Reason to Be January 2026 Update: Reflecting on 2025, Looking Forward to 2026

Newsletter Revival

What’s this? The Reason to Be newsletter/blog is making a comeback? Yes, after seven months without making a blog post, I decided I am going to revive the Reason to Be newsletter for the following reasons:

1. I have been consistently posting shortform content (more on that later) but I greatly miss the non-dopaminergic simplicity of the blog format.
2. One of my new year’s resolutions is to slow down, and I think having some sort of regular newsletter will give me dedicated time to reflect.

With that being said, let’s get into the 2025 Reason to Be recap!

2025 Reason to Be Recap: Quick Stats

Drafts written: 2
Songs written: 21
Songs started (but not completed): 4
Songs cut: 18
Songs written AND cut in 2025: 9
Actors and production team members involved: 20 (thanks everyone! <3)
Audience members reached: guessing ~300 (thanks everyone! <3)
Shortform videos created: 157
Applications submitted: 8

Now, let’s get into some more detailed reflections!

The Circle of Life: The Birth and Death of Songs

In 2025, I wrote these new songs:

• “Reflection” #1-#4 (Val, draft 9)
• “Memories” (Instrumental, draft 9)
• “Outside” (Company, draft 9-draft 10)
• “IVANA for Short” (IVANA, draft 10)
• “IVANA for Short (Reprise)” (IVANA, draft 10)
• “Hey” #1 and #2 (Val, draft 10)
• “How Do You Do It?” (Val, draft 10)
• “Tomorrow May Be Bright” (Lacey, draft 10)
• “Reach Deep Inside” (Val, draft 10)
• “Music was Always” (Val, draft 10)
• “Can You Play Today?” (Val and IVANA, draft 10-present)
• “News Report” (Val, IVANA, Lacey, and News Reporter, draft 10-present)
• “Winter Wish” (Instrumental, draft 10-present)
• “Winter Wish C” (Instrumental, draft 10-present)
• “Winter Wish B” (Young Lacey and Young Val, draft 11-present)
• “Too Late” (Val, draft 10-present)
• “And a Crowd” (Val, draft 10-present)
• “What Am I to Do?” (Val, draft 11-present)
• “Moments” (IVANA, draft 11-present)
• “Interview Prep” (Youngish Val and IVANA, draft 11-present)
• “Tiny Drop of Rain” (Val and Lacey, draft 11-present)

And let us also celebrate these songs that I started in 2025 but haven’t finished yet:

• “Why Make Music?” (Youngish Val, draft 11-present)
• “This is Your Chance” (Val’s Dad, draft 11-present)
• “Inch by Inch” (Lacey, draft 11-present)
• “Jingle Bells/Bows” (Instrumental, draft 11-present)

But of course, there can be no Circle of Life without death. Let us take some time to remember the songs we lost:

• “Ladybird” (Trapper Kid, draft 1-draft 9)
• “I Want a Future” (Lacey, draft 2-draft 10)
• “Finale” (Company, draft 5-draft 10)
• “Merry Christmas Val” (Carolers, draft 8) (this one was written and cut in the span of two weeks!)
• “Reflection” #1-#4 (Val, draft 9)
• “Composing” (Val, draft 8-draft 9)
• “Song Inside My Heart” (Beethoven, draft 8-draft 10)
• “Song Inside Your Heart” (Beethoven, draft 8-draft 10)
• “My Two Best Friends” (Young Val, draft 8-draft 10)
• “Memories” (Instrumental, draft 9)
• “Outside” (Company, draft 9-draft 10)
• “IVANA for Short” (IVANA, draft 10)
• “IVANA for Short (Reprise)” (IVANA, draft 10)
• “Hey” #1 and #2 (Val, draft 10)
• “How Do You Do It?” (Val, draft 10)
• “Tomorrow May Be Bright” (Lacey, draft 10)
• “Reach Deep Inside” (Val, draft 10)
• “Music was Always” (Val, draft 10)

I know some of the songs were fan favorites, like “Ladybird” and “Outside.” Alas, the plot demands what it demands! I don’t make the rules.

Now, here’s a question for the keen eye: which character did I cut and which character did I add between draft 10 and 11 (current draft)?

