10 Essays + 10 Substack Recommendations

Includes direct links/PDFs to add to your digital garden this season

Dear friends,

I’ve written before about the idea of a digital garden — a curated, evolving space where you can return to ideas, essays, notes, and quotes that resonate over time. If you missed that post, you can find it here: Digital Garden Digest: Cultivating a Reading Life That Grows with You

Lately, a few questions keep coming my way:
- What are the newsletters I actually open?
- What writing do I return to when I need grounding, or a spark?
- And if someone were just starting their own digital garden—what would I suggest they plant?

So here’s a list — 10 essays and 10 newsletters — for when you’re in need of something thoughtful, something slow. The kind I think you might want to revisit when you have a lull in your days.

10 ESSAYS TO REVISIT

• The Pain Scale – Eula Biss

• On Self-Respect – Joan Didion

• The Uses of Anger: Women Responding to Racism – Audre Lorde

• The Cult of the Literary Sad Woman – Leslie Jamison

• Grand Unified Theory of Female Pain – Leslie Jamison

• In Defense of Despair – Hanif Abdurraqib

• Slow Change Can Be Radical Change – Rebecca Solnit

• A Palestinian Meditation in a Time of Annihilation – Fady Joudah

• Nothing Personal – James Baldwin

• The Schedule of Loss – Emily LaBarge

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💌 10 NEWSLETTERS TO SUBSCRIBE TO

I hope you find something you love in this list — something to bookmark, return to, or share. And if you have a favorite Substack or essay you think I should read, just pop it in the comments. I’m always looking for new things to plant in my own digital garden 🌱

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A NOTE ABOUT SUPPORTING THIS WORK

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I recently shared why I've turned on paid subscriptions for fossilisedflowers — not to gate content, but to sustain this space we're building together. After losing my job while raising two young children, I'm dreaming of the possibility of doing this work full time.

Everything I create will always remain free and accessible to everyone. If you're able to support this work through a paid subscription ($8/month or $80/year), you'll receive my deep gratitude, participate in monthly giveaways for my favorite books & objects, and receive a handwritten postcard — but most importantly, you'll be helping keep this tender space alive for all of us.

If you'd like to read more about this decision and what it means to me, you can find my full note here.

With love and gratitude,
Dhivya

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FROM THE ARCHIVES

💌 The Sunday Letter: Burnout Edition — a slow exhale in written form
📋 A Dopamine Menu — tiny things to reach for when nothing feels good
🌿 A Practical Guide to Rest & Slowing Down — part checklist, part companion