I’m a reluctant writer. I said what I said. I’m laying on my couch, tapping this into my phone as I listen to the electric heater built into my cheap efficiency apartment turn off and on. I cancelled my membership to the YMCA because I never go there; I am eating junk food and getting cheap fat this winter, wrapped under polyester blankets, in old Columbia fleeces as I hide from the cold and hibernate and listen to my upstairs neighbors vacuuming, which they always are doing because they own two cats they never let out of the house. If I had a cat, especially if I had two, I’d let them out of the house as much as they wanted; it feels weird to keep a cat cooped up in the house all day and the kind French-Canadian neighbor across the way lets his black cat named Buddy out all the time. Buddy has a handy cat door that’s always open when he wants to go outside. Buddy doesn’t come out in the cold. I don’t blame him and it makes me wonder if all cats are indoor cats in the winter, or if that’s a cat-by-cat thing. We have Buddy to thank for there being so few copperheads around my apartment complex; he hunts them. There used to be far more, said Alain, his owner, in his quebecois accent. But there aren’t anymore. That’s a good thing. I previously took little walks around the grounds of the complex and at times got pretty deep in the ivy that spreads everywhere on the North Carolina ground, in the forested parts at least. I’ve seen snakeskins and am glad that Buddy has dispatched them. It’s lowkey impressive that your average-sized house cat can take on a copperhead. Maybe he was able to get young ones. Or maybe Alain was lying.

I feel trapped by my attention span lately—locked into little engagement loops that never get me to where I need to go. Is the novel dead? My novel? Others? It feels like the novel as such is a dead medium. I can’t see it competing with the thrill and wonder of videos. Novels require attention spans that feel ridiculous to expect of people in this world. On LinkedIn I saw an article I didn’t bother to corroborate that talked about how Generation Z is the first generation scoring lower on IQ tests than their predecessors. Apparently previous generations did better on measures of intelligence, focus and problem solving than Gen Z. Just as the Millennials are the first generation not to do better than their parents economically, it seems that the fundamental skills of reasoning have not been bequeathed to those born after Millennials.

When I was younger, I always enjoyed reading. Now the latest book I read was The Last Duel by Eric Jager, a good but really short book about a medieval event, a judicial duel to the death between two feuding men in a France torn by the Hundred Years’ War. I saw the movie about it first. I liked the book but it’s very brief. At the same time, I’m finally trying to finish the Lord of the Rings, which I’m embarrassed to say I haven’t done yet. Still haven’t read it. I tried to when I was much younger, like eleven or twelve and I got caught up in the slow, desultory beginning of the novel. I understand I’m not the only one this has happened to, but it’s still something I need to finish, as, overall, it’s still a major inspiration for the book I’m currently writing, or attempting to write, Eathel the Bastard. I guess if I haven’t read it, it can’t be an inspiration. Maybe the movies are what’s really the inspiration for me. What is writing a novel? You need to be assiduous in returning to finish it, and ruthless and merciless in refining it. It doesn’t employ the same discipline that finishing a poem does. Poems are intense, but shorter. They allow you to briefly engage with a feeling and emotion and then let it go. They’re easy to finish. They’re tough sometimes, but you can still see them all at once on the page and understand what’s missing, usually by way of feeling what’s unfinished, or sensing that the poem itself is unfinished and then continuing to attack it and return to it until it feels like it’s something closer to done. You can sound out the poem in your head to see where the rhythm needs fixing. When I worked at my previous job, I seem to have been more prolific and published lots of poems online. They’re all at my website, and the latest ones are even dated. You can tell that the latest ones were all written from the security of my previous job; they are more efflorescent due to the calm that came from the stability of being employed. I miss that: having little to do, forgotten within the corporate structure I was a small part of, and free to go through my old diaries and notes and find things I thought were beautiful and transport them across my myriad devices by reading them into my Notes app on my phone, relying on the great transcription features built into the Apple software to reliably capture the words. Then I’d work on them from my phone and at home. I’d transfer them over and over from my work computer to my personal devices, revising them at each stage, until the editing seemed almost to happen automatically, by accident, as a side effect of all this shuffling around from platform to platform.

Sometimes I’d open up a text editor and simply write out what I thought during the long down time I had between the meetings I was supposed to go to or during the meetings themselves. Or, writing by hand, my doodles would turn into snippets of poems or text that I’d then elaborate on.

I have been thinking a lot lately about what would have happened had I been more serious about writing from an earlier age. I’ve posted on Substack Notes earlier about how I never wanted to be a writer, and that’s true. At some point I lost the joy of reading too, I think.

