Why Write?
It’s taken me quite a long while to figure out what it is that I want to do / am meant to do / came into the world to do. But I think I’m finally finally getting it clear (although anything I say may and will be subject to sudden changes without warning, of course, hehe). So here is the long story:
About a year and a half ago my father passed away. Although obviously a sad and tragic event, nonetheless it wasn’t completely unexpected, seeing as he was over 90 years old (he was several decades older than me, so don’t start thinking I’m anywhere near retirement age yet myself haha).
What got me to thinking, I googled his name. A couple of decades ago if you googled his name several articles that he had written in his day would come up. During his active years he had succeeded in achieving the milestone of becoming a well-known and respected figure in his field, through hard work, long hours and lots of sacrifice.
In fact, it was his favourite subject for a sermon: how the only way to accomplish anything was to make great sacrifices.
YOU HAD TO SACRIFICE YOUR TIME WITH YOUR FAMILY AND LOVED ONES.
YOU HAD TO SACRIFICE YOUR DREAMS.
YOU HAD TO SACRIFICE BEING TRUE TO YOURSELF AND TO WHAT YOU REALLY WANTED AND LOVED TO DO.
But the rewards would be worth it, he used to say. He succeeded in becoming the iconic figure in his field that he’d always wanted to be. Not because he cared one iota for his profession but rather, only for the social prestige that this brought him. He felt he could only respect himself and feel good about himself if other people found him respectable first.
At the end of his career, as he was nearing his retirement, people would stop him in the hallways of his workplace, shake his hand and congratulate him for all his professional accomplishments. And as I’ve mentioned before, he wrote several articles that were published in prestigious scientific journals in his field and that attracted significant attention. He was praised. Almost famous in his field, even.
After his passing, I googled his name. And there was nothing.
The articles were gone.
The people who used to remember him and praise him were no longer around anymore. Most of them were probably deceased already. And the younger generation no longer cared about him or what he had accomplished.
Time marches onwards. Every day we have newer and newer technology. The tools and techniques my father used to use in his day had become obsolete. The things that had taken him years to achieve could be done in months today, thanks to the new technology.
I remember my parents (both worked in the same profession) splicing microscopic cells painstakingly under a microscope in order to extract the DNA from these cells, so they could study it. It took hours to extract the DNA from one single cell. Today we have machines that can read the DNA of thousands of individuals, plant animal or human, within those same hours. It’s no longer necessary to splice a cell by hand under a microscope.
As I said, what used to take my parents years to accomplish could all be done within a few weeks, or months, nowadays.
So all the discoveries my father had made were no longer necessary. The result is that today, almost thirty years after he retired, no one remembered him or his accomplishments anymore.
That made me sad. And more importantly, it made me question: If nothing you do will ever be remembered within a few years of your death, WHAT POINT IS THERE IN DOING ANYTHING AT ALL??
If you could become as famous as my father was, and within thirty years of your retirement no one remembers you, what point had there been to his life?
Of course there’s the personal side. I remember him.
But the world doesn’t remember him anymore.
So what point had there been to anything he had done in his life, on a professional level?
So for a long time I wandered around. I didn’t want to do anything anymore, because no one would ever remember it. If I wrote stories for people to enjoy, what would be the point of it? Within a few weeks everyone would forget them all anyway.
Did I Stop Writing and Become a Coach?
I started thinking about becoming a coach, because as a coach I could directly help people and make a real, tangible, accountable difference in their lives. I was coaching a friend for a while as she went through a crisis.
It did seem to help her a bit. But then I realized that everything I was helping her with were things that she was only absorbing INTELLECTUALLY. She understood these things with her mind. But what I was teaching her didn’t ultimately change her — BECAUSE SHE COULDN’T FEEL THEM WITH HER HEART.
I realized then that ART is the only way to change people’s HEARTS.
I want to clarify that by art I mean any form of creativity, not necessarily only fine arts or visual arts.
Telling Stories
Stories and telling stories is as old as mankind itself. Stories reach people in a way nothing else can (except maybe other forms of art). People can’t help but feel curious, when you start to tell them a story, about what happens next to the heroes in the story.
We just do. It’s ancestral. It’s human nature.
We BECOME the people in the stories. We care about them. We identify with them. Because we can see how they are just like us. And that makes us FEEL FEELINGS.
It touches us and moves us and reaches our heart.
So that’s why I realized that I had to come back to ART.
Writing stories. Telling stories.
Making you wonder so what happens next??
So Now, What Does Happen Next?
So yes, now I’m back with lots of new story ideas. At the time my father left the world I was working on a horror novel, which I’ve now finished (first draft, so watch this site hehe).
I also have the first draft of episode number 3 in the Annasuya series already written up, and I plan to edit it soon.
In addition I have a couple of half-written books on the computer, some short stories, which I may or may not tackle afterwards. And at last I am finally working on an author website (here it is hehehe!!).
It’s the Christmas rush soon, so my very first project after the holidays is to finally, finally FINALLY release the book that I was preparing with Junction Publishing.
And in the meantime you can still continue to catch me on Amazon, at https://geni.us/htgUDNV
Yep they’re still up there hehe. And in addition all my books are now available on paperback. Woo-hoo!
I won’t reveal much more about this right now, but here’s a sneak peek at the cover of the upcoming WITCHES’ HAVEN, the first book in the Alumari series:
More details coming up shortly. So stay tuned folks!