Creative Coffee

A food memoir about ambition, burnout and ugly feelings

One of the joys of my creative life is knowing other creative women, and growing alongside them. I’d followed Lydia Pang’s work for years before we finally met in person in 2019—back when she was creative director at Refinery29, about to move to Portland to become creative director at Nike. Our first friend-date was at a restaurant in New York, in the middle of our younger hustle years—bold, ambitious, HUNGRY and painting on our lipstick every morning with a smile. I was in New York to record a Skillshare workshop, meet with my new PR team and record a live episode of Ctrl Alt Delete podcast at WNYC Studios. Life was different, then. It was so fun reconnecting for this conversation. Lydia dialing in from her home in rural Wales with her husband and young baby; me from my quiet leafy corner of London. I have always loved Lydia’s confidence, one of those women who stands up tall, feet on the ground, rooted in herself. I had no doubt that her first book, Eat Bitter [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/eat-bitter-lydia-pang/7955074?ean=9781784746308&next=t&next=t&affiliate=153], would be excellent. She’s a creative powerhouse: I could go on about her academic background studying at The Courtauld Institute of Art, or being a judge at various big industry awards like Cannes Lions, or running her own successful creative studio MØRNING—but basically, Lydia Pang doesn’t do things by halves. The Eat Bitter project began as a self-published zine, and was available as a one-time pre-order back in 2020. It wasn’t just recipes; it also embodied the “struggles of her Hakka ancestors… whose ingenuity produced a distinct food culture based on fermenting and foraging.” It gained traction, and people wanted more. Then, the publisher Chatto & Windus won a ‘competitive eight-way auction’ to publish Eat Bitter as her debut memoir. It launches this week. Structurally, it has eight recipes from the ‘most painful and formative moments’ of Pang’s life—and there is a generosity of spirit, as though she’s welcoming you into her home and laying it all out on a glorious platter to be shared and consumed. ‘Eat Bitter’ is a Chinese proverb that means ‘to endure pain before tasting sweetness’—aka: we can do hard things and things take time. The idea of slowing down, enduring, surrendering. It is a book for our times. It’s about burnout, grief and the aftermath of ambition. It’s not just about food; rather, food serves as a metaphor for life stories, consumerism, and nutrition—or the lack thereof. Pang argues that we live in a culture of speed and convenience, and that the system perpetuates this insatiable modern appetite: “We live in a world that venerates optics and quick fixes over slowing down. Time is our enemy; it is stolen from us and yet it’s our fault for letting it slip away. [..] The system doesn’t want us sober and awake, thoughtful and reciprocal. No, it wants us to soothe ourselves with sugar that rots our teeth, so we’re ready to be sold a dental package, distracted from the horrors that ensue and circle us.” - Eat Bitter The book is about finding nourishment again. Not in quick fixes, but rediscovering the things that stretch us, slow us down, encourage us to use our hands. We are so worried about ‘wasting our time’ in our quest for validation that we forget to invest in things that don’t show immediate results: “Eating bitter is not a ‘fix’ you can throw money at; you will be challenged to pause and reflect. Simmer. Eating bitter is not something you can flash-fry and check off your list. You cannot excel at this.” Surely, Pang says, we shouldn’t be afraid to do things that are ‘pointless’. We should waste more time trying stuff out. We don’t always need to be productive. It’s exhausting, really, how much of modern work-culture is all about gaming the system. Life ‘hacks’. AI. Shortcuts. Wanting everything to be a success immediately. She discusses how we are all missing out by trying to always cheat the system. Instead of networking, why not write a handwritten letter to someone you love? Instead of ‘happiness hacks’, why not let ourselves feel our disgusting feelings? “Let me fester, for f**k’s sake. Manifestation, goals, journaling, projecting (all things I’ve done with varying degrees of success) can be suffocating. [..] But eating bitter is not about training our minds to be and do and think better, day by day. I don’t want to be a sunny person who always sees the opportunity, rather I want to be a feeling and fearless person.” Whether it’s finding way her way back home after burnout, or finding ways to reconnect with her husband, or grieving a painful miscarriage, or overcoming health issues or heartbreak—eating bitter acts as the rudder, steering the ship back to sanity. Pang slowly heals by putting the productivity mindset down—and instead spends hours and hours making wontons with her father, spends time in the forest, puts the perfectionism down, lets herself unravel: “I had spent my entire existence achieving (and performing) the ultimate version of a best life, and I’d been addicted to the cortisol of it all. But now I was numb, burned out, sad that I was sad — my master plan had not served, and there was something shameful about that. [..] Looking back, it makes me smile that I thought I hid it. Of course my parents knew. But they simply accepted me and Roo, and they fed us.” Feeding each other is an act of love. The book is an ode to her family and their Hakka heritage. It’s about family and food, yes—but more than that, it’s about having the guts to be imperfect, messy and unapologetically yourself. It is about finding resilience in letting your ugly sides be finally seen. It’s about how we care for each other when the chips are down. It is a gift to the reader when a fellow ambitious creative woman lets the mask purposefully slip, letting you in, showing the messy and vulnerable sides of coming out the other side of the girlboss era. I felt seen in her words. The ambition hasn’t gone away, but it’s definitely morphed into something else—something more solid and matured. Brené Brown really was onto something when she spoke about the ‘power of vulnerability’, wasn’t she? Pang said in our interview: “I wanted to be so perfect, and glossy and powerful, I wanted a vessel to put all of my ugly bits.” That’s exactly what Eat Bitter [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781784746308] https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781784746308is. In its raw ‘ugliness’, it is a thing of beauty. I found the book emotional, brave, and eye-opening, and I highly recommend it. Thank you Lydia! Get your copy of Eat Bitter here [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781784746308]. In this episode (available to listen to at the top of this post 🎧):— getting into writing during the pandemic— the power of ‘pointless creativity’; and how the book turned from a fun zine to a full-blown book proposal— having an agent who pushes and challenges you— why timing matters for writing memoir— the power of a small tight-knit network— how creativity is about building your own world— how Lydia is marketing the book (bone broth candle anyone?)— how food/recipes is a vessel to tell stories— the power of the ‘messy’ generalist — Are we impatient with our creativity?— Playing with our ‘ugly’ feelings, and different versions of ourselves— Writing about real people and real events in a memoir— Self care vs self-ambition and marriage This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe [https://thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Do authors still need gatekeepers?

