I need to learn to accept that I have been given – or been given access to – all the answers I need. That I have been prepared appropriately for every challenge and question before it needs to be met.
I need to learn to accept it.
And I need to learn to see those answers in time, to realize what I already know about how to meet challenges before or as I am dealing with them, and use the tools that have been given to me more consistently.
I … I apparently already say in various ways that I “have all the answers” I need, but … I never heard myself saying it that way, even when people were repeating it back to me. I was talking on the phone to Stacy yesterday for a couple of hours (thanks again; I didn’t realise until I got back into the Starbucks and my friendly baristas were asking me why I’d gone home that I’d been on the phone for so long) and it came up a couple of times, and the second time when she told me I had all the answers and I tried to say (as I have been trying to tell people over and over again for months now) “I don’t have all the answers!” she actually put it in a way that I could hear that I DO say that I have all the answers. A lot, apparently. I’m going to try to pay attention to myself speaking more closely, looking for that phrase – I can’t … I hadn’t ever heard myself saying it before Stacy so reasonably pointed it out.
And … well… I DO seem to have the answers I need… and … I often find that when I have a question I just can’t figure out the answer to, I eventually figure out that the answer is something I said out loud to someone else (or to myself, I’m not sure there’s a difference, sometimes) and … somehow misunderstood my own words.
So in going back over and over my own words in as many conversations as I can recall accurately, as many emails and chat logs as I have access to, I’ve been looking closely at what I said and finding things … layers of meaning I hadn’t realised were there… entirely. I haven’t been looking much at emails and chat logs the last few days, but there has been a certain amount of looking that has been filling my time instead – I’ve been trying to edit Book Two. There’s a lot in there.
A lot.
Wow.
I’ve been reading the first half of the book and … there are things I’m appreciating about it that … I’m pretty sure aren’t in the second half. There is … well, I’m not there yet in my reading, but I remember writing it somewhat, and I believe there’s a major shift in the writing style between the first and second halves of the book. Before and after that italicized section I want to tear down and re-write entirely. And … there’s a lot I want to change about the second half. I need to add a number of sentences here and there to make the entire birth process more apparent, more realistic, more detailed, more painful for the reader. I need to go into more detail about the particulars of what make the actual birth / lack of birth … well, what, if it were depicted visually would be clearly horrifying, but I’m not sure comes across effectively in the descriptions and mental images created. I need to go into more emotional detail, perhaps explain more of what has been assumed by the characters – there is much that I thought ought to be explained in future books or not at all that … I am having second thoughts, thinking perhaps I should go into more detail on the “second wave” and what they were doing, explain that the tall man defeated the entire army on his own more explicitly… that sort of thing. And totally re-write the “prom” discussion. it isn’t prom, it’s … some other dance. I know, I know.
And… and I … I was reading the book and it was like being in my head again at each moment the words were being written. I could see, right there on the page, where I was, what I was thinking and feeling and … I can see some of my questions, some of my answers on the page, mixed into the story. And I keep having to stop reading. My mind goes off in directions unrelated to editing, to what is taking place on the surface of the story, in the words on the page. I get too distracted by what I’m learning about myself between the lines to read the lines, and … yesterday it meant stopping for a long phone call with Stacy. And then chatting with the Starbucks employees for a long time, and … doing some editing for a bit, but then going to watch The Son of the Mask (which … I liked a lot, I think) and … not looking at my book at all today.
Today, I … I don’t know how or why, but I slept until 11:30AM. Then … I did some laundry. Yep. And ironed. While watching Indian Summer (from Netflix, because I’d never seen it) on DVD. And then watched Good Eats Art of Darkness III and an episode of Iron Chef America on my computer, where I’d downloaded them via BitTorrent. And … Uhh… Watched the second half of Frailty, then Enterprise, then some other stuff… and then another episode of Iron Chef America (on the TV this time) while working on an art project. Besides shirts, I haven’t worked on any art projects for … a long time. Since last summer, I guess, when I moved to Phoenix. Nothing.
But I’ve got to get back to work on this GWB thing. I haven’t decided on the final version of the text for it, but I’ve changed up my methods based somewhat on my work on T-Shirts, so I spent tonight working on drawing letters on paper to cut out and trace around onto tape to cut out from to spray paint the wood through. Yep. Which, if you know how I do art, makes perfect sense. Anyway, so … since I’m not working from any existing guidelines or from computer output, the letters are all being designed by me. Pretty straightforward on most of them, but there’s certainly some choices being made, it’s an original work in itself. Similar to fonts I’ve used in my paintings before, but … a little different. Is that weird? That I create whole new fonts for one-time use? I suppose they aren’t usually entire fonts – I typically would only do the letters I was actually using. The last one I recall creating from scratch was REALLY neat, but I only did a few letters, A, B, D, H, I, P, R, T, and Y. Though I did develop rules for how more letters would be expressed… anyway. This time it’s the whole alphabet, since I don’t know what I’ll be saying. All upper-case for now, though I’ll probably have to design some punctuation, too. But hopefully I can get the thing painted and screwed up by … I don’t know, the end of March or April?
Sigh.
Editing Book Two has been so difficult, mentally and emotionally, that I keep wanting to just … set it aside and write something else, something new and unrelated. But I have given myself a deadline, and I have promised people that the book will be available. And I do everything I can to keep my promises, to keep my word, so … I’m confident that before February ends, you will be able to buy Book Two from press.modernevil.com. And then maybe I’ll curl into a ball for a few months and not write anything.
