On Friday I burst through the finish line of the writing project I’ve been working on since January. I’ve been going really hard on this project, and when I was finally done - when I was able to click SAVE and close it out with a flourish - I felt…nothing. Like I was proud of myself for finishing a thing, but other than that, I felt completely empty.

I don’t think accomplishing things is for me 🤷🏻‍♀️

After that, my body completely plummeted into a three-day bed-rot Manifestor energetic down-cycle (I finished Galavant, though, which…what a DELIGHT!). Which is a thing I always try to fight even though there’s literally no fighting it because I don’t have any energy left! It’s all gone! And now I’ve been sitting here all day, trying to write out some new goals for what I wanna work on next.

I’m gonna tell you a lil’ secret - I sometimes get a lot of anxiety around goal lists and manifestation stuff (a.k.a., vision boards and “calling in” lists, etc). I get excited to do them, thinking about all the great things I want to accomplish or manifest and how my life is totally gonna change from the second I finish the thing and I’m finally gonna be the person I always wanted to be!!!, and then I sit down to do them and am immediately paralyzed with anxiety and procrastination.

All of a sudden, I can’t even begin to put to paper what it is that I truly want to call into my life. Even the things that, on any given day, I would declare with my whole chest that I’m not gonna stop until I get them are called into question. Do I really want to be a bestselling author? What if writing steamy screenplays for big ‘ol buttloads of cash would make me happier? What if I want to do both (note: I actually do want to do both)?! Do I really want to live on the West Coast? What if I meet a brawny Southie type who loves to read literary novels, and all he wants to do is carry me off to a cozy place on Nantucket where he sails me around in his boat by day, and then by night I get to watch him get into loud, mouthy arguments with local bar patrons about the fact that Bukowski actually sucks and if you haven’t read your way through the collected words of Jane Austen you’re just kidding yourself?!

I don’t want my goals and manifestation lists to rule those kinds of things out, you know??? I somehow always feel that by deciding to pursue one goal, I’m slamming the door on all the other Choose Your Own Adventures that could come up - and could potentially make me happier!!! - if I pursued another one. Or all of them!

But what it really comes down to is this: When I’m having a hard time making a decision about what I really want, it’s usually because I’m not trusting myself enough to know that I’ll always make the right choice for myself.

OR it’s because I don’t trust that I’ll really, actually do whatever it takes to come through for myself.

Because that’s all that goals and manifestations really are, yeah? It’s a list of decisions that you’re making for yourself.

It’s also a commitment to those decisions, to showing up for yourself.

So when I break it down that way, I realize that a lot of my anxiety around goal-setting and manifestation-list-making stems from knowing that, in the past, I haven’t always made the best choices for myself, and I haven’t always shown up for those commitments, or for myself. And then I have to remind myself of all the ways I’ve come through for myself in just the last few years…all the times I was consistent, even when it was hard; all the times I met my own deadlines, even against all the odds; all the times I did the hard thing required in order to really show up for myself.

Self-esteem, guys. Who knew?? Like my dream boy from Southie would say, it’s fuckin’ tiiight.

Anyway…two of my biggest goals for this year is to complete as many writing projects as I possibly can and master my own manifestation patterns, so this list I’m working on right now is pretty important to me. Ideally, I want my writing goals and my manifestation mastery to go hand-in-hand, so I can create some magic around all the hard work I’ve been doing.

Next week I’ll let you know what I’ve come up with, because even though I instinctively want to go into my little hidey-hole and never show any of you my precious treasure, things just go better for me when I share stuff like that with all of y’all.

In the meantime, though, if you’re like me and you know what manifestation is but you wanna see if it actually works - or more specifically, works for you (trust me, I’ve been in the manifestation game since 2008 but I’m also skeptical 90% of the time, mostly because everyone around me seems to manifest all this great shit all the time and I’m still sitting here like, “Well, I got a new apartment and a dog two years ago but that’s been kind of it since then…”), then I have two cool resources for you to check out:

First is The Pathway, which is a manifestation method based on “raising your self-worth and stepping into your unique authenticity by reprogramming the subconscious limiting beliefs you picked up during childhood and throughout your life.” I’ve used it for years, and it’s pretty amazing for discovering the truest parts of yourself anduncovering core wounds that are holding you back. It’s not for everyone, but if you’re interested, you can use my affiliate code BER for 15% off by using the links below:

Payment plan

Pay in full

For you science nerds out there, a pal from my fave Discord, Hannah Summerhill, wrote an amazing article for Elle.com about what the CIA already knows about manifesting.