What makes writers writers and who’s a writer and how are writers defined in the societies I grew up in? One thing stands out—writers are usually sad and broke. The best ones aren’t even recognized as such until they’re dead. Herman Melville is a classic example. Today, kids read Moby Dick in school and it’s a great book, apparently. Like so many other books, I started it, but did not finish it. Anyway, Melville died in poverty as far as I know and without an iota of the renown that he now has. I wonder if he had any heirs or people that could even benefit from the legendary status of his work. Something tells me no.

I have nonetheless latched onto writing because I’ve always been told I’m good at it. It seems to be something that plays to my natural skillset of communication. But it also gives me something to own, a piece of capital in a world where wages are increasingly not any kind of path to prosperity. I did and do imagine wealth for myself, misguided, naive as that might be. I want to be free of all this working for other people, depending on them to pay my rent, put food on my table. I don’t so much care if I am always paying rent. I care more about whether I own the font of wealth. In America, I guess everywhere today, you can own the fountain or be downstream from the spring. I want my own well, my own thing, that I can rely on when other sources of prosperity are waning.

There was a time before the novel; will there be a time after it?

I think we’re already there but why do I want to do a novel? Why is that how I imagine my life going? Because I do imagine that. Some part of me has always suspected I would write several of them. I pattern my life so much on what I see others do, and a novel seems to be the most prevalent form of popular success for writers. But it engages none of the senses; therefore, does it engage with all of the senses, I wonder? I am wary of any form of media that takes up two or more senses—it’s easy to get wrapped up in them and seduced by them. Visual media can be, for example, a static work of art, like a photograph or painting or poster, so one sense. Movies and TV shows are visual but have audio in them too. Unless you’re watching silent movies, which no one is outside of film school. Something that engages too many of the senses, I don’t trust. We are too easily beguiled. Music engages one sense, hearing, so it’s relatively safe. What of audiobooks? Is that an example of something engaging beyond the no senses that writing may engage? I really don’t know whether it’s a thing that reading engages fewer senses, and whether engaging fewer senses is even a good thing or a bad thing.

Even though this winds around and doesn’t make too much of a point, I’m going to publish it anyway.

Thank you , , , , and many others for tuning into my live video with ! Join me for my next live video in the app.

Get more from Sam Liebl in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

It is daylight savings time again. Something, I guess, about the clocks changing and me changing, me ongoing, in medias res, made me want to break the streak of not posting. I wanted to collect my thoughts into something longer, something compiled over time, instead of the write-and-post-the-same-day kind of energy I first brought to Substack.

2025 passed in a variety of ways, and most of them were unpleasant. I’ve struggled with profound depression, with working at several jobs that didn’t last long and, currently, a lot of anxiety around beginning a new job. I think—I hope—the internal turmoil going to go away soon, but it has still been something formidable to contend with over the past few weeks. I am endlessly grateful to the company that hired me, and intend to do my best to succeed there. It’s just that it seems like some mental health issues are trying to lay me low, even from the relative security of a salaried position. What’s up with that?

Withdrawing from social media

Today, March 15, I deleted, not deactivated, one of my Instagram accounts. Meta, the parent company of Instagram, Facebook and more, wants you to deactivate, not delete, your accounts. That is pretty telling, I think. There’s still an account out there I use for poetry and writing, and to keep up with a few friends I’ve made before and after my stint on social media, which you can find at samliebl_. I don’t really know what’s going to be there, but it will be more serious than my last one was, that rogue account that’s scheduled for deletion.

Besides pushing for deactivation over deletion, Meta doesn’t immediately delete things; they only schedule things for deletion. Meta says that my old account won’t appear in any searches between now and then. I wanted to delete that account because it represents a different time in my life. A time where I was going all in on social media, and I thought I was casting my lot in with the people living on the edges. I was going to be, if not an influencer, which I never wanted to be and something of which I do not think I am capable, at least influencer-adjacent. I yearned to propel my art forward that way.

It’s more difficult than you may think, deleting an Instagram account. While the process to delete your Instagram is itself straightforward, the problem is that, in creating an Instagram account, you are also likely to create a corresponding Facebook account at some point in managing and posting to your Instagram. You also create a Threads profile almost automatically. These are all products of the technology giant Meta, and they badly want you posting and engaging on all their platforms. It’s little steps that get you: when you post to your Instagram stories, for instance, Instagram asks you whether or not you would like to post that story to your Facebook as well. If you don’t have a Facebook account, they ask whether you’d like to create a Facebook account. They do the same thing for Threads, which is a less well known, text-based social media network. I think it’s pretty cool, but it feels like there’s no one actually on Threads.

To me, social media is a toxic compound. For other people, it’s something they can consume with few mental health issues; not so for me. It’s like being lactose intolerant. Some have no physical problem digesting dairy; others can’t. I am social media intolerant. Just like being lactose intolerant doesn’t stop people from enjoying ice cream and pizza, I still can take pleasure in it and often do, but it comes with longer term mental health struggles. I compare myself to others. I lurk on people’s profiles that I shouldn’t. I post things I regret later.

