Me Gushing about Golden and Treating Your Writing like a Job

So frankly, the last few weeks -- and days especially -- have been hard. I thought I was doing better with my anxiety, I thought the medicine I was taking was working really well, and then something just snapped and it came rushing back over the past few weeks. Along with anxiety, depression always follows so it feels like I'm fighting two things at once. And despite me feeling like a mess (and maybe just being a little bit of a mess) over the past few weeks, I realized something really awesome. My writing has always been my passion, my love, something that brings me joy, and ya sometimes it was a reprieve from the hardships of life. But mostly it was just something that I loved to do and I've been treating it like "work" since Weapon Icean is published and I've been trying to get it out there while also working hard on book two (which is taking waaay longer than I thought it would).

If you want to be serious about your writing and either be traditionally published or self-published you need to treat your writing like work. Normal people clock in every day for work and then clock out and get paid. Day in and day out. Us writers are working around the clock. Our minds never stop. Mine doesn't anyways. If I'm not over-analyzing my writing, then I'm thinking about plot or characters or new ideas or analyzing characters and plot in other shows and books. My mind is always going, going, going.

I'm addicted to this show (12 Monkeys) and I had to have a 12 Monkeys gif in this post... Jennifer is the best candidate to explain never ending thought)

But I got so caught up in writing being "work" that I forgot that it's also supposed to be fun. It's supposed to be my reprieve from life, something to make me feel happy when anxiety and depression come back into my life. A sanctuary or secret hideaway where it's just me and these imaginary characters that are all too real to me. After finishing edits on Project Khione I felt sort of empty and hollow and not happy with my writing. Nothing I churned out felt good or sincere or real. It all just felt like empty words on a page.

Was me...

And that's when my short story obsession happened. I decided to put Project Khione aside for now and just write stuff that makes me feel good and happy. Short story, after short story happened. Some of them are so-so but others I am really proud of and they make me smile every time I read them because I can't believe I wrote something that good. Short stories are great and I love them but I wanted something more. I wanted a long term project, I wanted to be with characters for a while and I wanted to write a novel. At first I thought the novel that was going to bring back my joy of writing was about Story and Remiel. They sort of flat-lined half-way through the story... which frustrated me immensely.


Yup

As my anxiety and depression started to come back full force and really dig their claws into my head I went to see Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2. (I will write my review of that movie! I promise... at some point...) and Golden was born. I had these two characters a year ago, Renee and Jax, in a scifi world with super powers and all that. But those golden skinned aliens in Guardians Vol. 2 really inspired me for some reason. I liked their look, the gold of their skin, and the fact that one of the characters (you'll know who I'm talking about if you watched it) was called a Celestial. Golden skin and the word Celestial kind of smashed together in my mind and my polite, benevolent alien race, the Celests came to be. I put them together with a cynical and paranoid Renee and a charming, kind-hearted guy with a bad past named Jax and it just clicked.

I can say with complete honesty that I haven't had this much fun writing something since even before Weapon Icean. Delphi and all of them were great and I love them a ton but I haven't felt this happy and this excited about characters and a project since my steampunk trilogy way back in like 2014 I think it was. Maybe it's because I stopped treating my writing like work, like a job and have given myself a lose finishing date, a goal that doesn't stress me out or maybe Renee and Jax have just clicked with me but I'm seriously loving this book.

I'm calling it Golden right now (cuz ya'know the gold Celests?).



I think the reason why this book is clicking so well with me is because of Renee. She and the rest of the cast formed so organically in my head and have transferred onto the page more or less effortlessly. I realized the other night when I was typing like a crazy person that I have sort of transferred all the negative emotions that I feel when I have extreme anxiety and depression into Renee. I feel awful for her because really she feels a lot of emotions... a lot bad ones. She's paranoid and cynical and doesn't trust easily. She has a lot of walls up and is in a situation that makes her feel out of control and helpless and angry and frustrated and messy and too vulnerable. To me that sounds just like what it's like to have anxiety. Yet, even though she is all of those things and argues a lot and snaps at people and says things that she doesn't mean and is messy she still persists. She fights hard and stubbornly for what she wants and she doesn't back down. Getting Renee to do anything she doesn't want to do is like pulling teeth. She's one of those characters that you either have to knock out and drag her from one event to the next or bribe her... or you know, threaten her.


I couldn't help myself... there had to be a Cole gif in here somewhere. But Renee isn't that bad... really, she can have fun sometimes...

Then there's Jax. He isn't the typical love interest or MMC that I usually write. He has a bad childhood, a troubled past but he didn't let that ruin him. Jax has a strong moral compass, is compassionate, loyal, and uncompromising. Once he's on your team, he's on your team for life. He won't hurt you or push you or force you to do something you don't want to do. But he still gets the job done and is still willing to make hard choices because he's fighting for the people he loves and cares for. He's optimistic and once you prove your trustworthy, he trusts you with all his heart and is willing to give you the benefit of the doubt every time. Suffice to say, Renee and him balance each other out really well and make for great character dynamics.

Those two, Jax and Renee, are the reason why I am loving Golden so much. It's become an outlet for me. When I am so pent up and anxious and frustrated and angry because I feel anxious and have irrational thoughts I can just shove it all onto Renee and let her go through the same sort of hard times that I'm going through. Only she gets to have aliens and be on a spaceship and have super-powers. I don't this I've been this vulnerable in my writing before... like ever. I'm so excited to share Golden and Renee and Jax's story but if -- or when -- I decide to self-publish them I'll also be nervous and a little scared that I'm releasing Renee, who is pretty much is how I feel when I'm at my worst with anxiety to let anyone read it.

 I have no idea where Renee and Jax's story is going to go or what is going to happen with them but for the first time in a while I don't care. I'm just letting Renee and Jax take me where they want to go, letting them tell me their story as I write them on the page.

*Ends rant about Golden and Renee and Jax and how much I love them*

Hope you all have a great rest of the week and a productive, good June!