Amy Suto’s book Write for Money and Power [https://rstyle.me/+OVDiBeTvnoFuVQ6hRt8sjA] has an arresting cover. It’s bold. It’s not messing around. It asks: can you be an artist — and want money and power? Inside a system that doesn’t often grant artists much power? How many of us have been sold the starving artist myth? That to be an artist, you should be living off nothing, and never ever “sell out”? I met Amy last year at a writing retreat I was leading in Tuscany, and she mentions it in the book. It was such a lovely surprise to come across some of the reflections and takeaways from the week we spent together. I enjoy watching Amy deliver her work with confidence and generosity. The book is well laid out. The main headline of the book: “This is the golden age of writers who know how to sell their work without apology.” I underlined so many things with my yellow highlighter. It is structured in a kind of addictive way—each section gives you resourceful tips and advice, there is no fluff. Amy introduces the book explaining where she came from: Hollywood writer’s rooms. The Hollywood writer strikes happened. Work dried up. Contracts ended. Then, she gets diagnosed with Rheumatoid arthritis and needs to figure out a way to manage her symptoms and, hopefully, heal. Amy’s career pivot and health problems led her towards the world of freelancing, ghost-writing and self-publishing. She’s leaves the Hollywood system behind her. Why write for the gatekeepers, when you could write for potential readers instead? She says: “A self-published book gives you something to sell. It’s your intellectual property. It earns while you sleep. It helps your newsletter audience go deeper and gives you a chance to build long-term assets instead of waiting on publishers or agents.” Amy delivers some great phrases in the book. She says she noticed “the fear underneath the champagne toasts” at industry parties. She believes “the dream isn’t real if you can’t own it”. She describes traditional book contracts or a staff writer job on a TV show as “a very fancy cage.” It’s not a business model that suits the writer. She isn’t afraid to critique The System in this book. The same system that floats corporate publishing or Hollywood: “The system itself is not designed to make you rich, powerful or free. It’s meant to benefit the people at the top. It’s designed to keep you grateful. It’s designed to keep you waiting.” How long have you been WAITING to receive a reply about something? It’s common in big industries. It’s slow, slow slow. She asks the reader practical questions. Say your industry dries up tomorrow. What are you left with? “No email list. No reader connection. No platform you control.” It is a call to arms to writers: Own Your Stuff. Her message is clear: we believe in the ‘starving artist myth’ because it benefits all the middlemen. The book reads as a huge permission slip to writers who want to try out making things on their own terms. She says we used to need validation, “now we need a laptop and the guts to hit ‘publish’.” Another myth explored in the book is the idea that the cream rises to the top. She believes we’re sold this story that the good stuff will just magically get discovered. This myth of ‘getting discovered’ stops writers and creatives from making their stuff. They sit around waiting, instead of putting things out there to be discovered by readers, or the Internet, instead. She says “the creator economy doesn’t reward polish, it rewards participation.” I love how she says to the writers brave enough to hit publish: “Welcome to the arena.” Amy shares success stories which read as very inspirational. She makes a lot of money herself. Not everyone is going to have this worldwide success, but isn’t it fun to think “ooooh what if?” in a self-publishing world of no limitations? She writes about Andy Weir, who had self-published The Martian on Amazon for 99p before it went mad with readers. She tells stories of the newsletter Stratechery which apparently makes [https://medium.com/better-marketing/how-one-writer-makes-3-2-million-a-year-from-a-newsletter-476f011104a9] $3.2 million a year. People like Heather Cox Richardson [https://substack.com/profile/4875576-heather-cox-richardson] on Substack who apparently also makes seven figures. In our conversation, we talk about money. Amy talks about how ‘not all dollars are the same’. There is an energy flow, a feeling, an exchange. For example, I hardly make money from podcast advertising nowadays, because the relentlessness came at a cost to my authenticity and wellbeing. I wanted to earn money through my writing and connection and flow, which is why Substack felt right for me. We talk a bit about AI in this conversation. Near the end of the book, Amy says she uses AI to help when making creative projects. Not for the writing itself; but for the admin, the grunt work. Why would you go through hundreds of pages manually, when you could use an AI to organise transcriptions? I personally don’t want AI anywhere near my creative work, I don’t want to collaborate with robots on ideas. But, I’d be open to AI assisting with intern-level admin work. She says: “I don’t see AI as a replacement for human creativity and thoughtfulness. I see it as hiring the world’s cheapest, fastest, always-available intern.” Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments. I hope you enjoy this conversation. Amy is more embedded in the self-publishing world and her lens on tech from living in San Francisco. I got a lot from the conversation and the book—and I enjoy the idea of self-publishing no longer being a dirty word. Resources mentioned:— Write for Money and Power: [https://rstyle.me/+OVDiBeTvnoFuVQ6hRt8sjA] The Anti-Starving Artist’s Guide— The rise of the Substack book [https://sorrywereprosed.substack.com/p/here-comes-the-substack-book] by Alys Key [https://substack.com/profile/3438121-alys-key] — Kevin Kelly’s 1,000 True Fans [https://kk.org/thetechnium/1000-true-fans/]— A Year of Nothing [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781917523585]— The Success Myth: Letting go of having it all [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781804990766]— Make Writing Your Job [https://www.makewritingyourjob.com/] This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe [https://thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