Presentations

We had three amazing presentations of Reason to Be this year! In March, we produced the first ever workshop production of Reason to Be at Pomona College. Then in May, we had a short showcase at Harvey Mudd College’s Alumni Weekend. In September, we hosted a reading on Zoom. Thank you to everyone who participated and watched! And a huge thank you to everyone who donated as well.

Thank you, donors!

Thanks to the generous people who donated at the HMC Alumni Weekend presentation and the Zoom reading, I was able to compensate the actors for the Zoom reading and upgrade from hobbyist to professional-grade software for music notation and production. Thank you so so much for supporting independent artists!

Getting It “Out There”

In 2025 I received some important advice that I should stop being a perfectionist and start putting my work out there. So I started doing this through two avenues, one is through formal applications to fellowships, awards, residencies, etc. and the other is through social media.

Submission opportunities often require song demos, so learning some music production/audio engineering became something that I started to do. I’m still not very good at it, but at least now I know what EQ and compression are!

Despite my prior reputation as a Luddite, I decided that the plunge into social media would be worth it for my career, so I started posting shortform video content almost daily on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. I mostly post short vlogs about my writing process and song snippets, though I also occasionally post reviews of San Diego theatre, educational videos, and memes. Somehow I have over 700 followers on TikTok now.

Though I am somewhat morally opposed to social media, I have to say I do receive benefits from posting on it. I have some repeat fans that comment on my videos so it feels nice having some sort of small online community. And also even with my low follower account, my social media presence has led to tangible benefits in real life. Long story short, La Jolla Playhouse reposted one of my reels, it was seen by UCSD MFA students, and now I help out with sound on the shows. I have only been posting for about six months so I’m intrigued in seeing where my social media takes me in 2026.

Plans for 2026

This is How I Choose My Fate

I had two realizations recently:

1. I’m actually extremely serious about wanting to pursue a professional career in musical theatre writing.
2. I think songwriting for musical theatre is legitimately the only thing I’m talented at. Note that I specifically said talent, not skill. I feel as though I am skilled at math through hard work but I don’t have the same intuition for it as I do for songwriting.

I’ve been thinking a lot about how I’ve really been pedal to the metal on Reason to Be for the entirety of its development. Really, I have been pedal to the metal for everything for the entirety of my life. But if I’m really serious about making Reason to Be the best it can be, then I need to slow down. People often say that writers “write to deadlines,” and I think churning out a lot of drafts quickly was very helpful to me in the early stages when I was still figuring the piece out. Now that I’m in more of the refinement stage, I feel like I really need to take my time, both for the quality of the piece as well as for my own sanity. So I’m not going to give myself a deadline for the next draft, and I’m also not going to give myself pressure to submit anywhere in 2026. I will still want to do some presentations but they will probably be more casual, for works in progress. I think when it happens, it will happen, so I don’t need to enforce a timeline on myself. Also, I plan on spending less time writing and more time studying music and theatre, to increase my aptitude as a composer and writer.

Aside from the more general change in my approach to deadlines, I am also changing how I approach the day-to-day. In the past, I’ve spent the day grinding research, academics, etc. leaving myself weekends, late nights, and school breaks to work on Reason to Be. My new approach is to block out my entire morning before noon every day as solely dedicated to either health-related activities or musical theatre writing/study. Obviously I will not be able to do this all the time, since I have obligations to my PhD program, but I will try to protect this time as much as possible. Instead of prioritizing my academics and cramming in the writing in whatever time remains, I am going to prioritze musical theatre and cram my academics in whatever time remains. This is highly experimental and it may completely collapse but it is worth an attempt.

Double New Year’s Resolution

I want to increase time spent on my musical theatre career (whether that be writing, studying, or marketing) and I also want to decrease my unnecessary screen time. I was inspired by this paper clip anecdote so I decided to purchase two packs of paper clips and gave myself the following rules:

1. Add one paper clip for every hour spent working on my musical theatre career.
2. Remove one paper clip for every hour spent on unnecessary screen time (necessary activities such as schoolwork or research do not count).
3. By the end of the year I should have at least 500 paper clips in the jar.

This way I can still allow myself the occasional YouTube video, as long as I also work on my musical for the same amount of time. I know for a fact I will want to play Slay the Spire 2 when it comes out in March, so I better start cracking open some Sondheim scores!