Operation Achieve Anything: Day Two-Hundred, Dateline 7-19-2018
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“We all want progress, but if you’re on the wrong road, progress means doing an about-turn and walking back to the right road; in that case, the man who turns back soonest is the most progressive.”
Good morning crickets. Welcome to day number two-hundred of Operation Achieve Anything. Holy crap, there’s still one-hundred-sixty-five days to go until I’m done with this challenge. That’s fine though, not only because I’m just going to start something new as soon as this one is done, but last night, I was so zoned out while writing that I couldn’t even wait to see what I had to say. That’s not to say that I made any sense, but it did remind me of why I do this as well as where I would like to eventually be as a writer, where I feel like I’m being entertained by the efforts of my own brain to express itself through my pecking hands.
This sort of plays into yesterday’s assignment in that I’ve grown to be this way from years and years of adjusting to situations especially as I continue to age. The book wants me to delve deeper into the dark side by sharing examples of times when I became too comfortable for my own good and had to leave something I love in order to better the situation for myself. I have nothing but examples of this and it was the primary influence in my midlife meltdown when I decided to finally give up on screenwriting after over two decades.
First, I left working in film since I never really wanted to be a movie maker, I just wanted to write the scripts, so when I gave on on screenwriting, I found no joy in lighting, and it started to become just a job. With the thrill gone, I was losing friendship both on and off the set which led me to spend more and more time by myself. This is the main reason that I started this blog, because, I still really wanted to write, I just needed to discover a new non-film genre that would allow me to better express myself.
Unfortunately, this was all too much at once, especially when you factor in the new retail job that I landed and hated, as a creative introvert with no interest in being in management, yet there I was. It was nice to have steady pay and benefit, but all that this led to was me getting back onto prescribed drugs, which once again, led me to become suicidal as a side effect to the drugs that were supposed to boost my mood. I was so torn because these people were my comfort zone for so long but I knew that if I didn’t leave when I did, I would either be dead or in a much worse off place if I were to stay.
As I was losing my mind, I started to burn bridges in order to make it easier to leave with no one pushing me to stay. I wouldn’t say that I’m happy that things went the way that they did but if living is a sign of success, it turned out to be my only move. I’ve done this several times in my up, and down life, it was even how I ended up in Seattle in the first place when I first became suicidal after discovering a testicular lump. This is probably not what the book would subscribe, but it does fulfill the assignment.
For today’s assignment, I’m supposed to celebrate the fact that I’ve completed two-hundred days and reflect on the path I was on before starting the book and then where I’m at today. As always, you’ll have to wait for tomorrow’s update to hear what I come up with to write. Until then, it’s now time for me to sign off as usual by saying, good day and good luck to you and all of your projects.
Talk to you soon.
Sincerely,
The Wicker Breaker
P.S. Below are links to my novel, which I plan to promote as part of Operation Achieve Anything, as well as a link to where you can buy the book that is providing the structure to this project in case you would like to purchase it in order to play along.
