This Morning I Made a Major Announcement

And it was hard.

A few years ago I started a group on Medium to help offer support and encouragement for poets on the platform. It’s been a busy few years of leading the group and due to two main reasons, I have had to make a tough decision. (With the encouragement and support of my editing team, of course.) (#FOLLOWSAM!)

• My freelancing business is booming. My time is now spent more away from Medium.

• The Medium atmosphere has changed a lot since I started the group.

I announced this morning that I’d be archiving the group. It was not a decision made lightly. My ultimate hope is that the poets in the group (nearly 800), without the security of the group offering continuous support, will be forced to engage ON the Medium platform with each other, following, reading and supporting each other even more.

So now, I take a deep breath, and I look out to a horizon with more time in it for my freelancing work, and for my other writing projects. I woke up this morning filled with two distinct yet opposing feelings: 1. Relief. I know this is the right thing for me at the right time, and I hope people will understand. And 2. Deep emotions over all the memories, connections, friendships, and various group activities we’ve done together over the years—especially those activities that lifted, supported, and helped poets from around the world to grow.

I am proud of the work I’ve done there for The POM. But, alas, all good things…

Moving forward, I have many different things I am working on. Here’s a list of updates!

• I am STILL querying my first novel, Elephant Song, and since I do this so sporadically, I want to recommit myself to getting this done.

• I am working on my second novel, which is adequately and temporarily titled “This Damn Novel Needs a Title.”

• I am working with 3 new clients, all of who are large companies, who sought out my services from LinkedIn and approached me to be a part of their content teams. The work is steady and keeping me rather busy.

• I am still working on Fiverr doing small editing jobs and working with poets to polish their manuscripts. As I gain more private clients, I may eventually move away from these Fiverr jobs. (Fiverr takes a HUGE cut of my earnings and I have to be “on-call” all the time to answer Fiverr messages.)

• I have joined a new platform called Simily, which is very young and has a promising pay scale for writers of fiction and poetry. Here’s my profile.

• I am still writing for NewsBreak, though much less often as my time moves away from content writing sites and toward private clients. My last article there did earn $130.00, which was a reminder to me that there is still money to be earned in local news reporting, though it’s not my favorite thing to do. (Which is why I write there under a pseudonym.)

• I am still writing for Medium! I am not ready to leave Medium, though some writers are. I am redefining my presence there as a content creator rather than a group leader. I hope this change means more readership for me and better brand establishment for me as a writer.

That’s all for now, I just wanted to let my Substack readers know about what’s going on in case they missed the announcements today. Until next time—may creativity give you great joy, today and all days!

Love Christina,

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