Read it here!

You’ll also want to check out her other writing (gathered for you in her Writing Highlight on IG), and her Sunday Night Manifestor’s Club. I personally would love to join her next Manifestor’s Club cohort because it looks ahhmazing, but I’m still waiting for my next project to pick up so it’s just not financially feasible for me at this time (omg, look at me being all fiscally responsible! You guys, it sucks). So I’m hoping that a bunch of you will join instead and end up manifesting a shit-ton of money and then take me out to dinner or buy me stuff as a thank-you 💖

And if you’re like, “Manifestation?! I don’t wanna read about that woo-woo shit!”, then tough titties kid, because this newsletter is about me and my dumb life, and I like to talk about writing books and movies, making life into one sweeping adventure via setting goals and following your big dreams, diving into spirit stuff like manifestation and ghosts, and staying abreast (heh) on pop culture and entertainment, with a bunch of hilarious TikToks and GIFs thrown in for good measure. Kay? So if you don’t like it, then fuckin’ BEAT IT and subscribe to some boring science and math newsletter instead!

The Best + Easiest Thing You’ll Make All Week:

These Snickers dupes have been all over TikTok the last two weeks, and last night, after realizing I already had pitted dates in my pantry, I decided to try them out for myself.

All it takes is pitted dates, peanut butter, chocolate, and your freezer. I’ve seen people sprinkle chocolate chips on top, but I feel like that’s not enough chocolate to get the full effect. I made my own chocolate sauce with some Hershey’s cocoa baking powder and cocoa nibs…it tastes great, but it’s a little too runny and it melts really fast when you take the Snickers dupe out of the freezer. So instead I would buy a bag of high-quality chocolate chips and melt the chips into a sauce to pour on top.

But they really do taste like mini Snickers Bars! (And I LOVE Snickers more than I’ve loved some of my boyfriends, so trust and believe me on this!)

Unlike other weeks, the pop culture be NOT poppin’ this week. There’s really nothing going on, other than apparently the girls on VPR are FIGHT-TING after the reunion and Ariana was announced as the new host for Love Island, her all-time favorite show.

• The only Housewives show that’s still currently on is RHOP, and the absolutely dismal season (with the exception of that Mia and Gordon scene at the very end!! Mia’s been having an affair this whole time? And Gordon knew? And if you want fair, go to a carnival?! I was LIVINGGGG) is now in their reunion episodes, which has already been infuriating and unproductive. I hate that the Green-Eyed Bandits took what was once a delightful franchise and turned it into show that even die-hards didn’t bother to watch this season, all because Wendy gave them both a much-deserved clap-back three years ago.

• Once RHOP wraps, we won’t get another Housewives show until RHONJ premieres in May. However, Peacock IS throwing us a bone in the meantime!

• The best Bravo show on right now, imo, is Summer House. It’s just so fun this season, you guys. This is one of those rare shows that you can literally just dive right into without going all the way back to S1…though if you have the time and inclination, I recommend starting from the beginning just so you fully understand the origins of Amanda and Kyle and appreciate just how far The Artist Formerly Known As Cocaine Carl has come. #growth

• The Valley (Bravo) premiered a couple weeks ago, and…I was so prepared to hate it and not even watch it, because NO ONE ASKED FOR THIS, but honestly…it might be the heir to VPR that we deserve. Jax is secretly in love with Kristen; Britney is such a dork but is also a man-coddling asshole; Kristen’s backwoods bf Luke SCARES me; Jesse is a dickwad; and I like the other women but honestly I can’t even tell them apart at this point.

• I also blasted through A League of Their Own (Amazon Prime) this weekend, and man oh man…WHAT A GREAT SHOW. I started watching it with my family over the holidays last year and liked it, but didn’t really dive back into until this week, and that is a thing that I regret. Amazon canceled the second season due to the strike (or so they say), and it’s fuckin’ BULLSHIT because that show is truly so great.

