But Maybe This is Progress — mnchrm vol. l
Incoming Transmission—
Hello fellow travelers. How’s the path look today? It’s been a while, but you were not forgotten. Far from it.
I sort of feel like I’m going in circles: making a strong declaration about my intentions, losing my way or getting distracted, and then slowly finding my way back onto the path. Sometimes I end up a little further down the road, but often I’m right where I left off.
This process is a little bit like meditating. You sit and focus on your breath, or nothing at all, soon find yourself drifting into thoughts & memories, before winding back where you meant to be. I guess the intention there is to persevere until it gets easier.
During a Relentless Picnic podcast episode (why do I need more than one note?), one of the members shared a quote which was along the lines of, “A man who never creates good habits will have to start from scratch each time.”
Oof.
I have a problem with prioritizing. As a generalist, as someone with wide-ranging interests and ambitions, I do a lot of different things at once. I’m not much of a multi-tasker, so I usually try and prioritize the different things I need to do in a day, week, month — and use a calendar, to-do apps, and of course my planner to track how that’s going. These tasks might be to write a piece here, edit some photos there, study Japanese later, and so on.
I like working on one thing at a time, and all at once. If I know a task will take me two hours to do, I’d rather just find two hours to do it all in. However, this leads to a lot of dead air. Trying to work on that.
The problem is, when I prioritize, I stick so rigidly to that schedule that I don’t let myself skip even when it would be advantageous to do so. I knew this week I needed to write a review of a book I’d read. That became my top priority; I’d decided I’d do that first, and nothing else until I got it done. Of course, things aren’t always so simple. Things came up, and I knew I wouldn’t have the time to sit down and jam it out until Sunday. Instead of filling that time with something more productive, I simply… didn’t.
Free time came, free time went. And without the space needed to do what I knew I needed to do, I largely did nothing at all.
It’s something I’m working on. I found the time, I finished the review, and I’m really proud of it. I hope to share it with you all soon.
I just need to be more flexible with myself, because life is flexible. I like to think I’m pretty go-with-the-flow with others, but need to extend myself the same courtesy.
But maybe this is progress. Maybe preventing myself from really goofing off is a step up from goofing off. Maybe the zen-like practice of returning to focus after distraction is the process itself. Even if what fills that space is nothing.
Last week, I mentioned I was going to undertake a meditation challenge, and I failed it! I skipped a day, which turned to two, and then I was off the rails.
Of course, I intend to get back to it. For this, I think the journaling has been effective. However, this is as much about the meditating as it is about building a habit. I’ve heard that seven - ten days of a consecutive action usually build a new habit, making it second nature. Still trying to find my magic number, and what works best for me.
The main reason I’ve been so busy lately is work. As I mentioned in a previous letter, I’m a bit disillusioned with the freelance lifestyle at present, so I opted to make a change. I took a contract job in an office building, working more or less nine-to-five.
When I went into film, part of the allure was to avoid the dreaded nine-to-five. I don’t know why I disliked the idea of it, but I knew I did. Perhaps something of the implication of boredom, of repetition. Unfortunately, I didn’t know that in my haste I had traded the nine-to-five for eight-to-eight; much worse!
My temporary move to corporate America is not a solution, or even a bandage; it’s just something different. And maybe through the process of elimination I’ve had a clarifying experience for where I want to be.
I think somewhere along the way, I lost sight of where I wanted to get to, if only for a moment. I want to write. I want to be a novelist. And I want to teach.
Knowing this and getting there are two completely different activities. All the conventional wisdom says that MFAs are less and less worth it, that teaching jobs are impossible to find, and the extant ones are increasingly less viable. I get that, I really do. But I went to film school. The time for me to be conventionally realistic is long gone, died in a high school guidance counselors office years ago.
The terrain is rough, and the maps unmarked; all I’ve got to go on are the stars and whispers. But just having the end goal in mind feels like progress. Makes it seem just a bit more achievable.
Some first steps: finish my goddamn novel. Then write the next one. Continue to read books, review them when possible, and try and pitch broader and broader writing to outlets. Send fiction out, and get started on those literary projects that have been on the edge of my focus for so long.
I’m also going to try and start teaching, in action. I’d love to do even just a workshop on screenwriting, on photography, on lighting, on cooking; any topic I know. I hope to start pitching places on those, and at worst, I’ll start a goddamn YouTube channel.
I’ve been pretty hyped on Japanese singer Ichiko Aoba lately (again, I know I’ve got one note) and the hype train rolls on.
This video of her giving a performance on a giant rock in the Japanese mountains is at once so ephemeral and timeless. The sounds of nature perfectly blend into her acoustic guitar and soft voice, as if it was always meant to be.
The temporary change in working environment is coming with new problems just as it’s offering a change of pace. I’m still learning when I can best work on writing. Even with more time in the evenings (theoretically), it can feel like my life is playing on fast-forward. Come home, read for an hour, cook dinner, eat dinner, do the dishes, go to bed. I need to figure out a new strategy for doing what I want to do, especially with my slightly revised goals.
So far, it seems like the best way to do what I want is to switch my schedule back to waking up early. Gonna experiment with that and sleep a bit, and I’ll let you guys know how that goes.
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Good luck, my fellow voyagers. I hope you’re all finding your ways along the path, but if not, I hope the wander is enjoyable in itself.
Fight on, friends.
Your faithful commander,
— I