What happens when you spend a fallow year underground?

After reading Kathy Slack’s Rough Patch: How a Year in the Garden Brought Me Back to Life [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781472148858], I immediately wanted to speak with her. I had a feeling we’d have a good conversation, not least because her book shares so many themes with my own, A Year of Nothing [https://www.emmagannon.co.uk/preorder], which launched this week. We both write about deeply personal years in which, against our will, we were forced to let go, opt out, and go underground—years that made very little sense at the time. Mine unfolded recently; Kathy’s took place more than a decade ago. Our situations differed in many ways, and we used different language to describe our experiences—and while I’m not sure the word burnout ever fully captures what the soul moves through in these dark times, it remains an easy shorthand for the culture around us. Beneath the surface, there were striking similarities in our stories. We were both looking back on particularly challenging years in our lives, and we both chose to write them down and open up. We both lived through turbulent periods in which our worlds were turned upside down, and later wrote about the slow process of coming back to life: emerging from dark, fallow seasons and digging our hands back into the soil of life. In Rough Patch [https://uk.bookshop.org/p/books/rough-patch-how-a-year-in-the-garden-brought-me-back-to-life-kathy-slack/7642085?ean=9781472148858&next=t&affiliate=153], Kathy writes about leaving her glossy advertising career in London—a life that looked like a ‘dream’ but was quietly draining her soul: and discovering unexpected solace in her vegetable patch. Her book offers a brilliant exploration of the healing power of nature and the practice of self-compassion, and along the way, I picked up some useful gardening tips and nourishing recipes. In this honest chat, we discuss the differences between depression and burnout, the importance of deep rest, kindness toward ourselves, how a memoir isn’t a manual, abundance vs ‘success’, choosing to be child-free, and the deeply satisfying feeling of growing your own vegetables from scratch. Hope you enjoy. 🌱 Other books/links mentioned: * Kathy’s Substack ‘Tales from the Veg Patch’ [https://kathyslack.substack.com/] * Kathy’s cookbook: From the Veg Patch: 10 favourite vegetables, 100 simple recipes everyone will love [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781529107968] * The Success Myth: Letting go of having it all [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781804990766] This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe [https://thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Why do we write memoir? (with Elizabeth Gilbert)

