Sometimes You Need a Little Motivation

Simply put, I'm monitoring many aspects of my health. I've gotten back some wonderful blood test results that were... Maybe a little TOO comforting. However, my LDL (bad) cholesterol came back as borderline high. It's not the worst news since the offset of HDL (good cholesterol) is well within a healthy range. This means that it's not a huge red flag, but my love of eggs and dairy needs to be cut down.

I consider it a great thing. I've been wanting to find motivation to improve my mental and physical health, I haven't quite had the strong push I needed to be more aggressive with the physical. Since I started Cymbalta on a low dose, I've stumbled on some side effects that concern me: vivid dreams that startle me awake but are instantly forgotten, for one. I also feel a kind of detachment to my surroundings and it takes longer for me to motivate myself to move. Sometimes I catch my breathing being too shallow, a little dizziness and being tired. While it definitely helped remove lethargy and nerve pain, it seems a little too intrusive on the rest. I decided not to take it today and message my doctor to see what she has to say. I can always switch to Lyrica if this one doesn't work out. I really, really don't want to pretend I'm okay with any medication that trades too heavily on my goals, but this could be just due to my low drug tolerance and something that could taper off.

I veered off a little but the cholesterol test had me dropping workout videos into a playlist and pulling out my old P90X3 schedule. I want to pick that back up on Monday, see if I can get back into circuit training. This hot, volatile summer has made me lazy in more ways than one and I know that one way I can restore my energy and drive is to drop a few pounds again. Which also means that I'll be using every drop of energy trying to restore it. It was losing a bunch of weight the first time that motivated me to be creative again, but I know this time, I'll have to maintain both to feed the other.

Though my memory isn't always great, I do know that each successful trip into healthy, happy days always began with being scared shitless. Spraining my ankle on a tiny curb and a high blood pressure scare set me into exercising. Looking at files and files of unfinished projects scared me into being creatively ambitious. While it's very difficult for me to maintain focus, I'm hoping that medication can improve that in time too. 

But I don't like it. Even 'non-addictive' medicines don't comfort me because it's not the physical reliance that scares me as much as the insistence on half-assed habits that wreck some other aspect of health. I can't just obsess on diet and exercise if it means ignoring my creative progress, and vice versa. Yet it's very difficult for me not to obsess on the one thing making me happiest. I just have to learn to consolidate my health into a layered motivation, being conscious of all the things that will make sure happiness isn't a phase of euphoria in one and neglect of something else.

Being conscious of that isn't an epiphany. There were obstacles that left me scattered and grasping for answers. Yet now that I'm well and truly afraid again, the little rebel in me is gearing up to fight for what must be done.

Don't be afraid to be scared. Be afraid that nothing scares you enough to seek change.

The Fiction Author's Journey

Writers, even before they are authors, often hear a lot of similar lines from the people in their life. If not being asked to be a character in their book, then something else; perhaps that they have some ideas that would be great for their story. Sometimes it's a shared misery (or pretended misery more akin to a humble brag), sometimes it's a bit of pleasant nostalgia. If, like me, you're in the latter group, then no matter how many times you hear it, it always warms your heart a little that people want to be involved in your work, even in a passive manner. Sure, some people can be pushy or relentless, but in most cases, they are coming to you with a vulnerability, a trust that you won't reject their interest. So even if someone can get a little defensive or stand-offish, it's mostly coming from a place we can relate to, maybe a place where we've lashed out from before ourselves.

One thing I'm learning to tackle more are personal alignments. While I've said before that I don't make characters that line up very well with myself, I've been more generous in offering up vulnerable instances in the guise of fiction. I might change the relationships of the involved characters or put it in a wholly different environment, but the psychological landscape is an internal conflict that can take place in anyone, resonating with people for the intricacies of those similarities. It's true enough that people who share a diagnosis are still, for all intents and purposes, alone in their suffering. Yet in support groups or forums, people still find comfort that other people can better describe a feeling they are troubled by as long as they can't name it. Because of that, I've learned to use my experiences without making it about me-- I can transfer these details and name them, creating an environment that can be discussed or understood.

Perhaps. I'm also aware that I might be too wordy for some people, which I'm not using to insult anyone's level of intelligence. I don't just fixate on what characters do or even observe. I also let them muse on what they think they are seeing on people's faces. Often, they aren't right so I do rely on the reader not automatically trusting a character's observations sometimes.

Conversations. Hoo boy, that one was not so easy for me. I wouldn't say it has little to do with any social ineptitude on my part. I just started asking myself if people really talked like I was making them talk. Back when Gilmore Girls first came out, that was a huge point of contention, how rapid and instantly witty the characters were yet how emotionally inept they were as the counterbalance. While it was an enjoyable show, too often it felt disingenuous and unrelatable. While I don't expect fictional stories to be overly realistic, it can really take you out of a story too much if a character can't be believable in and of itself. Conversations can't just be witty or enjoyable to be successful, but I do labor to avoid the small talk as much as possible because I loathe it and... I'd rather the reader just assume it happens rather than painstakingly recreating those boring and 'realistic' moments. I take it seriously that a writer has the power to decide what parts of the story are worth being delivered. It can be tough to decide but conversations... if they're there, make them count. Also, I try not to use them to bend the rules of exposition. While it's okay to let a character explain some finer points, I really don't want them describing what might be way more interesting to play out in real time.

As a fiction author, I can become personally fixated on what I believe to be strengths and weaknesses of mine, though neither of them become off-limits to my story. I certainly want to play to my strengths, but at the same time, those weaknesses could stand to be challenged and reformed as well. While I don't care to subject people to bad writing like subjects for my mad experiments, I find it worthwhile to go ahead and write them, then work out if they should stay or go or just get worked on over time. Play to your strengths, play on your weaknesses. While at some point, I have to make an executive decision for the good of the story, there is really no such thing as wasted effort.

Each writer's journey will differ and I can't say being a published, marketing author makes it any easier. No matter what paths you take, remember to include some room for self-discovery. Even in non-fiction, there's room for that, and not just for those memoirs either. I'm playing with the idea of a how-to-draw book that combines the technical with the intuitive, aiming to make it an experience that doesn't allow for the feeling of failure to inhibit you. To write a book that honest and evocative, I do have to delve into what I used to refer to as 'the zone', that place where you turn off the harsh critic and trade it for the helpful one. This is a place that does require conscious introspection into a mental process.

I don't think there is any such thing as a valuable book written by a completely detached writer. While we all need a healthy dose of logic and reason to create successful stories, we also can't completely distance ourselves from the subjects. Instead, there's ideally a place where our work is neither too precious for criticism nor too detached for emotional response.

In any case, keep at your own personal journeys. Back to editing for me, but think on your own strengths and weaknesses sometime. You may want to reevaluate that every so often, really assess what you found to be stronger or weaker in your writing and ask yourself how you can build from that.