Breakfast Chats: A New Series + We're A Bestseller On Substack
Thank you.
This month’s issue is coming to you from a bestseller newsletter on Substack! ✧˖°
Like I shared on my Stories some days ago, A Slow Afternoon became a bestseller last month and as a big thank you, I wanted to send a special, bonus post open to all subscribers ☼ (The regular edition will still be coming later!)
Note: I didn’t do a voiceover for this post but let me know if you really want me to do it for the next one in this series.
Welcome to a new series called “Breakfast Chats”…
…that I’d originally planned on bringing in, once we’d all been here a few months :) But after being ranked as a Substack bestseller (I need to stop writing bestseller, hah), I wanted to celebrate the milestone and share something as a thank you for all the love, warmth and beyond generous messages, that so many of you have been sending me every single day. I may or may not make this series a regular feature right away, but here I am dropping the first installment in your inbox this month, as a way of showing my gratitude. Thank you for believing in the idea, thank you for reading it, thank you for telling your friends about it. Thank you.
So what is Breakfast Chats?
It’s a series where I’ll share short musings, conversational tidbits about life things, inspired from my own “Fridays” posts from the old-school blog times…but hopefully better? :)
It’s going to be a mix of stuff, like the kind you talk to your friends over at a breakfast meetup. Maybe some thoughts that can stay with you and me, add value in some way. While the monthly issues will be longer essays & stories, I want to keep a lightness to this series with shorter chats.
I hope for it to be that easy weekend read that feels comforting and wholesome ♡
Welcome to breakfast chats. Let’s begin.
1. I’ve been thinking about trying out yoga since a while now and recently I’ve been looking up options close to my place to maybe try a yoga class once a week? Growing older has only made me understand how much our bodies work for us the whole day and night, and making time for fitness is such a wonderful way of rewarding it for all that it does. So I feel like I’m finally ready to get around to doing it and I think I’ll book myself in for a trial class next week and see how it goes.
2. I ordered homemade shami kebabs (south Asian meat patties) from someone in the neighborhood this weekend and it’s truly been the highlight of my week. I love shami kebabs in every possible way; on the side with some daal chawal, or sandwiched with some cheese to go with your chai. Nabeel and I only learned to cook over the last few years and so there are many things that we’ve never tried our hands at, shami kebabs being one of them. We eventually hope to have a date one Saturday afternoon and make them together but for now the ones resting in my freezer are making my heart very happy and I cannot wait to have them soon.
3. So just as I was writing this, Nabeel came to give me a hug, and at the risk of making us all a little awkward heh, I thought I’d share this almost-everyday ritual where the both of us hug for 30 seconds. I know, sounds silly, but hear me out. Anytime of the day, when one of us gets done with something, we’ll go over to the other person and hug for a while.
Other than the fact that it feels good to be physically close with someone you love, a 30 second hug is supposed to do quite a few things for you. It releases the feel-good hormone, oxytocin, in your body that can create feelings of contentment and closeness. And it can help lower your stress hormones, among a bunch of other benefits. Some say it’s even 20 seconds, and honestly, I don’t think it’s about doing 20 or 30 specifically, but just that warm, physical contact that feels genuine & safe, can be so therapeutic and healing and communicate love and support to those who matter. On days when one of us is having a bit of a rough time, that 30 second hug feels like a balm for the soul. Be it your spouse, or kids, best friends, parents; try giving a longer, deeper one next time and see how it feels :) And just in case you don’t have someone in your life right now or past history that makes human contact feel uncomfortable at this point, they say even hugging a pillow can potentially soothe in the same way.
4. Last month when we were on holiday in Kenya, I went with one very clear goal: I won’t photograph every single thing. I’ve been thinking about digital clutter a lot over the past two years honestly. And I feel like I have too much on my phone and in my email. So many pictures that I haven’t gone back to look at, so many subscriptions from brand emails that I don’t even know how I signed up for. I’ve been quietly clearing things up but there’s such a long way to go.
This time though, I decided that the past clutter can continue to be cleared as life happens, but starting with this trip, I wanted to have better digital habits. So, I recorded much less, left some things completely for my mind to store away for me. There were so many animals we saw that I have no photographic evidence of, but I know they’ll be there as these sweet, blurry memories.
It also makes me wonder that while modern tech allows us to, but maybe we’re not meant to remember every single thing?
Anyway, although I still haven’t gotten started on it, my plan is to gradually clear out all the excess that I may still have from my trip, because despite trying, I still do. And I hope to have a very curated, clean folder with only the best videos and photos from our trip, that I genuinely know we will look back at. I also feel like the more condensed that collection is, the easier it will be to revisit. It’s a small step, but it feels like a good beginning on this long journey of minimizing my digital possessions, as well as creating conscious space for the things that actually mean something to me. So I’ll be doing this through the rest of this year, fingers crossed.
5. We went to get some quick groceries midweek and I picked up a free magazine at the checkout which had all these interesting recipes. I instantly texted a friend if she wanted to come over on a weekend night and we could try cooking something together for a change vs doing the same old, same old. So she’ll be coming over later tonight and hopefully we’ll have a good time as well as whip up something delicious for dinner. I’ll be taking the rest of the weekend off from socials, hope you have a great weekend.
And that’s it for our breakfast chat! Let me know if you enjoyed this. The regular edition for October will land in your email in two weeks so look out for that.
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