  I highly enjoy the way that historical period pieces and shows like The Gilded Agenow make a point to feature diverse characters, but I also think too many shows like that want to gloss over the actual realities of being a LGBTQ or a person of color even just 20-30 years ago. And sometimes I get it, because Black/brown and LGBTQ folks should get to see themselves represented in costume-y fun shows without having to be constantly reminded of the discrimination and violence that used to be regularly visited upon their own. But what A League of Their Own does so well is remind us of just how far we’ve come, whether it’s through overt references to the fact that being queer could literally get you arrested or locked into an institution, or a casual aside from one of the characters that she couldn’t open a bank account until her husband signed off on it. We still have so far to go as a society, and sometimes that is so fucking depressing, but thinking about how many people could never live out loud back then…there’s a certain element of gratitude, in realizing that we’ve at least come that far.

  Okay but also it is FUN, and I don’t even like baseball!

• I also started watching Summer House: Martha’s Vineyard (Bravo), but I’m having a HARD time getting into it. I started watching last season but was 100% out after the bathroom incident (like, disgusting?), and then was even more out after I saw some footage of Silas yelling at Jasmine. I WANT to support this show, I WANT to LIKE this show, but I’m having a hard time finding my in. I like Preston and the new girl, and I love that Shanice cannot go a single 24 hours without flashing them titties, but Jordan is so sour; Summer is sort of a jerk; Jasmine is the kind of woman that I feel like I wanna like but I just know I’m gonna regret it later; and all the other guys are just…not hot OR interesting.

• I started watching Vanderpump Villa (Hulu) yesterday, and honestly…don’t bother. I was excited for a French Chateau version of Below Deck, but it is SO FAKE, y’all.

By now most of you have heard about the murders of 7 World Central Kitchen members as they were on their way to deliver aid in Gaza. Despite what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says, the strike was intentional, as the convoy coordinated movements with IDF ahead of time. The convoy was hit three times, and then the drone chased wounded aid workers from vehicle to vehicle to make sure they were all killed.

Killing humanitarian aid workers is a war crime, as is bombing hospitals and purposefully killing civilians. I don’t think it takes a political expert to suss out what the IDF is doing, but it hurts my heart and it makes me feel so hopeless. When I start to feel hopeless, I call my reps and take it out on them, and then I donate and/or share resources. If you’re the same way and would like to donate to World Central Kitchen, you can do so here.

I also think I’m going to make a little regular space in this newsletter shouting out my favorite charities and humanitarian orgs. I just had a really down moment today, thinking about all the bad news in the world and how it seems like we’re actually going backward when it comes to human rights and just being fucking decent to each other. I remember reading books about the Holocaust when I was in elementary and middle school and being SO MAD at everyone who lived during that time for not doing everything they could to stop what was happening when it was happening. I think about that a lot, actually. Like, every day. I know a lot of us are doing a lot, but it also feels like we’re fighting this huge war machine while watching literal war crimes happen right in front of our eyes and the people who are supposed to punish that kind of thing are just 🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️ and now Meta and Twitter are hiding political posts and all of that is meant to exhaust and silence us and I am NOT going to give into it.

So if you have political or humanitarian resources that you have found helpful or orgs that you deeply believe in, send me a note or 🗣 them up in the comments. Or I’ll fucking start a “ceasefire now” meditation circle at noon thirty every day - right after we pray for Britney - if y’all think it will help bring back some light and hope into our lives and the world at large. I do not care! If you are a person who knows more about this stuff than me, this is one of the only times in my life when I want you to tell me what to do!

Anyway, I love you guys. Maybe I’ll join the Peace Corps like I wanted to do back when I was 20. I mean, I literally already have all of the disaster relief training and certifications that one needs. Ainsley can go live with the true love of her life (my BFF Katy) and I can work on my French, and then when I write these newsletters from my tent in an underdeveloped country, I can act like I’m better than all of you.

And yes, I did have a hard time staying in 3-star hotels in Egypt on a trip that was purely for funsies, but I would appreciate you not bringing that up right now.

Alright, until next week -

-AC