Blocked with Fear

Here's some more from The Artist's Way.

Having art block does not mean you are lazy. It is a complicated and deep thing. There can be any number of things causing it.

Having artist block is often a form of fear.
The fear of how people will react to your creations.
Fear of failure
Fear of success.
Fear of how people judge artists. Many people think that being an artist is a waste of your life. This is especially frightening when your family or friends think these things. And even more so if that person has a strong influence on your life (like some parents).

People in this position spend their energy on the wrong things: Regret, jealousy, self-loathing, and doubt.
So we have to try to turn that energy into something constructive, and not as anxiety-causing.

But also, when someone is blocked and fearful, it gets them sympathy. And that sympathy can make them feel good.
Don't get too attached to the sympathy. It's much better to make something for other people to see and love. That's a more positive energy to receive than sympathy.


In the end, remember what Elsa teaches us!
Love melts the fear~

Reverse planning

When I write a story, I write a first draft with a general, sometimes vague idea of where I'm going.
Then when I finish, I go back and tidy it up to make everything cohesive. Even if it means going over it 7+ times.

For my fanfictions, I work it a bit differently.
I publish each chapter as I finish, keeping in mind where I'm going. There have been a couple times where I went back and edited a chapter, just to add a detail that I thought might be helpful. I've even had to change something that ended up not working in the long run.

But manga writers can't go back and edit their chapters once they've been published.
I'd always been amazed at how manga writers can work with only one chapter at a time,. What if they ever need to go back and fix something to make it cohesive?

Bakuman answered the question. At least for certain stories/writers.
They work backwards from the way I'm used to. Instead of going back to fix things, they bring old details forward. They go back through their work and pick out little things, then expand on those details in later chapters.

It makes total sense.
And it's fascinating to me sine it's so different than how I work.
I don't think I could work like that, even in my fanfics (since even those are planned out more or less beginning to end).
I can't imagine working on a story, never knowing when it would end XD
Manga people are pretty amazing.

Show it Like you Want

Movies like to have at least one tough lady.
I'm guessing it's partly because they want to show diversity, and to have a bit of girl power.
But this comes with some annoying implications. Mostly it say that girls can indeed be tough, but it is unusual. It comes with the implication that most girls are not strong, even if a few of them are.
Half the superhero teams I can think of have 3 or 4 guys, and one girl. Possibly two. But it's almost inevitable that the guys outnumber the girls.
In the movie Dragonheart, Kara is very tough. No one ever really makes a fuss about her being a lady and a warrior until the very end when a bad guy laments that he was beaten by a girl. Of all things, a girl. It throws girls back down there, and portrays Kara more as an exception than as something normal.

Almost every movie I can think of that deals with feminism has with women fighting against a society that is holding them down. Which is understandable, since it's based off of real life. But that also means that all of the stories are still throwing around worlds in which women are not equal.

That's one thing that makes Steven Universe so fascinating. This show breaks a lot of norms for a kids cartoon. But the people in the world of the show don't look down on anyone from gender, race, or romantic preference (ignoring the obvious castes of the gems).
Ladies in the show are tough. That's just how it is in this world.
No one ever finds it weird or unusual that people of the same gender are in love. It's normal.
When Steven dresses up in a skirt and makeup and sings on stage, no one teases about "Haha! Steven's in a dress!" The only comment is "Ah! I knew It had to be Steven. Who else would think of being a mystery guest?"

In this world, people are accepting about stuff that is looked askance at by much of our world.
I think it is a fabulous example for people to follow.
Steven Universe gives us a world which is much more equal than ours.

I especially love this, because I'm trying to do something very similar. I want to build worlds that can act as examples for us, instead of just warnings.
I wish I had more examples other than Steven Universe to give.

Cold Cold Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone!

Heheh. I think our house has some weird demon in it right now.
First of all, over summer we had our carpets replaced. But we haven't refinished the floors yet, because we want to do it the same time we replace our kitchen floors and repaint the cabinets, which will probably be when the weather gets warmer.

That's not particularly weird.
But now it is weird.
I'll see if I can remember everything, but I bet I'll leave something out.
A few weeks ago, our water heater sprang a leak, so we had to get that replaced.
About a week ago, a guy had to come and replace a piece on the roof that was leaking during the rain. We still need to fix the ceiling where it made some weird marks.
Last week we got a new toaster oven because our old one wouldn't start half the time.
Last week, our internet was out. It took a week and three or four different people/companies to help figure out what was wrong.
On the way home from Christmas eve, Dad noticed that my car was getting really hot. So, it might be out of coolant, or it might be something more serious because my car is falling apart (I won't list the weird stuff about my car).

And finally, the night before Christmas eve, I noticed it was colder than usual in my room. Yesterday morning, I noticed that the heater was blowing cold air.
Our heater stopped working. And since it's Christmas, we can't get anyone in to fix it. Mom left a message with repair people, but we won't know until probably tomorrow when they can actually come.
Now it doesn't snow at our house, but these past couple days have been very cold. We had a fire going all day, but that doesn't help any of our bedrooms.

Aaaah, wow. When it comes, it's a flood, huh? It's kind of hilarious though. Hopefully this means our house will be perfect for a while now. Get all the repairs out of the way for a few years, huh?
It's been chilly, but luckily the cold never bothered me anyway.

It's been a lovely Christmas though!

Desensitized

It feels like I'm getting pickier about the stuff that I become a big fan of.
When I first started getting into manga/anime, it felt different and fresh, so I got into things very easily.
Now I've gotten very used to anime/manga. I have a larger repertoire, so I can recognize what's unique and what follows the same common patterns.

