Just a writing ramble

I have a tendency, when I can't sleep, to let my mind wander around. I try to limit the dwelling on things that could kick in my anxiety, trigger my depression, or cause some other kind of negative response. Those leave me unsettled when I finally do get to sleep. Instead I let my mind run around and think of story ideas. Sometimes I'm hashing out a glitch in a story, but a lot of the time I'm running scenarios through my head for new stories.

Most of them I just ignore or mentally discard. But those that keep my attention I make notes on and leave them in a file so I have the ideas there for when I need something new to work on. I currently have fifteen ideas in the file that aren't connected in any way to any of my existing worlds and projects.

In the Aleran books (my fantasy world), I have probably more than twenty novels I want to write – most likely more. I have two sci fi and one cyberpunk story lines I want to play out. All three of those have at least two to three books in them. Possibly more. I have an urban fantasy story line that I want to pursue, also with multiple books. I have my faerie tale retelling novellas to write. I have two already. I've got some vague ideas for at least five more. I've got a sci fi novella I've written that so far doesn't fit into any of my existing worlds either, that might end up getting added. Or not. Or it might spark a whole new series. I'm still working on that one.

I've been asked why I'm not published yet. That's a little hard to answer. I've been writing since I was a kid. The Aleran world is the longest lived of all of my projects, though you wouldn't recognize it from what I started 25 years ago. I've written fifteen full novels, though I've only kept maybe five of them. Only two of them will probably ever see the light of day anywhere other than on my computer. I also have multiple novellas I've written, but again there's only a few that I'd even attempt to publish.

It's been in the last five years that I've started putting real effort into getting published. I've started doing research, weighing pros and cons between traditional and self-publishing. I'm pushing to finalize and solidify the world building for my worlds so I can keep things consistent between books. I'm starting to build a platform, making my online presence more known. And I keep writing and editing, trying to get my things to the point where they're fit for publishing.

I don't know when I'm going to get published. I don't know which method I'm going to use. I do know I will never stop writing and editing. It's a part of who I am and I will keep moving forward.

What does giving up mean to you?

I've long wondered why I keep blogging. Then again, I wonder why I keep writing. I know everyone feels this way about something. Why am I doing this? I'm a hack. I'll never be good enough. I should just quit.

We have to tell ourselves that this is bullshit and keep pushing forward.

There are going to be times where something has to be put to the side and something new started. That's just life. But if we give up without really trying, that's when we fail. It's like learning to swim. If you just stand there and dabble your toes in the water and say you can't swim, you're right. You can't. But you didn't really try. But then you get in the water, you have your lessons, and then either you can swim or you're relegated to staying in the shallow end of the pool because you sink like a rock. If it's that last, you didn't fail. You tried and gave it your best.

Himself is constantly reminding me of this. I have a tendency to give up after not succeeding once instead of trying again. I have a real complex about what I consider failing and look at myself as a failure when I shouldn't. He has to keep telling me as long as I'm trying I'm not a failure.

How many times do we just give up because something seems out of reach without actually trying for it? I know I have several of those missed opportunities littering the path of my life. Even if we don't get what we want, we learn and grow from those experiences. They can help us achieve new goals later on down the line.

I'm wandering a bit here, so I'll go ahead and stop. Tell me your thoughts. Do you believe that not succeeding at something is the same as failure? Or do you believe as Himself does, as he's teaching me to believe, that the only true failure is a failure to try?

Monday Maundering - Random babble again

I don't really have a purpose for today's post, except to ramble along about whatever crosses my mind. You have been warned.

Let's talk the media - specifically news outlets. I don't get my news from the mainstream outlets anymore. At least not the ones here in the U.S. Fox News, MSNBC, CBS, CNN, ABC, none of them. Firstly, I don't have tv. So everything I do is online or via the radio. And even on the radio I'm listing to NPR and PRI (a lot from the BBC, especially at night). BBC is the only mainstream media I listen to. I get better reporting on what's going on in the world from them than I do from our own newscasters.

I also read Huffington Post. I'll admit that they can be a little one sided as well, but at least I'm more likely to be given the facts behind a situation than I am with the other media outlets. If someone posts a link to another online news site, I'll go read that too. I'm very ecumenical. I give everyone a chance to tell me their version of the same story - as long as it's not Fox News, CNN, MSNBC, and the others like them.

Names. What's in a name? My friend Joelle got a lot of comments on one of her blog posts about how she has a male character who uses the name 'The Queen'. He's not a drag queen. He's a very dominant personality. He's actually a dom in her BDSM book series. He's a fascinating character and very complex. As of yet, I don't know how he got the name but I'm sure it would be an interesting story to learn.

What we call ourselves is our business. I have my real name, which I don't generally use online. And I have my pen name, which is what people online know me by. There was a transgender woman (male to female) at my work place who preferred to be called Michelle. She was a sweet, wonderful woman. But some people couldn't get past the fact that she'd been born Jeremy and continued to call her that and refer to her as a 'he'. It upset her so much she actually quit, citing harassment as the reason. The people who harassed her? Didn't get into trouble. At least, not that I saw. Two of them boasted about having driven the 'freak' off. I was livid for days after that.

What does it matter what we call ourselves? A name is just a label we give ourselves. Some of us choose to keep the labels we were given by our parents. Others choose to change that label as they grow up. We use nicknames as a different label as well. Respect those around you and use the name they prefer.

Monday Maundering - My love affair with caffeine

I think just about every author out there has a love affair with something to aid their writing. Be it alcohol, cigarettes, or mine - caffeine. To be more specific, Mountain Dew. I have to have Mountain Dew at some point in my day to write. Which makes kicking the caffeine habit a hard one for me.

Did you know that caffeine is the world's most heavily consumed psychoactive drug? 90% of adults in America consume caffeine daily. The lethal dose of caffeine for most people is 10 grams, though we're not likely to see more than 500 mg of caffeine in most drinks. Those children and adults who had heart problems because of an overabundance of caffeine, such as is found in energy drinks, are believed to have a higher sensitivity to caffeine than others.

Me, my sensitivity to caffeine has been dulled by years of use. I don't get the energy boost off of Mountain Dew like I used to, which is fine by me. I don't do energy drinks because they leave me feeling jittery and generally give me a stomach and/or a headache with everything else that's in there on top of the caffeine. You have to figure that guarana, which is a key ingredient in many energy drinks, has caffeine in it naturally. So beyond what caffeine they're adding, you're getting an extra dose in the guarana.

Did you know that caffeine resides in chocolate too? It's there in minuscule amounts, but it's there. That's why I don't think I could give up caffeine completely. I love my chocolate too much. But I can deal with it in moderation, which is the key point of everything.

So why am I talking about caffeine? Because it's a habit that I want to kick. I want to be able to write without having to have Mountain Dew around. I'm trying to lose weight and guzzling soda all day isn't the way to do it. But I'm so addicted to the Dew (not that Mountain Dew is naturally addicting...it's just what I'm hooked on) that I have a hard time focusing on my writing if I don't have at least one can or bottle there with me.

So I'm slowly weaning myself off of Mountain Dew, and off of caffeine in general. I think I'd be a lot happier off of them and caffeine does tend to screw with my anxiety levels anyway. So the less I consume the better. So wish me luck in getting over this love affair.