🪐 How a former magazine editor became a 'Narrative Optionalist,' an ally for those re-editing their lives

Hello again, or if we are meeting for the first time, I am Naomi Yusei😊
Using the 'editing techniques' I cultivated as a former magazine editor, I write for those who have lost their words amidst unreasonableness and the hardships of life, helping them reclaim their own stories.

I currently work under the title of Narrative Optionalist. Instead of forcing someone else's 'correct answer' onto you, I increase the 'state of being able to choose' within your situation. Delivering
options and a light to your hands in this way is my job and my mission🕯️

Here, I would like to share a little bit of my profile, detailing the journey of 'editing' and 'reconstructing' that led me to this work.

🏠 The origins of an editor, starting from a three-mat room

When I moved to Tokyo from the countryside in Tohoku as a student, I lived in a dormitory room that was only three mats in size, working at a newspaper delivery center. I slept for only 3 to 4 hours a night. The environment where I could read the Nikkei newspaper for free every day expanded my world.
The excitement of economics and management, the mechanisms of society, and the moments when words move reality. What I gained there was not so much grit, but rather the habit of reading the world through words and numbers📚

After working at an advertising agency and a printing company, I became a magazine editor. I would develop concepts, conduct interviews, structure articles, and polish headlines. I would take things that weren't getting across and refine them into a form that could be understood.
Eventually, I started my own editing company and became involved in supporting businesses. On the front lines, there were always circumstances that didn't come to light and honest feelings that were hard to express. I would touch upon those carefully and give them the shape of words. My work has always been 'editing'✍️

🌫️ The day I stopped editing my life, and what I saw

The turning point was the COVID-19 pandemic. Losing someone close to me wiped the slate clean on the premises of my life.
I moved my base to my parents' home, and in the time I spent standing still, what I began to see was a voiceless pain.

Emotions sealed away by discrimination, prejudice, and the pressure to 'read the room' or 'everyone is enduring it.'
When people lose their words, they become unable to choose. Swept away by the situation, unable to explain themselves, their own outlines begin to fade. As an editor, I did not want to overlook that reality.

“I need to re-edit my life.”
Convinced of this, I decided to become someone who supports the ability to choose, rather than someone who presents the answers. Instead of moving others with grand claims, I started from my own feet. To ensure that each person can re-choose with a sense of reality, I began by weaving words that leave room for interpretation🌱

🧭 The backbone embedded in the name 'Naomi Yusei'

My pen name, 'Naomi Yusei,' is not just for show.
One of its origins is the song 'You Say' by Lauren Daigle. In the song, the phrase 'You say I am loved' appears.

For me, the 'You' is not the evaluation of others, but the words that my future self says to my current self. A standard that supports me, unaffected by someone else's mood or the atmosphere. That 'form,' which I repeat to myself, becomes my backbone.

“No matter what you say, this is how I will live.”
Because I have this standard, I believe I can offer words that stay close to your sense of reality, rather than someone else's version of what is right.

🧵 What I am weaving on note (Site Map)

On note, I mainly weave articles on the following themes.

“I am re-editing my life. —Working Mom Re-editing—” & “I am re-editing my life.”

I record the process of recovering after being broken, using words that have a tangible feel.

“Touching the abyss of note”

While introducing creators with powerful words, I break down and explore the 'power of writing.'

☕〖Collaborative Magazine〗 Our Lunch Break

Work, parenting, partnership. Whether it's daily misunderstandings or small joys, we run a space where everyone brings their articles together, hoping they reach someone during their "lunch break" 🌿✨

🖊️ "Life Re-editing Lab" (Novel)

A socially conscious novel (12 episodes completed) about a course that turns failures, debt, divorce, gaps in employment history, and family wounds into "readable stories."

Mio Shiraishi uses a red pen to rephrase people's pasts, pushing her students toward success. However, behind the profitable pasts, erased names, deleted pains, and untold lives quietly return.

Can life truly be rewritten? Or are we just hiding the inconvenient chapters?

Communication techniques for parents and children that keep the door open

From days of scolding to days of silence, find words that can repair relationships. Change the design of your conversations on the days when replies are short. Building a home where a mother's words are "safe." Don't rush for answers; turn the key to the heart.

