It’s easier to fail. Success is hard, no matter how you measure it. For me, it’s writing. It’s easier and, usually, more fun to fail. Galloping across the farthest reaches of Northrend with Kat in World of Warcraft, or catching up on the latest episodes of Leverage, or rewatching Doctor Who or Battlestar Galactica… Failing is easier. Hours pass and I realize I didn’t write again today.

Deadlines are a little better. People are more likely to leave you alone when there’s a paycheck on the line than if it’s some ephemeral personal project. But I need to buckle down. More paying gigs would be nice, but there are three personal projects that are important to me. I have to stop getting in my own way.

To that end, I need to establish habits. In Twyla Tharp’s book The Creative Habit, she says “first steps are hard… Turning something into a ritual eliminates the question, Why am I doing this?” (The book, by the way, is awesome. I can’t recommend it enough.) I need my rituals. This blog will become one of them.

Artists limber up by sketching. That’s one purpose this blog will serve… It’s hard to stare at a blank page, but once you get your mind in the writing mode, it’s a lot easier to just keep going. So I’ll see you here, right? It’s no fun without you.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

This post is going to be a kind of manifesto in a sense, and just plain catharsis in another, It’s probably also going to be pretty scattered. Mostly, this is about my mindset and the emotional and creative frequency I’m currently on. If you’re not interested – and really, I don’t blame you – maybe you’d like something else?

I’m Going to Suck

First thing you need to know? I’m a shy and insecure person. I’m not nearly as bad as I used to be, but I am. I have never really been able to fully invest myself in anything I’ve done creatively, because I always have the little voice in the back of my head… They’re going to laugh at you. Nobody will like it. Even now, every time I send off a draft to my editors, he’s there… This is it. This is the one. They’re going to read this and you’re going to get an email that says “whoops, we made a huge mistake. I’m not sure why we even hired you in the first place.” I stress out and live in fear of people thinking my work sucks and, by extension, so do I.

Fuck that.

Everything I do isn’t going to be gold, and I have to be OK with that. But just because I produce something that sucks once doesn’t invalidate the other things I’ve done or the potential I have to produce something amazing in the future. Honestly, I think getting the suck out now might even raise my chances of producing that amazing thing.

I’m a Writer

Someone asked me what I did the other day, and I told them the truth as I see it.

“I’m a writer, and a web designer,” I said.

“Oh,” he said, “anything I might have read?”

“Probably not,” I shrugged. “All of my actual published work is in tabletop RPGs.”

“Oooh. I thought you meant a real writer.”

Yeah. And again, fuck that. I don’t need validation from anyone to know that I’m a writer. I’d be a writer even if I didn’t have a pretty regular gig doing it. I write. As melodramatic as it sounds, I couldn’t survive without writing. Without it, I wouldn’t be whole. I’m proud of my work for White Wolf. I love role-playing games, and I love that I get to take part in shaping and building a world I’ve been immersed in for over half my life. I will never be ashamed of that.

That guy who basically said I wasn’t a “real” writer? He didn’t mean to insult me. He was surprised that it annoyed me.

Pretension

Society frowns on the kind of earnest and thoughtful intensity that creates its most enduring, beautiful works. It’s interesting, because it’s almost like a kind of institutionalized discrimination. People who try are weird. Pretentious. Even when you make it, even when you earn society’s “acceptance” of your weirdness, you’re separate. Celebrity is, in a sense, another kind of segregation. It’s still a matter of us and them.

Pretension is such a dirty word. Except all writing is pretense. Everything worth doing is pretentious. You’re damn right I have aspirations “above my station.” You’re damn right I’m going to stretch and reach for things.

And I may miss. I may fall off the ladder I’ve built for myself. But that’s just an opportunity to stabilize the foundations and build it higher before I climb back up.

I’m done apologizing for that.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.

Good lord. It’s been too long since I made a proper post.

I’m never going to get around to redesigning my site. The cobbler’s children have no shoes, and all that. So, for the moment, I just went ahead and installed Wordpress and a theme that doesn’t make my eyes bleed.

Let’s see: Quick updates this time.

Writing

I’ve been writing like a madman for the last month. By the 4th, I should have written 64k since March began. I’ve been sick for most of that time, too, which is slowing me down more than I’d like.

Shadows in the Dark: Mekhet, Night Horrors: Immortal Sinners and New Wave Requiem have all been released and very well received. I’m really proud of NWR in particular, since it’s actually convinced longtime Masquerade fans who dismissed Requiem to give it another look.

Gaming

My group will start playtesting Geist as soon as I finish this mad dash of writing. The Hunter game and the Mage game are on hold until we get through that.

Miscellaneous

We might have a new cat soon. His name is Hoshi, and he’s adorable.

Originally published at Fragments of Shadow. You can comment here or there.