My guess is that you are feeling subscription fatigue, too. It seems like everything is a subscription these days!
Not only do we have many subscriptions in our normal life—music, tv/movie streaming, sports streaming, audiobooks, Amazon Prime, workouts, and on and on—but I’m inundated with subscriptions in my writing life! And while the ones in my normal life might not be “essential,” many of the ones in my writing life are just that.
For example, Microsoft Word requires a subscription. And since most people use that, I have to have a subscription for editing many of my clients.
I have subscriptions to Apple Care on my computer and iPad, both of which I use daily for work.
Additionally, there are subscriptions for various programs I use, including one for my newsletters, another for delivering ebooks, a third for creating graphics, a fourth for organizing my research files, and a fifth for my calendar/to-do list.
Of course, subscriptions are also required for website hosting, domain names, and computer backups.
It’s really not that I’m even complaining about the money. I know these are the costs of business. But it’s not easy to keep up with all of them—how to best use them and at what level to subscribe!
For example, I recently realized two of my subscriptions had many of the same functions. Since the more expensive one does more, I’ve been slowly eliminating my need for the other. (Which is why, if you happen to go to the store on my website, it is currently empty. I’m working on that!)
I suppose now that this is the world we live in, there is no going back. But I think the myriad subscriptions we find ourselves holding these days contribute to our general stress.
Do you have subscription fatigue? How have you handled this?