In the interim, I also deleted my profiles on Bluesky and Twitter/X. I’m still on YouTube, Discord2 and my beloved TikTok. TikTok is chaotic, hilarious and runs at a frenetic pace. I like it. Believe it or not, I’ve made what I consider to be genuine connections and friends on that platform, parasocial they may be. Several times, I’ve had people mention, IRL, that they stumbled across my content on TikTok. For my goals, that is what social media is for—building influence in real life.

It’s distressing how much social media is kind of required, not only for creative work, but also professional, day-job work. My LinkedIn is necessary for the new job that I have, and it is genuinely useful in that domain. Though there are several articles worth of material on how much LinkedIn has degraded since I first posted my résumé in the sky some 14 years ago.3

Some of the jobs I worked.

State Farm

I was, for a short while, “Sam from State Farm.”4 The insurance industry was not for me. One thing to report from this time was an expansion of my skills in AI—using artificial intelligence to study for an insurance exam my actual intelligence never wanted to pass. That in itself is not that interesting, but I gained a lot of experience, at least, in the possibilities and limitations of the ChatGPT voice interface.5

The main thing I came away with is that speaking with AI, using it verbally, is going have a big impact on how people use it, and by extension, all digital technology. Again, another idea for an essay.

Idle Hour

For the visually inclined, here are a few quick images from my brief time at a coffee shop. This super aesthetic hipster haunt is in Raleigh, NC, and called Idle Hour. This wasn’t the only time I worked there. I used to clock in during COVID.

Here’s a link to their Instagram. I highly recommend them, but I eventually went to work at Amazon because that giant corporation pays $18.50/hr, plus bonus dollars for shifts they need, like those in the dead of night. Those shifts seriously suck, but it was nice to get that extra pay every now and then.

Amazon

I think working at Amazon, and discussing my impressions working there, is worthy of its own series of essays, for those who would be interested. There’s a poll at the end if you’d like to vote on what to hear next.

Amazon is an elaborate, interconnected group of contractors and employees, whom Amazon exclusively refers to as “associates.”

I did not like working at Amazon. There are many reasons why. One of two chief things, in retrospect, that got me about Amazon was the commute. Working at Amazon isn’t just working the hours you are scheduled for. It’s the time it takes to get to the warehouse, the time you’re waiting in line from one of the three shuttles that are supposed to come on time to designated parking spots, but rarely do. There are Uber shuttles and further examples of how Amazon, how every large company now I guess, outsources everything instead of bringing or keeping functions in house.

It wasn’t all negative. Working at Amazon was multicultural. You have so many different kinds of people—most joined together in a common attitude of not wanting to be there. Some seem happy to be there. The happiest are the ones who appear to have a sense of community. That was heartening.

The second thing that made me sad was the fact you are constantly reminded how much you are a number, a data point, in a huge and overwhelming structure. Everything, and everyone, had a QR code assigned to them. Spaces on the floor were designated their own codes. It was lowkey fascinating to see this machine of parts and people humming along. You felt as if you were on the ground floor of capitalism itself. It was futuristic, to be sure. More to the point, it was dystopian. I’m not sure that I liked the future it showed me.

There was also the fact that everything at Amazon was mediated through an app you had to install on your phone. This includes all human resources functions, like applying for new skills-based training, and all staffing concerns relating to things like scheduling and various opportunities for time off. Concentrating your entire interaction with the company into an app wasn’t as great and efficient an experience as management claimed. You missed out on things because you weren’t constantly checking your phone. And I think one of the things that makes me sad is to be so attached to my phone.

New job

All that in the rearview, I am pleased to say that I have found a new job with an income I can finally support myself on. I’m working on saving money and getting over the challenges I’ve faced in 2025.

This is part one of an indefinite series of articles about my life in 2025 and beyond. Whether there will be more updates specifically on or, God willing, actual chapters of, Eathel the Bastard, I cannot say.

Today I feel better than I have in the past. I attribute this to the fact I’m planning to publish something, anything, and put myself out there once again. I hope this feeling stays, but all moods are fleeting. I know that more now than ever.

A poll for the baddies

Subscribe

It’s definitely been a while since I posted on the Eathel the Bastard publication, but it’s changed over the past year I’ve been working on it. Quite a bit has happened. I’m hoping to change that with more self-contained narratives in the form of short stories that keep the burners on for the epic novel that I want to release this year. 🤞

Today is January 5 and it’s Monday, which means that I’ve already gotten through the hardest part of my week.

