Tag Archives: motivation

What horror and fear mean to me

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I am a child of the ’80’s. I watched Nightmare on Elm Street on VHS, saw Freddy’s Dead in theaters with the 3D glasses, and horror was my escape.

I was home alone a lot and staying up late watching scary movies on HBO was my favorite thing. My mom jokes about me watching Children of the Corn and Halloween and how it didn’t scare me much. I think it unnerved her that it didn’t scare me, which I understand.

But for me horror has been something I’ve always gravitated towards and while I’ve talked of the reasons on this blog, I’ve still never narrowed it down. I’m sure it has something to do with dealing with trauma. There was plenty of yelling and screaming in the house before my parents divorced in ’85. That yelling and having one parent belittling me constantly about my weight left scars that will always be there.

I have a couple of stories that deal with that stuff that I’m shopping around, but I may hold onto them for something else.

When I was a kid I knew that I wouldn’t make it past 40. I don’t know why I knew this, but I did. Now I’m 45 and after living with that for so long everything is easier. I was worried the whole year leading up to 40. Anytime I was in the car I felt unsafe. It was a weird feeling to believe you would die. I was completely absorbed in the concept, though I never told anyone.

There are other things that I think about going back to my childhood that float around in my head, but that’s a bigger one.

When you believe you’re not going to make it past 40 you don’t try that hard beforehand, at least I felt like I didn’t.

Today I feel like I’m working harder to make something of myself because after believing you’re going to die at a certain age, things afterward are different. You look at life in a certain way. Nothing that happens, even today as I sit in the bedroom isolated from my family, none of this feels hard and while I’m pissed that I got Covid, it’s just another thing to get through and I’m okay with that.

I was a horror movie fan long before I started reading horror. My first experience with reading horror was King’s Nightmares and Dreamscapes and Four Past Midnight. I got them from my big sister and while I loved them, I didn’t read any horror for a while after that.

There was always a stigma around reading horror, especially growing up in Utah. If you read horror there was something wrong with you mentally. I’ve read quite a bit of King since and other older authors like Algernon Blackwood, Lovecraft of course and I’m making my way through the shorter fiction of William Hope Hodgson, Guy De Maupassant, and F. Marion Crawford.

I told myself I would read more classical horror, authors of color, and those in the LGBTQIA+ community this year. I have few books by authors in those categories as well but I’m always looking for recommendations.

I’ll leave you with this. No matter how hard things are I’ve always found peace in reading and watching horror. Fear is not the creature in the woods, the killer with the knife, or anything else. It’s the tricks your mind plays on you when you’re trying to get through the day.

A bit different

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I’ve been sitting in my bedroom the last few days after testing positive for Covid-19 on Saturday morning.

I come to the blog a bit pissed as I’ve been cautious with everything but obviously not cautious enough.

There are many things not say but as I’ve been away from my family in the bedroom my wife and I usually share I think that I’ve realized my health needs work, and it’s not because I’m terribly sick. I have a cough, had a fever earlier in the week, but I need to get in better shape and eat better.

When it comes to writing I have to make good a promise I made to myself. I have to get busy on figuring out how to make my own covers and not just shitty ones I’ve made to my needs.

I have goals this year and I’ll not be held back by anything.

I’m tired of existing. I’m going to live.

Navigating in new waters…

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When I set out to write the new project, I wanted to use an outline. There are many reasons for this, but the greatest among these are, the five stories I’ve written that are still out, were outlined.

The leads me to believe that when I outline the story comes out better. Because of that, I’ve decided to outline this story and anything else I write during 2022. I know this will be a transition from writing without an outline, but I know it will bear fruit, as it has so far.

Now that I’m doing this I have to understand how to outline better, and while I won’t follow everything, my writing and the story will have a better core and cohesiveness that it hasn’t had, except for the stories that are out.

I talked about music the other day, but the outline, and having a roadmap for the story will help a ton.

I know this is a short post, but I had to tell you what’s going on. I have a review on my other blog for The Best Horror of the Year, Volume 13, on my review site. I didn’t go as deep into the 24 stories, novelette, and poem as I wanted to, it would have created a larger article than I wanted, but here’s the link to that blog.

Moving Forward and Finding a Place

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Not sure where to start with this post.

Every once in a while I’ll get a bit philosophical. I’m not sure what causes it, sometimes it’s my emotions, but it happens. I like it when this happens as it lets me know I’m moving the correct direction.

I’ve been on a bit of a journey lately. I don’t know why this happened, but I’ve felt something missing.

I gave up on beliefs a long time ago, but lately, something is missing. My journey led me to look at Norse mythology and in looking I found something that fits with who I am.

These types of journeys are somewhat odd as for the longest time I gave up on spirituality, belief, and Gods. I never thought I’d find something within that wanted to go that way. I never felt a desire to go that way, but as I write these words, there is something, maybe an ancestral calling, that brought me to Norse Heathenry.

I’ve looked at numerous blogs about beliefs in my lifetime and there have always been the words, “when you find what’s you, you know.”

This always stuck with me.

I happened to be looking at Norse Mythology for something I worked on recently and wandering around the pantheon of the Norse beliefs, I found me.

I had not wanted to write this as it should be a personal thing, but you may see a few changes on here, and if you know me personally, you’ll see them as well. They will be small, but you will see them.

Now, to this, I am not talking about where Norse beliefs have been hijacked by others. I choose this as who I am, the same as another chooses their beliefs. It’s a weird place to be in for me. It’s an odd situation and because of it, I am making adjustments to how I handle writing, life, and all of the things beyond those other two.

This journey is difficult for me. As what I grew up believing is vastly different. Having no beliefs for over 20 years and suddenly to have this land in my lap, takes adjustment, but I know this is where I should be.

As my mental health hasn’t been great this year, this could not have come at a better time.

I’m learning, but make no mistake, I will always be moving forward.

You know when it’s not working.

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I’ve written books with and without outlines and one thing I’ve learned is that some stories defy outlines and other deft discovery writing.

It’s this thing I’ve struggled with since yesterday’s post.

I’ve tried working this with an outline, but nothing comes.

I have the idea. I know the path it will take and which way it will go.

So as I write this on Tuesday, I’m sure I’ll start writing the new novel Wednesday morning. I can’t not write it and I’m feeling the force of the story coming harder than any in a while.

I want to know where it ends.