I was away for awhile due to alien abduction. Well, I was kidding, but then I tilted my head and thought about it for a few seconds, and discovered, much to my own amusement that there is a way I actually could think of it all that way metaphorically. Among other things an alien must have absconded with the part of my brain that usually would have handled many of these situations very differently.
I did the best I could but some of it wrecked me extra (some of it was the stuff of true nightmares, yep, new stuff was added to my mental repertoire of PTSD flashbacks, things I wish I could have figured out how to stop or protect myself from in the moment but because horrible things had been happening for so long that I could barely do more than try to talk about them after). There were naturally moments of joy and laughter etc interspersed but not nearly enough to help me respond to both the good, the bad and the people better in the moment. So I made sure I also took the time to get a big chunk of the most raw healing and grieving done too. It was a varied cluster of many things that required energy, time and emotional sorting that usually went into the handling of my website and presence, and more project work than what got done. Heck there was this two and a half month period where I could barely walk or put weight on my right knee, just woke up one day with a ton of knee pain barely able to walk.
Plus I felt like it was important to work on the following:
- Take some time to practice varied writing approaches, such as making sure that wordcount goals and outside accountability really weren't for me.
- Allow the projects I'm working on some extra time to roil around the back burner in my mind
- Apply myself to trying to make all manner of decisions including about projects, platform approaches, strategies, improvement methods, and more.
- Worked on lots of Ink and marker abstract and geometric designs, which a big part of why I do them is to practice linework, intricate design work, and so on. (the merch shop that will soon begin having these items posted, ideally within a week or so of posting this)
- I also have been studying all manner of things in everything I encounter etc, much of which should if nothing else add to all that will continuously make me a better writer.
- Plus had to try to gauge just how radically my PTSD and my Autism, and the other conditions that stemmed from there really affect everything, and try to ponder possible shifts in approach and whether they may or my not help.
- I learned so much, including many things about what not to do in future situations. Definitely reflected on problems I encountered and try to imagine how could I handle them better if anything like that came up in the future.
- So many additional projects arose out of the efforts to do better, and in trying to process everything.
- Mentally preparing to do more in my poetry section of the website. Poetry is such a great writing warm up, among other things. Plus, I noticed recently there may be some sort of regular poetry circle at my local library.
- More is planned & in the works for my Decadent Angels series, some work has been done on that in the background. Release of new parts and so on will begin as soon as they are ready. Though I'm still unsure what to do about the current format, it's currently in ongoing story poem and it has long felt like it outgrew that format, not surprising since it originally began as a writing warm up exercise and only took a few parts to become a full blown project.
Then there was this shift where last week (end of July) I realized a chapter change was approaching (I will discuss the chapter change thing in a later post which I will link here, but I came up with a technique around the idea of it and started using it a little over a year ago to survive something I didn't know how to make it through). I will go into more detail about many of these things another time. However as I began shifting to the new chapter this Sunday, and today (Friday well Friday night) I am certain I am solidly adjusted and firmly in the new chapter. The shift was like stepping through the looking glass, it's a totally different and way better dimension, although I do have to say that this new chapter also explores processing deeper more difficult layers of my traumas and my life position, especially in comparison with how much work I have to do on soooo many fronts.
It's gonna be a world of work getting my web presence rolling again, and tons of situations I have to address like figuring out what the heck I am supposed to adjust for that change they made with European laws recently, and how to handle using the Tumblr section since they had made all photos downloadable straight from Tumblr (particularly on mobile) and I just do not license my photos and art that way. Maybe the way I have been using Tumblr just isn't going to work anymore, there was no setting for disabling that so I expect I'm going to have to contact them & find out what I can get done to allow me to still use the platform close to the way I want to. And that situation makes me concerned about the other platforms I am using, so lots of ongoing technical aggravation is still taking energy that I would prefer to put into my actual projects. I shall as they say, soldier on, anyhow.
Initially had to post this while falling asleep typing it. I took an editorial pass (the Monday night after originally posting) and then occasionally had to add a link or some such later. I had many blog drafts started that just didn't get finished or posted in the last couple years, and I didn't want to fall into the same territory with this. While I am not an actual perfectionist, I do at times get carried away with wanting to fine tune in an overly fashion to the point of missing my timely relevance windows, a thing I am trying to mellow out on, especially since it leads to other real life difficulties outside of creative projects and their releases.
What did you most relate to amongst the obstacles I mentioned? Did you discover any helpful ways to address it, that you would like to share here?
What life lessons have you taken some extra time to focus on recently?
Who likes Decadent Angels? And who would like to weigh in on the formatting of Decadent Angels?
Have an amazing day.
