Happy New Year!

Hello again. I hope this finds you and yours well and warm.

I launched How to Talk to Yourself eight years ago on a site called TinyLetter — a simple and elegant newsletter service dedicated to writing with few bells and even fewer whistles. (My Scrivener project I use for drafting newsletter posts is still called “tinyletters”.) That sweet and beloved site was bought and dissolved by MailChimp, which itself was absorbed by Intuit. I moved the operation to Substack, back then an exciting service that promised several more bells and a couple of welcome whistles. It encouraged thinking of a newsletter more like a publication, easily enabling the tossing of individual issues via email onto subscribers’ virtual porches while also curating them into a somewhat pleasing magazine-ish archive. On the way, I attracted subscribers (including paying ones) and built a body of work that I’m still mostly proud of and something like a little community.

If you know anything about Substack these days, you’ve probably heard about people leaving. Writers have vacated for multiple reasons, from the political to the practical, and pretty much all the reasons are good ones. I don’t begrudge those who continue using that platform — it’s real hard to build an audience these days, Substack offers free accounts, and most platforms of any kind lie somewhere on a moral spectrum between questionable and outright evil. But in addition to embracing some bad political practices in the service of profit, Substack seems intent on following the usual tech-company strategy of growth at all costs, adding and hard-pushing services that no one really wants (microblogging, a notes thing, chat features, etc.) while letting the core product languish. Substack’s aggressive corporate message also continues to be that acquiring a massive, monetized audience is easy, just ask these creators that we paid handsomely to bring their already giant audiences to Substack. Super annoying.

Why am I telling you all this? Well, life continues to excel at producing reasons not to think about stuff. The year ahead in particular looks (threatens, really) to be a difficult year, filled with way too much suffering and strife but also the possibility of joy and newness, all of which calls for thinking. And being alive and thrown into a world already underway while aware of it all remains incessantly puzzling and weird and interesting, an experience both universal and achingly personal and worth the grapple. I’m the kind of person who likes questions and trying to figure stuff out, and writing is my preferred way of figuring. Which is to say that I plan to continue this newsletter, mostly because I need it as a place and method of meeting the time ahead, a small tonic against the doomscroll. I hope, dear reader, that it has helped — and will continue to help — you in similar ways as well.

I’m keeping things going, but, for the reasons above, I needed a change of house. After researching the alternatives, I’ve settled on Buttondown, in part because its emphasis on the writing part reminds me of TinyLetter, while offering new things to learn.

I’ve brought you and all my current subscribers, free and paid, to this new place. The transition should be seamless, as they say, on your end: How to Talk guides will still appear in your email at regular intervals, just from a different email address. Paid subscriptions will continue as before (without Substack taking 10%). I intend to continue offering all newsletter posts, past and future, to all subscribers with the option of paid subscriptions at various levels for those inclined to support my work and to offset what I pay Buttondown for their fine services. For now, I’m going to keep the existing Substack collection up for a bit longer, but you can also browse past guides on the new site’s pleasingly minimalist archive.

Apologies for the change and for any bumps or snags in the transition. I understand if you unsubscribe, but I hope that you’ll continue and comment and maybe even share this newsletter or its parts you’ve enjoyed with someone else.

Okay. Welcome to our new house. Please make yourself at home — feel free to root around in the fridge, put up your feet, get cozy. Onward into 2026.