I have a scenario that I"m curious about (except it involves time travel, so I will probably never know the answer). If I had never watched one of the first anime that I saw and liked, and I instead watched it today, what would I think about it?
I suppose I would still like it. I don't think my taste has changed that much. Maybe I wouldn't like it as much.
I think what would happen is that I would be less interested in the more average manga.

Either way, I tend to be very loyal to books/movies/anime/manga/games that I like. Once I fall in love with them, I never stop liking them. I may stop obsessing over them as much, but I'm never sick of them.

Twisted Pacing

Whoo, and our internet is finally back! XD
It's been mostly broken for a week.

Now I an watch anime and read manga again. Heheh.
When I read manga online, I usually read them very slowly. I don't like reading stuff on screens. I rarely get through more than a chapter or two at once (though that's also because I want to have time for research reading, and for writing).

It took me ages to get caught up on Silver Spoon.
When Hachiken got into an argument with one of his friends, the bad feelings seemed to drag on for a while.
Then when I watched the anime, I realized that the fight was just a short time. Part of an afternoon, or something. Instead of the days that it felt like when I read the manga.

Which made me realize the really slow pace I read at really messes up the pacing in my head XP
Oops.
If I read it in one sitting, that wouldn't happen.
That's why I've started ordering any manga that I can from the library. Then I actually read them in a decent amount of time.

Seriously though. Never watch or read Silver Spoon late at night. They talk about so much food that it drives me crazy that I can't get any of it. It looks so delicious. TT^TT

The Shifting of Kenshin

As I've said before, Kenshin is my favorite character ever.
Or, he was. Now he's tied with Garnet.
I recently realized that both of them are rather similar. They're both wise, and they kick butt in a fight. But they also make me laugh a lot.

Does that mean I have a type? For my favorite character, at least.

The confusing thing about Kenshin though is that there are several versions of him.
I only really like the Kenshin from the Original manga, and from the first live action movies.


The Kenshin from the anime is both too smart about fights, and too dumb about people.


The Kenshin from the OVA episodes is moody and depressing. There's nothing fun about him.


And now there's a new Kenshin manga, Rurouni Kenshin Restoration, made by the original artist.


Now the artist created my favorite character. I want him to do well. But I haven't cared for anything he wrote after the original Rurouni Kenshin. All his other works felt very typical. And this new version of Kenshin is no exception It took away the funny parts of Kenshin that I loved. Like that "oro" face.
I'm sure Watsuki had his reasons for rewriting Kenshin. But it didn't add anything new for me.

I just finished reading it today (After finally discovering a way to order things from distant library systems. I could never find the last half of it until a few weeks ago).
In the manga, Watsuki about how he had changed the characters in this version.
And most of what he said disappointed me. The characters were already great. If they're not broke, why try to fix them? Although I say that because I didn't care for the changes.
He said he wanted to get more into Kenshin's thoughts. But there wasn't anything revealed here that we couldn't already pick up from the original manga.
And for Kaoru, he said that he made her talk less tough, and instead had her wave her arms and chase people around. Really? That's... strange.

I guess I just wanted to talk about this in terms of what makes up my favorite characters.

In other news, I saw Doctor Strange yesterday. Most of the superhero movies have felt the same to me recently, so I didn't think I'd care for this one much.
But I liked it quite a bit!
Usually I don't care about special effects to much. I'm more interested in characters, world, and story. But I was very impressed with the effects. I think Doctor Strange and Avatar are the only two movies I would recommend because of their effects. But also for other reasons.
It's funny hearing Sherlock without the British accent. It threw me off for a while.
There's one scene where Strange has his shirt off. The girl next to me went "Oooh" in response to that. For the next minute I was shaking with silent laughter, because of her reaction.

3 Novels

When you write a story, you will be excited about it. You put a lot of work into it, and you want people to see it.

You'll probably want to get it published to get it out to the world.

But a lot of people jump the gun. They're carried away with their success at finishing something after so much hard work.
They take their first story and try to find a publishing agent.
Well, that doesn't really work. Writing is like any other art form. It takes practice, honing your skill, research, and critiques.
Your first novel is important. Everything you write is important. It's the practice you need to become excellent.
But your first full-length work is almost definitely not good enough to be published.

An agent's blog recommended that you write at least 3 novels before you think about getting published.
Probably more.

I just checked my list of works. Holy heck, I've written a lot.
I mean, half of it is fanfic, but I'm well beyond three novels. Hopefully that's a good sign.

The Slow Regard of Silent Things

I was invited to a surprise craft fair on Saturday. A very small one, but still fun.
I was working on stuff for that. And now I finally feel like I can relax and work on some of my other projects now. I'm glad I earned some money for student loans @_@

Our concert is tomorrow. I have a small solo. My level of panic over solos is ridiculous. This one isn't as bad, since it is small. But still. How on earth do you fix something like that? Just make me play in front of an audience for a few hours. Maybe that would knock me out of it...

In other news, I read the novella that goes along with The Name of the Wind.
It's called The Slow Regard of Silent Things. It's about one of the side characters, and I don't think it would make any sense unless you read one or both of the Kvothe books.


It was amazing.
The book feels like poetry. I want to read it again, and again.

It's fascinating to follow Auri.
Auri has this way of trying to make things fit perfectly. To find the perfect place for everything, and to have everything moving and working in the proper order. It's fascinating to try to bring a little of that into real life. To pay a little more attention to what might go well with this, or if this is the best way to go about your task, or if that item is needed.

After the book, there was a note by the author about his concerns writing this book. That's it's not a proper book.
And people reading the book love it, but they don't think other people would like it since it's not a typical book.
Those comments really surprised me. I didn't think there was anything wrong with the unusual setup. It didn't even strike me as unusual. Thought I suppose that might say more about my odd tastes.
It was a lovely book.
You should read the Name of the Wind books. Heheh.

I hope the last one is as great as the others~ And I hope it comes out soon XD