There was a time when I needed to do as much as possible, to do all the touristy things or at least a few of them as part of crossing them off my bucket list. It hasn’t been that way for a long time, I learned to let go of that need because it wasn’t what I was after and I have wanted to focus on my writing but using every stupid excuse in the book to not. I do that because I am afraid, both of success and of failure because I don’t know if I can, if I am able to create a story that is worth telling, that is worth sharing, that someone, anyone will want to read.
In December 2013 I was at a low point, by then I had my passport stolen along with a phone and was almost arrested. I was in India at the time and it was utter chaos, both good and bad and after having spent several months in Southeast Asia it eases you into the chaos of just trying to figure out how to travel in the subcontinent. I think I was in Bangalore near a temple that was celebrating its anniversary, there was a wedding and the streets were packed but I kept to myself.
It was there I started writing, not a story but a world. I was a gamer before I left Canada, it’s not like I played a lot but I was a loner and it was one way to keep me busy and entertained since I wasn’t really one to socially engage. So when I started writing on my shitty netbook that I bought to replace a notebook computer that was stolen I wanted to write something for myself.
The elements of a story always hovered around but I have spend years adding little pieces of the puzzle that makes up what this world would look like. I am a sci-fi nerd and watched, Star Trek in it’s multitude of series, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica and many others. I wanted to become God to craft a world and give it form and function. I came at it not from a story standpoint where I had a story concept that would be the foundation of a world but created a world that could be the foundation of a million possible stories.
That is where I stand now, I keep my eye out on scientific news such as if it would be possible to terraform Mars, I love The Expanse which combines elements of hard science and science fiction which is generally how I want to approach my own universe even though it is so different. I’m wary because am I being original or am I being generic, I’ve been reading books on story structure, screenwriting and novels and have written scenes and moments but am paralyzed by fear to take the foundation and actually start telling stories within it.
I don’t know how because I know they will suck, I expect them to be laughable. I don’t know what to do, how to balance action, with thought, character voice, description and exposition. I am not sure what kind of structure to use or in what format the story should take. Right there I think that is a poor way to see it, what kind of story or stories do I want to tell. I am thinking about doing serialized storytelling, almost like an episodic narrative but in the beginning I am going to start with something simple, a simple character moment that is an experience that shapes the lens of how this person sees their world and reacts to it.
I have not dedicated the time I need to for me to be successful and that has to change so for me it changes now. To spend at least 2 hours writing each day, maybe it will be put to use in planning, testing out scenes or styles of writing, forms of stories or seeing how I can learn the structure and use it in many different contexts from the beginning, middle and end of a sentence to that or a paragraph, a scene, an act and the story itself.
It is time to stop waiting, stop being paralyzed by fear and shake my life up to tell stories here in this world or the next, in my universe or that take place every day. It is about seeing how I can reflect an image of the human condition, how it has changed and how we remain so much the same from our beginnings to today. I have to do that with a realistic bent, there must be give and takes in the story, with the rules which define how the world works and the rules that the characters have for themselves. Some of those rules would come out of their own histories, family and the societies that they call home.
I’ve wanted to plan my stories out before I write but since I am just testing the waters, figuring out my craft it doesn’t matter, no one will care if it is good or horrible, I need to write, find people that will give me the honour of their time to read it and then expect them to nuke it like a target in war. I need that, I want that but I can’t do it if am not writing so that is what I am starting to do now. Right now I am just putting this out there for myself but I will begin a new phase in my writer’s journey.
I’ll take crazy scenarios, maybe the most ridiculous things imaginable and see if I can make them sing. I will do this for learning the craft of fiction be it in the form of a short story, novel even a screenplay. I am writing this on Gili Trawangan, the party island instead of partying. I need to find a balance between living, writing and enriching my own life so I can bring those experiences into my world or into the story.
It is where I need to do, it is the beginning of my deep dive into the world of stories, in a world of my creation. I don’t want to be limited to telling stories in this world and maybe by writing about our world as it is will inform me to figure out how the world could be tomorrow or hundreds of years from now. That is the trick, this is my Everest, a mountain that has already tested me to my limits and I haven’t even started the climb.
So here is what I will do starting tomorrow. Spend 2 hours a day writing and it doesn’t need to be the story I am working towards, it could be a blog post, a short story to experiment with words, structure and form. Maybe some of it will be coming up with ideas or fleshing out what I have already built but I have to start and go from there because this is my mountain. There is no other way forward for me and I know that but I can’t get there if I am afraid I have to leave the fear behind and just write, know that it will be a mess and just work on getting better each and every damn day.
I’ll keep a running commentary here, spend a good half hour talking (to myself) here about what is working, what isn’t and the rest of the time putting fingers to keys and seeing if I can make a bit of magic someway somehow.