A Remarkable New Identity

The Stories We Tell

The Next Chapter of Blog, Podcast, and More

This podcast is an exploration of my personal growth through books and film. It’s a way of educating myself on the complexities of our world, and organizing my views, through a study of art. I won’t promise I’ll present PhD level arguments, succinct, poignant, and revelatory. But I will be honest. Truly great writing comes from deep within, the parts of one’s psyche that they’d rather suppress. My best writing has come when I take a hard look at myself or reveal hidden truths about my identity

Already, my post about Spirited Away has resonated with people, vulnerable and embarassing as parts of it were to share. People value truth above all else, even if my specific circumstances are foreign to them.

My passion for writing has been hidden in plain sight all my life. This is now my fourth blog, and I’ve written all sorts of things in my spare time. I want to figure out how to turn writing into a career eventually, but for now, I am content to work on my craft and figure out what I actually want to say.

I am working on a novel right now. It’s my first creative writing project outside of short stories, and boy is it a challenge. I’m 62,000 words into it, but I’ve taken a break over the past week or two to really think about how I want to push it across the finish line. Likely, the first draft is going to be an incoherent mess, but that’s okay. Neil Gaiman personally told me that the most important part of creative writing is finishing, not starting.

Creativity is something I’ve felt was better left to others. I can’t draw or paint to save a baby’s life, and I’ve desperately failed every instrument I’ve tried. I figured my mind was logical and analytical, rather than imaginative and cerebral. However, I’ve discovered my view of creativity was far too narrow. Really, creativity just means the ability to form something novel & valuable—to create. I’ve created a podcast, I’ve created stories, I’ve created a world in which to set one of these stories, I’ve created this blog and many others, I’ve created a side-venture. I’ve created my identity.

You may be asking yourself if this is just another in my long line of ADHD hyperfixations. A fair question, but I don’t think it is. And this is because it can encompass all my ADHD hyperfixations in one place. I can explore a topic that interests me, unpack it, and move on with a deepened sense of self. Books and films have engaged me for as long as I can remember, and writing about them simply seems the logical thing to do. I’ve done it in the past on Letterboxd, in fact, though I hope that these reviews will be more focused and well-researched.

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