(Full episode for paid subscribers on Substack.) I have been lucky enough to interview Liz Gilbert multiple times over the years. First almost ten years ago now, when I launched my podcast Ctrl Alt Delete [https://www.emmagannon.co.uk/podcast] in 2016. We spoke on Skype, the audio was tinny, it was the early days of podcasting, I was in my mid-twenties recording from my spare box-room in my old Hackney flat. I remember how magical it felt to be speaking with a woman I admired so much. I was invited to her book launch luncheon for Big Magic [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781408866757] in London members’ club and I sat with journalists ten years older than me. I interviewed Liz again in 2019, when I was writing my first novel Olive [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9780008382735], and her brilliant novel City of Girls [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781526627544] was published. I went to the Bloomsbury offices on a bright sunny day, walking through Bedford Square Gardens with a t-shirt that said Sigourney Weaver on it. In April last year, I had the honour of introducing Liz on stage in front of thousands of people at the Barbican as part of her UK tour, and I got to attend one of her sold-out creativity workshops. As readers, we get to see all her different eras. During our conversation, we call the writing life ‘living out loud’ and ‘learning in public.’ For many Millennial women like me, Liz has been an unapologetic symbol of living a creative life, leaning into solitude, travel, adventure—and quite frankly: doing whatever you want with your one wild and precious life. Before All the Way to the River [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781526654564] came out this year—her new memoir all about her all-consuming relationship with her late partner Rayya Elias—I was lucky enough to read an early copy in proof form. I was absolutely glued to it, pretty much ignoring my husband for two days, totally immersed in Liz’s world. I love Liz’s novels for this reason, they’re big and expansive, an intricately built world to escape into, and I love this about Liz’s non-fiction too—she lets us into the full truth of what’s been going on in her life and shows us around. She did it in Eat Pray Love [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781408883174], Committed [https://uk.bookshop.org/a/153/9781408844472], and now this new book. It takes courage to say: Actually, you know what, I’m still a work in progress—and aren’t we all? She says life is full of ‘good guesses’ and it suggests that we should all have compassion for our past selves who were trying to figure out all of this *points around*. We don’t have to tie up our stories in pretty packages. We don’t have to be ‘consumed’ easily. We don’t have to have our personal stories confused with ‘giving advice’ or being a guru. We live in ever-changing lives and worlds. Life is messy—and so are the memoirs that follow. “I’ll see you in ten years with the next memoir. We’ll see what happens after this.” — Elizabeth Gilbert I loved interviewing Liz again this week, about our books, writing fiction vs non-fiction, ‘cooking’ our writing before publishing it, and why we do what we do. I also asked her for some friendly advice as my own memoir A Year of Nothing [https://www.emmagannon.co.uk/preorder] publishes in January. I hope you enjoy the conversation (and how progressively dark my office gets over the recording lol, it was 4pm in the UK i.e. winter hours!) xoxoxo Timestamps during our conversation: 00:00 - An introvert on tour06:00 - All The Way To The River and how it was born08:00 - Journalling vs ‘cooked’ writing10:00 - How would Eat Pray Love look in 2025?13:00 - Self-help vs memoir16:00 - Having respect for your readers18:30 - The myth of the ‘guru’20:00 - The fear of publishing a memoir23:00 - Dealing with judgment or criticism25:00 - The reason why we write books27:00 - When a memoir demands to be written30:00 - Writing the book you want to read34:00 - Choosing which form to write in37:00 - Fiction vs non-fiction 40:00 - Creativity and divinity 44:00 - “Success” isn’t enough47:00 - A darkness retreat50:00 - Martha Beck advice54:00 - What’s next for Liz 56:00 - US vs UK audiences1:00 - Where do we write?1:05 - Alone vs lonely1:07 - Women and invisibility 1:13 - The end! More on similiar topics: This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe [https://thehyphen.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Why we shut down successful podcasts

This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit thehyphen.substack.com [https://thehyphen.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_7] In 2016, Caroline Donahue [https://substack.com/profile/37148695-caroline-donahue] and I each started our own podcasts, recording hundreds of episodes with guests. As the industry grew, our shows became our main focus, and eventually, we both decided—separately—to shut them down. In 2023, I decided to end Ctrl Alt Delete [https://www.emmagannon.co.uk/award-winning-podcaster]after 15 million downloads and superstar guests like Richard E. Grant, Lena Dunham and Greta Gerwig, in or…