Amazon schedules me for a double on Sunday, and it’s by far my hardest day. I guess I’m getting old, because as I’ve mentioned, the work at Amazon is not that strenuous, but it’s still takes a toll on my body. Still getting over what might’ve been the flu and/or a cold so forgive my cough and the general haphazardness of my narrative here.

The main thing that I wanted to say is that as I continue to work on my fantasy novel Eathel the Bastard, which you can find on my Substack so far, although it’s undergoing a lot of changes, I’m working on the first of what I hope will be a series of short stories that are self contained, that will help me get into the craft and practice of storytelling and plotting out a novel and outlining everything.

I’ll be publishing those also on my Substack and I’m hoping to have the first one done by the end of the week. I just started working on it today. I had a goal of 1000 words, but I’m not sure that I’ll get that done, because I have to leave for Amazon in a little over an hour, and I’m pretty drained already from last night’s work. When I come home, I just kind of wanna crash and watch TV. It’s a fight to continue to create content, but I’m committed to doing it.

Thanks for watching. Also follow me on TikTok!

‘@sam_liebl

Subscribe

It’s hard to keep doing this day after day. Especially on Mondays. I actually forgot that today was Monday and woke up thinking it was Sunday. I went about my business and remembered, by virtue of it being on my phone’s calendar, and for no other reason, that I had a therapy session to start at 8 AM this morning. It’s rare we have any sessions on Sundays, but not unheard of. It was awesome to have such a lovely conversation with my therapist, but I was only so relaxed because I thought it was actually Sunday. That’s a very disjointed experience to have, as might say.1

Disjointed or no, it was very disconcerting to be so confused about the day. I don’t usually need a reminder for the day of the week. I operate under a fog of war, which doesn’t help.2

Substack features

I want to start using more of Substack’s features. Can you engage with me a bit more than usual by entering some information into a poll?

This poll will be open for a week from the publication and I wonder whether you might let me know if you only want original fantasy fiction, like Eathel the Bastard or Madta the Spy. As a reminder, I’m working on two stories; the latter is a subplot of the other.

Note that the first option is OK to select. If you don’t read me, or just read the beginnings of posts, for example, that’s totally OK; I’d just like to get a sense of the number of engaged readers that I have.

I hope you’ll take a moment to answer the above and I’ll do my best to incorporate the feedback into my stuff.

Eathel: unfiltered

As you can see, Eathel the Bastard has evolved to be more than a fantasy story—it’s now the tale of an online, indie creator struggling to make ends meet. I think this makes for a better story overall actually; it’s something I’d be genuinely interested to read—in tandem with the action, you’ve got a real, on-the-ground view into what it’s like to hustle your way to success on Substack and beyond.

Thanks for bearing with me as I attempt to build some buzz around a story I believe in when I’ve had my coffee, and hate when I’m fiending.

It’s sales.

I once had a sales manager who dropped some knowledge on me: “sales is beating your head into the wall until the wall breaks—or your head does.”

Sales managers always have the best stories and know how to work words to make them interesting. I used to have this cool collection of them.

They included such pearls of folk wisdom like “She could close a revolving door,” meaning someone was good at sales.

“If you’re not out selling, you’re being outsold,” said T. V., another sales mentor.3

Included here are some additional thoughts to augment the Live video.

, — thank you for holding it down on the side. It can get a little slow over here. I’m not sure if that’s a good or a bad thing yet.

What sales has taught me

It’s interesting to me how much sales has given me

Boa live! The Live Experience across TikTok and Substack

Live is its own channel. Mark my words. And in the future, whatever from Lives take on Substack, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook and x/Twitter is going to be the way we passively consume content. I wonder if there is a paradigm of active vs. passive consumption. Maybe someone can help me with this. Well, this is Substack after all: it’s apparently the place for culture. Therefore, I’ll do some research and contribute to the conversation, I suppose.

The features in ’s Live product show potential, but they’re still not up to par with TikTok’s comprehensive, often overwhelming, array of options to enhance your Live for your audience.

It’s really the backend where Substack shines: its emphasis on analytics down to the Note-reply level. The focus or encouragement toward automating one’s content: we writers are presented with easy options to schedule content, and, in so doing, create a kind of content calendar; and, we’re able to benefit from a considerable amount of integrations with important platforms in the content space: YouTube,4 Spotify, Apple Music, etc.

Synthesizing the best Live experiences for automated marketing

**Simulcast on TikTik (I am chai_phillips—follow me! Tell me you’re coming from Substack and I’ll follow back.)

On this one, my maximum credits for ChatGPT expired and I was forced to deal with the consumer-grade one.

Songs

Get more from Sam Liebl in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app

The two names were (to follow on #booktok)

Ayman Chaudary

Celene Velez

Get more from Sam Liebl in the Substack app

Available for iOS and Android

Get the app