![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
And a few days later
Feb. 5th, 2018 10:35 amI had such big plans for myself in Brisbane. Not only the Novelists Bootcamp with The Resurrectionist, which were superbly worth it, and I got a lot, got mucho, got EVERYTHING from it, but I was going to plan my novel, start writing my novel, walk daily, get a spa treatment, maybe see a show, experience good food, and make new lasting friendships. I even packed a wee travel kit of witchy things to celebrate Lughnassad.
I did walk each day. I did plan, within the structure of the bootcamp. The spa was closed on Sunday. I ate at the local vegan restaurant Saturday night, and found a boiled caterpillar in amongst the noodles and greens.
The show, too much effort. Lughnassad, too tired. Friendships - well, we all have each other's email addresses, and I've made one reach out.
I'm too damned tired to do anything. A small part of me wants to plan and rewrite NIGHT THINGS. Another, larger part, just wants to stop doing everything and do nothing. I'm a blank.
And I forgive myself for it, because I had a major mental spill last week, and I'm still rocked by that. A bit scared that I'm back in dangerous headspace, even though I'm not consciously aware of being so.
I want to do nothing. I sit here in my hotel room, in the last 20 minutes before checkout, looking out the french window towards the forested hills close to Brisbane, and I think...nothing.
Dollops of images come from the weekend. Green texta squares on the whiteboard, showing how to outline scenes. The pleasure principle vs the death drive in novels. The transition points in a book. Our practice plotting of a book about Mandy the Australian lawyer, and Viggo, the Danish criminal mastermind, with his mother nicknamed Gunmetal Granny, and Sadie the cleaning lady.
I can't grasp any of it. Not today. It's a travel day, going home to the House of Plague (gastro through the family). It's a day for checking out books at the airport, and wondering where my next meal will come from.
Am I okay?
Fragile after a tiring weekend. Mind blown open. Feeling dull, and lethargic.
I see my psych later in the week, and also have a planning session with PizzaBoy about the last housekeeping stuff to do on THE COMMUNICANT AND OTHER STORIES.
My mind shies from structure, even though I desperately need it to feel secure and safe. Truly, I have to dissolve this image of the writer as wafty fairy being hit with mystical inspiration and know-how. Get out of my head, Guinevere. Why are you even in there as my image of a writer? You're a media witch who happens to write. The one time I sat in meditation and started to consider if you used magic to get where you are as a media witch and writer, that night, it was the only time in my life that I felt I'd been psychically attacked. If so, that's some mighty strong defences you have up around that idea that magic made you who you are as a writer.
And if so, why am I not doing the same thing. Magic is a tool, as well as a way of understanding the world and the Mysteries. Why am I not using this tool to do away with the destructive mind stuff?
Oh listen to my mind's response: because you'll cock it up, because you don't know enough, because you're a dabbler, because you'll become precise, and cold, and calculating, without heart.
Uh huh. What strange ideas you have, mind. Shall we do away with them? Yes, let's.
I did walk each day. I did plan, within the structure of the bootcamp. The spa was closed on Sunday. I ate at the local vegan restaurant Saturday night, and found a boiled caterpillar in amongst the noodles and greens.
The show, too much effort. Lughnassad, too tired. Friendships - well, we all have each other's email addresses, and I've made one reach out.
I'm too damned tired to do anything. A small part of me wants to plan and rewrite NIGHT THINGS. Another, larger part, just wants to stop doing everything and do nothing. I'm a blank.
And I forgive myself for it, because I had a major mental spill last week, and I'm still rocked by that. A bit scared that I'm back in dangerous headspace, even though I'm not consciously aware of being so.
I want to do nothing. I sit here in my hotel room, in the last 20 minutes before checkout, looking out the french window towards the forested hills close to Brisbane, and I think...nothing.
Dollops of images come from the weekend. Green texta squares on the whiteboard, showing how to outline scenes. The pleasure principle vs the death drive in novels. The transition points in a book. Our practice plotting of a book about Mandy the Australian lawyer, and Viggo, the Danish criminal mastermind, with his mother nicknamed Gunmetal Granny, and Sadie the cleaning lady.
I can't grasp any of it. Not today. It's a travel day, going home to the House of Plague (gastro through the family). It's a day for checking out books at the airport, and wondering where my next meal will come from.
Am I okay?
Fragile after a tiring weekend. Mind blown open. Feeling dull, and lethargic.
I see my psych later in the week, and also have a planning session with PizzaBoy about the last housekeeping stuff to do on THE COMMUNICANT AND OTHER STORIES.
My mind shies from structure, even though I desperately need it to feel secure and safe. Truly, I have to dissolve this image of the writer as wafty fairy being hit with mystical inspiration and know-how. Get out of my head, Guinevere. Why are you even in there as my image of a writer? You're a media witch who happens to write. The one time I sat in meditation and started to consider if you used magic to get where you are as a media witch and writer, that night, it was the only time in my life that I felt I'd been psychically attacked. If so, that's some mighty strong defences you have up around that idea that magic made you who you are as a writer.
And if so, why am I not doing the same thing. Magic is a tool, as well as a way of understanding the world and the Mysteries. Why am I not using this tool to do away with the destructive mind stuff?
Oh listen to my mind's response: because you'll cock it up, because you don't know enough, because you're a dabbler, because you'll become precise, and cold, and calculating, without heart.
Uh huh. What strange ideas you have, mind. Shall we do away with them? Yes, let's.
