That's cringe
How I overcome the cringe of sending this newsletter
As you likely all know by now, I am a big fan of the Blindboy Podcast. I often find his hot takes inspiring these newsletters, especially as I listen while running or walking the dogs, typically when I get my best ideas.
Recently, Blindboy has been talking a lot about cringe.
The specific type of cringe that comes when you launch a creative project and share it with the world. This is so relatable to me because even though this newsletter is about to reach its 5th birthday, I still squirm at the idea that people I know in real life read it.
Recently, I’ve been approached at networking events by people who have said something along the lines of: “Oh, I read your newsletter.” And while this should be the biggest compliment, also makes me cringe.
If knowing people read this makes me so uncomfortable, why do I even write it in the first place?
This is the ultimate paradox. I have always written; whether people read it or not, never really mattered to me. I had a Livejournal, Tumblr, WordPress food blog… I have a huge pile of journals dating back to age 12.
When I discovered Substack, I liked the idea of its simplicity. I often get bogged down in the design of a project, I need to control how it ‘looks and feels’, and this can distract from the act of writing.
Also, the accountability of having to write something every week (although only I am enforcing this), is just enough to help me force my way through the cringe.
More often than not, I write this newsletter on the same day I send it. This isn’t a conscious choice, but simply because I am too busy to write it in advance. This strategy has worked for me for nearly five years, as I have written some of my most well-received posts in the hours before pressing send.
I think this ties directly into the cringe factor. I have an idea in my head. I write about it. I send it. I don’t spend any time worrying about how this will change people’s perceptions of me, or what they will do with the (often very personal) information I am sending them.
I don’t even share it particularly far and wide. I chuck it on my Instagram story to about 100 followers and repost it as a Note on Substack. Then I move on.
I wonder: if I took a more strategic approach to the newsletter; planned it in advance and had a social media plan in place to share it… would it lose its magic?
I think it might.
Anyway, back to cringe.
The concept of cringe is weird because everyone knows how it feels, but it’s not that easy to explain.
Cambridge Dictionary defines cringe as “feeling very embarrassed, and often show this by a physical movement or expression.”
Interestingly, when looking up this definition, I was reminded that cringe has another meaning: “to suddenly move away from someone or something because you are frightened”
In some ways, I think the second definition is actually closer to what we are doing when we let cringe overtake our actions. It is quite literally causing us to move away from the activity we want to do out of fear: what if people think I’m weird? what if I’m not actually a very good writer? what if people laugh at me?
I am sure people have disliked my newsletter or even laughed at me behind closed doors over the last five years. But I don’t care. I also know this newsletter often has typos, which will ruffle some feathers.
There are even probably some people who are sick of me going on about autism (although I have no evidence of this, and it might just be my own internalised ableism mimicking the voices of anonymous critics.)
The reason I am writing about cringe is because I want you to know that I feel it, but I do this anyway. And you can do your thing, too.
I think, more often than not, the cringe comes as a result of a false narrative in our heads. Firstly, we believe that we are the main characters in other people’s lives. We are, in fact, not. This newsletter is important to me, I have regular readers, I have casual readers… but it matters to no one as much as it matters to me. There certainly isn’t a single big critic who hate-reads it every week…
Or is there?
Well, if there is, then why does that matter anyway? The reality is that it doesn’t. I often think the things we criticise in other people tell us more about ourselves than they do about the creators.
If people don’t like you, or the art you create…
It’s a them problem, not a you problem.
So, this piece is specifically dedicated to anyone who is nervous about starting a creative project because of what people might think; that could be a Substack newsletter, a hobby Instagram page, or even writing a book. It doesn’t matter what it is, but doing the thing will bring you way more joy than sitting around worrying about the perceptions.
Cringe is unavoidable, but you can learn to sit in it. Or just completely ignore it and share your innermost thoughts with thousands of people anyway, like I do.
Things are a little bit better now after a rocky one last week. I’ve got a cold, so I haven’t been running, which is directly impacting my mental state. Here are some things that have kept me going:
📺 Silo (Apple TV) - We started watching this adaptation of Hugh Howey’s novel Wool, which we read many years ago. Really enjoying it so far, this story has stuck with me for years, so it’s cool to see it realised on screen.
📽️ Companion (2025) - Fun horror film about an AI robot who turns on her partner.
See you next week,
Ellen x
💌 About this email
I’m Ellen, and I write about mental health for the chronically online. I am a freelance copywriter, strategist and web designer, and I work from home with my husband, Craig, at Content By The Sea. We have two rescue greyhounds, Potter and Harmony, and a toddler.
I started this newsletter in March 2020 and have sent over 200(!) emails; currently, I have over 1,200 subscribers. I write about a wide variety of topics, including diet culture, my love of running, jealousy, my life falling apart, mam guilt, and this dystopian world we all live in.
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I read a theory somewhere that our feeling of “cringe” at others is a kind of social defence mechanism. When we see someone acting in a way outside of what society expects (even though it’s normally not in a way that’s harmful), our brain projects a fear of “oh god what would people think of me if that were *me* acting like that?!” So we feel a strong sense of rejection – cringe – because our brains want to keep us within social cohesion, because that was the best survival strategy for prehistoric humans.
Viewed that way, knowing that our peers might see our creative projects and cringe takes a kind of bravery. Every time you hit publish, you’re being visibly yourself in a world that wants you to be an anonymous part of the crowd. Something to be proud of.
I feel so cringe if anyone I know tries to talk to me about my newsletter, I literally find myself making it sound like a silly thing to do. So this is so relatable — why do we do it?