Tag: emotional health

About Writing

Catharsis

Autumn

Once, during a particularly stressful point in my life, I decided to get drunk. I chose an evening when I was alone and not likely to be disturbed, and settled in with my favorite bottles. After four shots of sugary liqueurs, my stomach called it quits.

I spent the rest of the evening hunched over the toilet.

I wasn’t miserable at all. It actually felt cathartic, to purge out all of the sorrows that I had endured in such a dramatic fashion. It was the only time I’ve ever experienced peace while vomiting.

Now, on those good days, when I can crank out over a thousand words in a comparatively short time, feel the same way: a cathartic purge. Those days help give me serenity and sanity with everything that follows.

Those days keep me writing.

About Me

Facebook

Autumn

[////]=I quit Facebook completely almost two years ago.

(^ Baby help. I didn’t notice it until several hours after posting.)

I created my account as a teenager because it was the cool thing to do (back when you needed to have a school e-mail address to sign up), then over the years that followed it  mutated into a sense of obligation. That whole, “I need to keep people up-to-date on my life,” thang.

Facebook was never a big source of dopamine addiction for me. I was never viewed as being trendy, so instead I mostly felt the anxiety of not being ‘like’-able enough for anyone. But, you know, I was obligated, even though I grew to hate it.

Then the summer of 2017 happened. As I contemplated posting about personal events, I thought about how stupid it was to feel enslaved to people who were never going to see or talk to me again. And why was I keeping up on their lives anyway? They never cared about me before Facebook came along. You know what? Screw them all.

I haven’t looked at Facebook since.

I also highly recommend quitting social media to everyone. Doing so had a surprisingly beneficial effect on my life, even though I never considered myself much of a user in the first place.

So…

This year I published a book on Kindle. I’m not terribly concerned about making money off of my writing, I just want to connect with readers (you know, the peeps who appreciate the way I think). Since I have four small children, I don’t want to do anything that intrudes on my life too much — motherhood comes first above all else for me, and kids are time-consuming. I confess that the thought of Facebook has crossed my mind as something easy.

But I swore never again, and I meant it.

Not to mention, I’m not going to find readers on Facebook, considering that I, as myself, did not enjoy any sort of popularity on the site. Not the right crowd.

I haven’t the foggiest if I have any chance of finding anyone with my self-imposed restrictions, but hey, I’ve never been known to be conventional. The important part is, I still have time for homeschooling and baking cornbread.

At the end of my own life story, I want to say that I kept myself.

About Writing, Light Eternal

About Light Eternal

Autumn

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I think that the best way to describe Light Eternal is as a Gnostic romance. Or, as my husband so succinctly put it, I studied up on Gnosticism so I could write trashy fanfiction about it.

I like fantasy romance, and most of my ideas revolve around the simplicity of two people in love. One of my biggest disappointments with the romance genre (and fiction in general) is that very few of them start with marriage, which, in my personal experience, is when I would say the real adventure begins. My novels don’t revolve around the question of “Will they get together?” but rather, “What are they willing to do to stay together?”

I also like magic and larger-than-life characters, so with a touch of amusement I would say that I ascribe to the “One-Punch Man” style of storytelling. The conflict isn’t about how they are going to be strong enough to win, but is instead an almost human interest exploration of what life would be like as the strongest, smartest, etc.

Light Eternal also contains a lot of pagan elements, including soul retrievals and spiritual parasites. The story is about gods and goddesses surrounded by a rich mythology, verging on spiritual fiction. Because there is a strong theme of Light versus Dark, there are a lot of Gothic and horror moments as well.

Finally, it is a novella about trauma, mental health, and dissociation. It illustrates the damage that traumatic events can cause, and the struggle to continue on with life afterward.

It is the best fictional Gnostic romance book out there!

Available for free with Kindle Unlimited

About Writing

On writing communities

Autumn

I joined an online community for writers.

I confess that on an emotional level, it takes me back to being a teenager on Elfwood, trying my best to chummy up to some clique, and wondering why they just didn’t like me no matter what. After all, I was WAY more talented than any of them.

Now I realize that it wasn’t about admiring talent. They copied each other, and I was stubbornly myself. Cliques don’t like individuals.

I like to imagine that those people who rejected me years ago are now trapped in lonely and pathetic lives. That’s what you get when you sell your soul! Bwahahahaha!

I can say this here, because we aren’t among them right now: I don’t like writers. I have never once gotten along with one. However, I like readers. I LOVE readers, really, because they love fictional worlds and stories as much as I do. I feel a kindred spirit with readers. Writers have fragile egos and are always on the defense — they feel threatened by talent and hard work. They don’t like me either.

I fully expect them to utilize the reviews and rating system to attempt to bully me into conformity. I will likely never be featured as a top writer. I will probably abandon my account with enough time. I suck at fitting in.

So why did I join a community for writers?

Because my oracle cards told me that I need to step outside of my comfort zone, and I can’t think of a more uncomfortable place for me.

That’s why I joined.

Fade to White, Muse

Fade to White origins

Autumn

My best friend in high school had a boyfriend named Jason.

Jason cheated on her then bragged about it online.

On my own profile, I wrote something vague about how people disappoint me.

All hell broke loose.

Jason and his friends began an online assault against me, attacking me at every turn. Before long, it spilled over into the real world and Jason started following me to work and my hang out places. He even threatened to rape me.

Luckily, telling him that I was getting the police involved was enough to make him back off, and it died shortly afterwards.

When I told my Creative Writing teacher about what had happened, her advice was “Write it out.”

So I wrote Fade to White.

About Me

The Past

Autumn

When I was a kid, I used to pin my bright yellow blanket around my shoulders (the perfect universal costume, in my humble opinion) and play act having conversations with the characters from my favorite novels. I loved those hours I spent in my room, exploring worlds and “interacting” with Martin the Warrior and Prince Caspian.

One day when I turned ten, I got hold of some lined paper, picked up my favorite maroon marker, and started writing those conversations down. Truthfully I didn’t understand paragraphs back then, or quotation marks for that matter, but that solid block of text was the beginning of my dream.

As I grew, I joined Elfwood and Fictionpress, swapped stories with other teenagers online, took creative writing classes all through high school, and majored in creative writing in college. For me, there were no other career options — I was a writer.

Then life happened.

Somehow, the agonizing moments seamlessly blended into becoming a wife and mother of three, and before I knew it the better part of a decade had passed.

But you know what? Writing is the only thing that gives my life a deeper sense of meaning outside of the ordinary. What would be the point of all the pain and joy if those emotions stayed secretly locked up inside my own head? Sometimes it seems like it’s the only way I can peacefully live with the past.

I have my days of dark depression, when demons loom over me and whisper bleak things in my ear, leaving me too paralyzed to think. Then the sun shines again, I find a quiet moment nestled between games and chores, and I write.

I will always be a writer.

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