"An Era Worth Challenging: The Reality of 'Entrepreneurship' for Young People and Women"

🌿 From "a life decided by someone else" to "a life you choose yourself."
In this age overflowing with information, the way we work can be freer.

In this magazine, we deliver tips for young people and women to "work in their own way," through the realistic option of "entrepreneurship."

Entrepreneurship is not just for special people.

Give shape to what you love and live freely in terms of time and place.

Don't be bound by evaluations; design your daily life yourself.

We will carefully unravel the small steps to make such a life possible in a 6-part series.

💫 You can start just as you are now. This is a magazine that gently supports your challenge.

The toughest job in Japan is being a working mom

"I'm doing the right thing, yet I'm not rewarded." Uncovering the true nature of that discomfort through data and reality.

This series is a social documentary that visualizes the "walls that cannot be overcome by effort alone," based on statistics from the OECD and the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.

The reality of 5.5 times more unpaid labor.
A corporate culture where reduced working hours become the end of a career.
Even if there are vacancies in local daycare centers, you can't leave your child there.

――And yet, mothers are still smiling.

Not with anger, nor with complaints.
A six-chapter structure for moving society with sincerity.

An entrance that needs no explanation

From children's cafeterias—a general contact point for unreasonable hardships—to questioning various forms of injustice.

Small and medium-sized enterprises, startups, and sole proprietorships

I write tips on how to start a business, endure societal prejudice, and work hard to make your venture successful and sustainable.

'Practicing how to live on note'

—Writing was a practice for living. All 6 episodes now available.

Writing may not be a technique to reach someone else,
but a practice for re-living your own life.

This series is a fable themed around 'writing equals living,' featuring a writer traveling through the 'city' of note.

A quiet story about a traveler who, while shaken by evaluation, troubled by voices that don't reach, and yearning while comparing themselves to others,
still continues to write and discovers their own 'way of living.'

It begins at a station before dawn.
The final destination is a hill bathed in light.

On nights when you can only breathe by writing,
won't you become a line in this journey, too?

'Female manager? — I decline.'

I want to keep working. I want to cherish my family, too.
But I am no longer the only one losing something behind the scenes of trying to balance both.

This magazine is a story series depicting the real struggles of working women, starting with 'Female manager? — I decline.'
It records the quiet decisions and inner cries that lie beyond words like 'promotion,' 'work-life balance,' and 'the gap between work and home.'

To everyone who wishes for career advancement while also hoping to protect their inner peace.
Let's spend time here together thinking about 'choices that are true to yourself' rather than 'correct choices.'

Changing a workplace where 'nothing changes even if you speak up.'

THE VOICE SHIFT is a practical series for connecting voices born on the front lines of hotels and inns to management decision-making.

Staff, team leaders, and managers. Through three articles, we depict the process of solving challenges seen from each perspective using 'systems, not effort.'

Front-line ingenuity isn't shared, smiles decrease due to labor shortages, and things don't improve even though you're watching the numbers—.
We have compiled tips for deciphering these 'invisible problems' occurring in such workplaces from their structure and transforming them into organizations that keep moving forward.

We have condensed the essence of 'system improvement that starts with a voice,' which can be applied not only to hotels and inns but also to manufacturing, startup support, and M&A settings.
The voices from the front lines move the inn and change the management. Bring a quiet change to your workplace as well.

The voices from the front lines move the inn and change the management.
Bring a quiet change to your workplace as well.

I want to be someone who does not underestimate pain.
And I want to be someone who helps you reclaim the self-explanation stolen by the inability to put things into words, and increases your options. This is an editorial room for that purpose📌

🤝 Written for people like this

・Those who have been feeling an indescribable pain and can no longer explain themselves
・Those who want to re-choose their lives based on 'conviction' rather than 'correct answers'
・Those who want to follow the process of recovery without rushing
・Those who want to take their own story back into their own hands

When you are fumbling in the dark, what you need might be a small light to illuminate your feet rather than a flashy answer.
I would be happy if my words could become one of the lighthouses illuminating your path🌙
Let's re-edit your life together.