Tag Archives: Life

The Fear Of Pushing Too Hard

Featured

Posted on by
Reply

I have this fear. It rouses its ugly head every so often. I’m working on whatever project, then I think about how much harder I could be working on my writing, on my life, and other things.

This fear becomes complicit in my not pushing my projects when they come out. On not trying hard enough to edit. Each and every one of them deserves my attention, but then there’s this fear.

It tells me that if I work too hard, I’ll alienate those I care about. That they’ll not like me as much. That I’ll break those relationships. I’ve dealt with abandonment issues since childhood. It’s one of my overarching issues.

Within this fear is the worry that if I don’t work harder, what I write won’t go anywhere. I don’t care anymore if it makes money. I care someone gets something out of it. I don’t write for anyone but myself. Some people won’t care about you’re writing. Others will. I stopped worrying about those who won’t. I focus on those who will.

Writing Disunion By Force took me to a few places I hadn’t dared tread since my teenage years. I wrote this book for my teenage self. He read a lot of these kinds of books. Most of them to keep him sane, others to keep him from killing himself.

I found solace and a bit of peace writing this book. I’ve come a long way from the kid afraid of screwing up. He continues to pop up, but I’ve shoved him down a little. I know he’d enjoy this book. I know there were times he was done. Times when it was just him in an apartment reading, watching horror movies, and trying to keep his head above water.

I live through the fear of pushing too hard, but it comes out right. I write for us.

Complaining too much and my brain telling me things.

Featured

Posted on by
2
Disunion by Force by Brian J. Stone

Everything I’ve written for the last couple of weeks is terrible. Whatever I picked up to read bored me and I’ve talked about it on social media.

Now, I try not to do this, but last week my brain told me off through a dream.

All the writers I interact with had an intervention. One said, “We’ve been watching you for a couple of years. I don’t know where you fell off, but you need to stop complaining and work.”

Needless to say, I thought of this dream for a couple of days. It resided in every waking moment. When I thought I got away from it, there it was, reeling me back in.

The funny thing is, I thought everything was fine. I didn’t see it. My subconscious did. It yelled at me in the dream, “You’ve been doing so good. You need to stop this complaining and work.”

Now, this is not a complaint to follow up on by the subconscious. It’s more of a story that I need to listen to that voice in my head that says to work.

I have a book out in a month, and I will promote the hell out of it for the next month and thereafter. What I will not do is complain about how hard this shit sometimes is. How hard I’m working. I want everyone to read Disunion By Force. I wrote it for me, so maybe it won’t reach the people I want it to, but I know someone will enjoy it.

They say you should write what you’d read and this is what my fourteen-year-old self would have read. It’s a book I think my biological father would like.

Gained A Level, or a few.

Posted on by
Reply

I sat down the other day and wrote out all the projects I’ve written in the seven years since my family moved from Las Vegas to Ogden, Utah.

I have 10 projects either done, outlines, or ready to be written.

Four thrillers in the military/political/espionage realm and six in the horror genre.

I’ve been hard as hell on myself for the last few months. Writing these down feels like I’ve gained a level in my writing.

I’m a big gamer, and I have been since the ’80s. Looking at all this feels like I gained a level in one of my games. The fear of rejection and the fraud police will always be on my mind, but I have a date for my military/political thriller novel, November 1st. Here is the link.

But I want to thank everyone who commented on my posts over the last few months. I’m working through some things personally, and all of your support has been amazing.

I have a whiteboard above my desk, and I have all of the books I’ll be publishing until 2024 listed. There are seven with dates. I have one of the 10 I listed above out on submission. As soon as I get a reply on that, I’ll add it to the queue.

I write horror and military/political/espionage thrillers. I grew up watching horror and reading thrillers. Tom Clancy will always be my favorite in the genre, but Mark Greaney, Jack Carr, David Baldacci, Brad Thor, and Brad Taylor are my favorites right now.

Here‘s my list of what I’m currently reading.

I hope you have a good rest of your week.

Not sure where this is going.

Posted on by
1

Over the last few weeks, I’ve thought about where I’m going with my writing. What am I doing right? What am I doing wrong?

I don’t have answers to either of those questions. I feel I put in enough time editing than I used to. I feel I’ve worked hard to overcome many of my crutch issues.

I submit when I see a call that a story will fit with. I work on my craft by reading books on writing and reading all genres of books. I’m thinking of stepping away to work on something else. Myself.

I have a novella out on submission and a thriller novel that I’ll be submitting in August, but after writing 13 novels and novellas, I’m not enjoying this. I write daily because that’s the deal my wife and I made when we left Las Vegas.

I would write and bartend a few days to make ends meet.

Anymore, I wonder if I’m helping her out enough. If I’m helping my kids enough.

Am I doing everything I can to make them happy?

There’s one thing about this I haven’t put forward often. Am I doing enough to make myself happy?

I don’t usually think about this. I used to put myself before anyone. That came from having the biological father I did. He always put himself first. I did that for years. I’ve worked hard to not be that way, but I think something was lost.

I think more about making others happy and not myself. I worry about whether others are getting what they need. I never consider what I need. It just doesn’t feel like I’m as important as everyone else. Maybe that has to do with my childhood, I’m not sure. I know this mentality has screwed up how I view my writing life.

I’m leaning towards getting the thriller submitted and seeing how it goes. Afterward, I’ll reevaluate my writing and whether I’ll write to submit, which is what I’ve done for the last seven years.

I have my story collection on Amazon and wish it would do well, but it hasn’t. After two years on Amazon and other places, I may pull it after it goes through its cycle on KU.

Today I finished a story, and it’s brutal and destructive. I don’t know what I’ll do with it right now. Probably keep it with the rest of my stories on my hard drive. I’ve worked hard on these stories. I’d like someone else to enjoy them.

I’m beginning to think I missed the turnoff somewhere. I don’t know where to go from here.

Getting through it

Posted on by
Reply

There have been many days where I wanted to quit. When it all felt worthless. When I wanted to throw my laptop and all the stories I’ve written in the trash.

This last week I spent time with my family at Disneyland. It was fun but we have our issues sometimes. I’m sure it’s that way with every family.

It made me realize that my head was getting in the way of my progress. I was letting my thoughts run my life. That’s not a way to live. The thoughts were terrible and I wish I could forget all of them, but they’re still there in some empty space in my brain.

I didn’t write on that trip. I barely took any pictures. I stayed as much in the moment as I could. And it was hard. I can’t remember the last time I put everything away and stayed in the moment so solidly. It was one of the most difficult things I’ve done.

I’m usually on my phone looking at social media, but I only did that on a couple of instances last week.

Being in the moment was as difficult sober as I knew it would be. There were too many times I wanted a drink to steady my brain. It made me want a drink and it also made me lash out at my family. That was my fault. I wasn’t prepared for all of what was going on around me and I wanted to dull it.

No dulling happened and I stayed a bit angry. I’m angry at myself today for not handling it better and for not understanding how difficult it would be to manage all of the stimulation around me. Which I should have.

Now I’m back at the desk working this week. I’m making my way through Tim Waggoner’s Writing In The Dark Workbook and will have a review with some of the exercises up when I’m done.

I can’t say enough about how this book has helped me. I’ll save that for the review.

I hope you’re going to have a good week and as I struggle to deal with my behavior I hope you’re managing your own.