I doubt … I doubt I could stop writing, though. Or creating art for very long, either. I’ve been thinking about comics again lately, too. I don’t know.
I should be sleeping.
Got to get up. and, uhh… do … something. and then work.
Sigh.
Eh, I’m only here for the perspective. No worries. It actually makes me feel useful to be able to listen. It’s been a while since I’ve done it for anyone probably because so many people took advantage of my ability to provide objective insight, so I cut people off for a long time. I forgot that I actually had some talent in that area. I forgot it was a gift because it hurt me once.
Anyway, I think I told you early on, like around the third time we ever had a conversation, that I pay very close attention to the things that you say. I know I have said this repeatedly since that time, as well. There are several reasons why I not only said this, but also do it. Some of those reasons didn’t actually surface until recently. First of all, you are a very complex individual with internal inconsistencies that manifest themselves externally. This, in and of itself, is fascinating on the grounds that I do not see this as hypocrisy. I see it as a war within. Secondly, it’s a challenge for me to be able to keep track of all of the things that you say because you speak a lot of truth or bring up items that I genuinely have to consider, or reconsider. Third, apparently there is a reason that I needed to listen. It’s inexplicable, but I just needed to listen.
There is a great deal of profundity and intellectual stimulation from thinking about these things, and I enjoy these conversations. There are times, however, that I cannot handle some topics, and have to cut myself off or interject some sort of conversational distance. You know precisely those topics in question, and you can probably pinpoint my defensive strategies and their insertion points. I think you know that has more to do with self-preservation than with not wanting to listen to you. There are simply some things that I am not strong enough (read: too much of a coward) to handle.
Moving on, I have a feeling that’s the part I’m supposed to play in your life for the present time: to capture those words, and act as a mirror reflecting your own words back to you in such a way that you come to understand them. (Mind you, this only works when I’m NOT exhausted and sitting in a restaurant with fuzzy, sleepy thoughts) But, I’m a teacher, and a teacher’s trade is to be able to explain anything as many different ways as it takes for all fo the students to get the concept. Your issue is that you understand the concept on a deep subconscious level, and on the outer most surface level when you speak, but it hasn’t met in the middle where you act purposefully with those truths in mind. It was all ok before because you could trust the fact that your subconscious would steer you in the right way, but when you have all of these doubts, this is when you need the conscious acknowledgement and voluntary movement in that direction. Suffice it to say, you are an original, Teel. Most people work the other way around…they hear/see/feel it, speak it, and consciously think about it until it becomes ingrained in their schema and their subconscious banks. You’re just backwards on that scale. No biggie. You’re still ahead of the game. All you have to do is acknowledge your truth and continue on with it, instead of realigning your life to it the way everyone else does.
You’re still in a good place. Hope that helps.
Ta.
Eh, I’m only here for the perspective. No worries. It actually makes me feel useful to be able to listen. It’s been a while since I’ve done it for anyone probably because so many people took advantage of my ability to provide objective insight, so I cut people off for a long time. I forgot that I actually had some talent in that area. I forgot it was a gift because it hurt me once.
Anyway, I think I told you early on, like around the third time we ever had a conversation, that I pay very close attention to the things that you say. I know I have said this repeatedly since that time, as well. There are several reasons why I not only said this, but also do it. Some of those reasons didn’t actually surface until recently. First of all, you are a very complex individual with internal inconsistencies that manifest themselves externally. This, in and of itself, is fascinating on the grounds that I do not see this as hypocrisy. I see it as a war within. Secondly, it’s a challenge for me to be able to keep track of all of the things that you say because you speak a lot of truth or bring up items that I genuinely have to consider, or reconsider. Third, apparently there is a reason that I needed to listen. It’s inexplicable, but I just needed to listen.
There is a great deal of profundity and intellectual stimulation from thinking about these things, and I enjoy these conversations. There are times, however, that I cannot handle some topics, and have to cut myself off or interject some sort of conversational distance. You know precisely those topics in question, and you can probably pinpoint my defensive strategies and their insertion points. I think you know that has more to do with self-preservation than with not wanting to listen to you. There are simply some things that I am not strong enough (read: too much of a coward) to handle.
Moving on, I have a feeling that’s the part I’m supposed to play in your life for the present time: to capture those words, and act as a mirror reflecting your own words back to you in such a way that you come to understand them. (Mind you, this only works when I’m NOT exhausted and sitting in a restaurant with fuzzy, sleepy thoughts) But, I’m a teacher, and a teacher’s trade is to be able to explain anything as many different ways as it takes for all fo the students to get the concept. Your issue is that you understand the concept on a deep subconscious level, and on the outer most surface level when you speak, but it hasn’t met in the middle where you act purposefully with those truths in mind. It was all ok before because you could trust the fact that your subconscious would steer you in the right way, but when you have all of these doubts, this is when you need the conscious acknowledgement and voluntary movement in that direction. Suffice it to say, you are an original, Teel. Most people work the other way around…they hear/see/feel it, speak it, and consciously think about it until it becomes ingrained in their schema and their subconscious banks. You’re just backwards on that scale. No biggie. You’re still ahead of the game. All you have to do is acknowledge your truth and continue on with it, instead of realigning your life to it the way everyone else does.
You’re still in a good place. Hope that helps.
Ta.