Never thought I'd update this blog, did you? It took more than a year, but I am back. This time I've dropped the pseudo-name Sammy Suzuhara. Call me CS. Severe is my real last name and I haven't given it enough credit for its radness. I am still working on Children of Tokua, the new name of this blog. This book has haunted me for seventeen years and finally, finally---no, I really mean it this time-- FINALLY, I am going to produce a finished product. I've made some serious changes that has revitalized the book, along with my interest in writing it.
Before I give you any details of what those major changes are, I want to share with you one essential process that I had to undergo to finish COT. Desire and motivation are very important when writing a book, without them, the thing never gets done. And this is true about any major project in our lives. I've been focused these past few weeks on raising my self-consciousness and performing some deep introspection. I had many obstacles to writing COT but I never dived deep into figuring out what they were. I assumed I was a chronic procrastinator, lazy, not disciplined, etc. And then sometime last week, I haphazardly visited this website called Personal Excellence after listening to a list of inspirational music which I arrived at through listening to Susan Boyle's rendition "I Dreamed a Dream" (Can't get enough of that song! Yes, I know it's a depressing song but it nonetheless inspires me, haha). I highly recommend the Personal Excellence website because it pretty much helped change my attitude toward COT.
I decided to read one of the articles on procrastination and did a self-introspection exercise to understand more deeply why I wasn't actively writing COT. My initial free writing produced some common answers such as: "I'm bored with the book. Hate seeing the same thing repeatedly. I'm lazy. Other things in life are getting in the way. Not enough time to truly write. I don't have enough discipline." I then steadily wrote things like: "I'm afraid of rejection. I'm afraid people will hate my book. I don't think I'm a great writer. I won't get anyone to represent the book. My writing isn't as great as I would want it to be." These were the real reasons why I wasn't finishing COT! In other words, I finally admitted to myself that I DIDN'T think I was a great enough writer for the book. This self-defeating thought and belief strangled my writing. I decided at that moment that I would no longer succumb to it. Taking this action breathed new life in my desire and motivation to write. I want to be a published author. I can clearly imagine myself as published author. I love the story of COT. I love the characters. They are my babies! I can't reject them just because of my own limiting thoughts.
So, I liberated myself from such negative thinking and instead embraced my capacity to write a story my heart desired.
And on the note of discipline, I realized from Personal Excellence, I didn't need discipline to write COT. Discipline is getting something you don't like doing done. I love COT so it should not feel like I'm having an uphill struggle writing it. Attitude is so important. Well, folks, that's all for now. I'll let you know how changed COT in my next post!
thanks for reading,
CSS
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