Welcome to There Has To Be More, a newsletter about the gnawing sensation that there is more and the unrelenting desire to find it.
Hello! My name is Divya Sharma. I am fighting the urge to immediately present myself alongside all of the identity tags that are commonly followed by one’s name. However, in this space, who I am seems more important than what roles I act out. So instead, I will start by saying I am a lover of poetry, sober dancer, horrid speller, hopeless romantic, and fan of wind.
For months I have found myself writing this newsletter in my head. Each article would come at night as strings of prose pertaining to a ruminating question. Yet, I found myself daunted by the idea of my words being finite and visible. I didn’t want to be known for a single “take” or, quite honestly, known at all. I hate to be perceived, and welcoming judgement felt antithetical to how I have behaved most of my life. But somehow, I still felt like I was doing myself an injustice if I did not state my thoughts with the strength of my full throat. So here I am, taking what feels like a risk, exercising my rights to speech, hoping to add value to even just one single persons life –– even if that person ends up being myself alone.
My favorite newsletters offer relief to my inbox. They are the first things I look for each morning and the only reason I check my email some days. They serve as jumping boards for enthralling real-life conversations, research deep dives, and personal introspection. I aspire to create this kind of content.
In There Has To Be More, I hope to share questions and musings. This aim may look like pop culture analysis, political discourse, poetry, or just recommendations of things I love. I reserve the right to make no sense at times and change my mind frequently. In exchange for your kindness as a reader, I will always do my best to write from a place of compassion and thoughtfulness.
I am here because I have spent many days trapped inside the feeling that there has to more. This feeling can arise in states of despair, confusion, or hope. There has to be more we can do to help others. There has to be a greater reason we are alive on this earth. There has to be more we do not yet understand. We are not stuck in our current circumstances. As a meliorist, I believe that progress is possible, but not necessarily inevitable, and that humans, with persistent effort, can better themselves and their surroundings. We can find more. We can create more. This is my attempt at both.