian commentary. If you hadn’t noticed by now, I am a believer (and an ordained pastor) and writing on the subject is crucial to me. It was, in a sense, supposed to be a vestigial form of my ministry, since I had resigned as a residential pastor with an international ministry early last year. I knew I wouldn’t be on the pulpit for a while, but what was I do with all my insights? I would all least write them.
Honest Believer was that. I committed to maintaining it as a separate newsletter from Taiwo Ash Newsletter, the general/main publication where I write about everything else I am doing—podcast episodes, music releases, coaching insights and personal essays. I wrote an edition once asking my then-intimate circle of readers to vote on which newsletter they’d like to be a part of. Some chose the main one, most chose to receive both.
It went on like that for a while. Every other day, I had a fine idea of what to write to my Honest Believer readers. Nine out of ten times, that never happened. But the main newsletter received frequent editions.
The Epiphany: Why two, instead of one?
Sometime in the last two weeks, I had a realization. There was no need to segment my writing into two publications. The logistic challenges of managing two different newsletters and a whole other broad digital ecosystem (and life) were quite enough of a prompt for this realization but they were not the catalyst. What the catalyst was, I don’t recall. But I did see that my Honest Believer pieces could simply sit in the, shall we say, spiritual pillar of my essays, instead of trying to be its own thing, separate domain and all. Perhaps editions could go out only on Sundays, for a example, while the other stuff can have a field day during the week.
This was not an isolated thought. Increasingly, over the past few months, in my writing and in my thinking, I have observed the importance of just being yourself. Everyone says that but I really mean it—embracing every part of who you are and not hiding. Why did I feel a need to apologize for being a Christian? For being opinionated? I came to realize spirituality is something everyone engages in, in various forms. So I started to own being a Christian as my spiritual practice. No longer something to hide, even if the ultimate hope is to evangelize. The writing is not to convert—it’s to share what its like living and seeking, honestly and presently.
The big issue would have been—what if this turns off readers?
I did have an episode where a prospect from LinkedIn subscribed to my newsletter at my request, because they enjoyed what I wrote about job searching, and then promptly unsubscribed when I sent out a newsletter edition about cooking with my wife. They must have been disgusted.
The episode touched me because that was my biggest fear—that showing up undisguised would lead to a loss of traction. But now I consider that the only way I can build lasting success is by showing up fully, regardless. That may come with slow growth in the beginning. But it’s the only way that I will be fulfilled.
And, I’m certain that I will still find business being my random self, talking about coaching today, music tomorrow, and cooking with my wife the day after that.
The Odyssey: A life shift from a movie
This week, for the first time in ages, I went to a cinema. We saw a movie titled The Odyssey. It was a rendition of the classic literature of the same title, one of many versions that have been made over several decades. To my surprise, I enjoyed it—not for the reason I would have expected. It planted something in me. I felt inspiration well up in my chest while watching, and started planning things I would do much differently going forward. That’s what a good piece of art does.
While I was drafting this edition, I subconsciously used the word ‘odyssey’ to describe my career sojourn especially in the past year. It felt magical when I used that word, because I realized it captures my experience exactly.
The word ‘odyssey’ is adapted from the name of the adventurer Odysseus, and it is about his long-winded journey full of monsters, luck and fate from a distant land back to his home. The movie explores that journey, and its meaning, reproduced for viewers.
I had the idea of renaming my newsletter, the Taiwo Ash Newsletter which has now absorbed the Honest Believer newsletter, after the movie. It feels right, and accurate, because that is what I write about—my journey from a 16 year old dreamer who wanted to be a glocal icon and life coach, then studied medicine as a means to that end, and has been finding his way back to the original vision since then, with many stops at music, podcasting, writing, Christian ministry and more. That is what I promise—front row seats through the journey.
The Odyssey sounds more interesting too, than Taiwo Ash Newsletter, to an objective viewer. Because who in goodness name is Taiwo Ash, that I should care for his newsletter? When I’m a global brand name, sure. It’ll mean something. But for now. anyone who hears The Odyssey will feel intrigued by it.
From here on out, I’m sprawling. I’m gushing. Unniching. Bouncing across the waters as if tortured by Poseidon, but for me, the waves are the challenges of being yourself and building a living from this, in a hypercompetitive digital landscape.
So, welcome to The Odyssey. And just like watching the star-studded movie inspired me, I hope watching my story inspires you.
For You: What you need to do next
Whatever that may be for you, heading into the week, consider showing up fully as yourself. Not hiding. Not apologizing. Ready and willing for people to walk away if they’re not with it, with that thing you feel self conscious about.
- Yours odyssesously,
Taiwo.