Hello, friends! Welcome to this month’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group! If you’re a writer, and if you feel in any way insecure about your writing life, click here to learn more about this amazingly supportive group!
They say write what you know. Sometimes writers follow that advice without intending to. There’s a recurring theme in my writing. I never noticed it was there until my editor pointed it out. That theme is illness.
In the epic, sprawling Sci-Fi universe I’m creating for Tomorrow News Network, a lot of people get sick. There are lots of space viruses and space parasites floating around out there, some of them natural, others manmade (or rather, alien-made). I also tend to use disease as a metaphor for other things. When my editor pointed this out to me, my reaction was basically: “Oh, that makes sense.”
It’s become something of a running joke among my circle of friends. If there’s a big, scary disease in the news, James will probably catch it. I’ve had tuberculosis. I’ve had West Nile virus. I’ve had swine flu. To be honest, I’m surprised that I managed to dodge COVID-19 for as long as I have.
But last week, I found out that I’d been exposed to somebody who later tested positive for COVID. Shortly thereafter, I started experiencing COVID-like symptoms. I’m currently quarantined at home, waiting patiently for the results of my COVID test.
Needless to say: not a lot of writing is happening right now. Not a lot of anything is happening, except sleeping, chicken soup eating, and binge watching Carl Sagan videos on YouTube. But my muse assures me she will return as soon as I’m feeling better, and we’ll probably have another scary space plague to add to our epic Sci-Fi universe.
Hello, friends! Welcome to this month’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group, a group that supports writers who might feel a little insecure about their writing. If you’d like to learn more about IWSG and see a list of participating blogs, click here.
This may be one of the hardest thing for people to understand: sometimes, two mutually contradictory statements can both be true. Here’s an example. I love writing. Also, I hate writing. Let me unpack what I mean.
First off, I really do love writing. It’s the single greatest source of joy and pleasure in my life. Being something of an ethical hedonist, I’ve been trying for years now to maximize the joys and pleasures of my life. In other words, I’ve been trying to squeeze more writing time into my schedule (as well as more time for other sources of personal joy, like drawing and reading).
I cannot take full credit for this pun. Versions of this have been circulating the Internet for years.
In order to keep maximizing my writing time, I’ve slowly been transitioning from writing as a hobby to writing as a career. But (this is the tricky part) if writing is my job now, if I’m not writing purely for my own amusement anymore, then I have to set a production schedule. I have to deal with word count quotas and deadlines and other boring stuff like that.
And when I’m up against a deadline (self-imposed or otherwise), it tends to stunt my creativity and spoil my fun. Writing starts to feel like a chore. I am not at my writerly best when writing feels like a chore. I don’t want to do it anymore. All of a sudden, I hate writing.
It really are the deadlines that ruin writing for me. Case in point: I’m writing this IWSG post well in advance of IWSG day, rather than scrambling to get it done the night before. And I feel like this is turning out to be a much more expressive and honest post than what I typically write for IWSG. Or at least, I feel a lot happier with this post than I normally do.
But if I want to make a career out of writing (and I do!), then I will have to learn to accept the bad with the good. I have to learn to live with this tension in my writing life: I love writing, and also I hate writing. I’m not really looking for advice here, by the way. I am merely acknowledging to myself and to you that this is the way things are, and I’m trying to be very zen about the whole situation.
So this is what the writing life is like for me. Perhaps some of you, my fellow insecure writers, understand what I’m talking about.
Hello, friends, and welcome to a special Halloween edition of Sciency Words! Today, we’re talking about the spookiest of scientific terms. And that super spooky term is:
QUANTUM ENTANGLEMENT
Quantum mechanics is the study of the tiniest of tiny things in our universe: things like atoms and quarks and electrons. And these super tiny things do some pretty weird stuff, if our current mathematical models are to be believed. Stuff that seems to defy our human notions of common sense.
In the 1930’s, when quantum theory was still brand new, Albert Einstein did not approve of all that common-sense-defying stuff that quantum mechanical models were predicting. So in 1935, Einstein and two of his colleagues, Boris Podolsky and Nathan Rosen, published a paper that was supposed to prove quantum theory was incorrect, or at least that it was woefully incomplete.
The Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen paper (or E.P.R. paper, as it’s now commonly known) didn’t quite get the job done. Quantum theory survived the attack. In response to the E.P.R. paper, Erwin Schrödinger (of Schrödinger’s cat fame) wrote a letter to Einstein. It was in this letter, from Schrödinger to Einstein, that the word “entanglement” was first used in reference to quantum theory. Well, actually, Schrödinger used the word Verschränkung, a German word which translates into English as “entanglement.” (The relevant section of Schrödinger’s letter is quoted in this article from The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.)
Entanglement refers to the way a pair of quantum particles can interact with each other and then remain “entangled” with each other after their interaction is over. If you measure the quantum state of one entangled particle, the other will instantaneously change to match. This implies that entangled particles can somehow exchange information at faster-than-light speeds. As Schrödinger wrote in his letter, this is not just a weird quirk of quantum theory; it’s the “characteristic trait” that makes quantum mechanics so radically different from classical physics.
Einstein was still not happy. Neither was Schrödinger; however, as I’ve come to understand the story, Schrödinger was able to set his personal feelings about quantum theory aside and continue his research. Einstein, meanwhile, kept trying to prove quantum theory was wrong until the day he died.
You might even say the idea of quantum entanglement haunted Einstein for the rest of his life. In 1947, in a letter to another physicist named Max Born, Einstein referred to entanglement as spukhafte Fernwirkung, a phrase which is commonly translated into English as “spooky action at a distance.” (The relevant section of Einstein’s letter is quoted in this book.)
Thus, quantum entanglement is the spookiest scientific term.
Hello, friends, and welcome to this month’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group. If you’re a writer and if you feel in any way insecure about your writing life, click here to learn more about this amazingly supportive group!
This month’s optional I.W.S.G. question asks, in part: “When you think of the term working writer, what does that look like to you?” My muse and I have had a lot of discussions about what it means to be a working writer. We have a very clear picture of what that should look like for us. It should look like this:
But that doesn’t happen most of the time. Why not? Because writing only generates a small portion of my income (Oh, before I forget: click here to buy my book!), and I still have to make the rest of my money doing a non-writing job. All the time spent away from writing, due to that other job, leaves me feeling frustrated and my muse feeling sad.
Honestly, I don’t really care if I call myself a working writer or a hobbyist. I don’t care if I’m a professional or an amateur. Those are just labels. What matters to me is getting more time in my day for writing. My muse and I want to have our little writing party (as pictured above) every single day for the rest of our lives.
So if being a “working writer” can help make that happen, then that’s what I intend to do.
Hello, friends! Welcome to September’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group, a support group for insecure writer’s like myself. If you’d like to learn more about this amazing group, click here!
This month’s optional I.W.S.G. question is:
If you could choose one author, living or dead, to be your beta partner, who would it be and why?
I’d have to pick Frank Herbert, the author of Dune, one the greatest science fiction novels of all time. Of course there are other Sci-Fi authors I’d love to meet and chat with. I wish I could talk politics with Mary Shelley and H.G. Wells, and I feel like Arthur C. Clark and Isaac Asimov would be great people to turn to for career advise. But for the purposes of beta reading, it’s got to be Herbert.
First off, have you read Dune? I mean, forget about all the Sci-Fi stuff. Forget about all those planets and spaceships and psychic superpowers. Forget about the giant sandworms and Fremen warriors and the plans within plans within plans. At the most basic, most fundamental level, the way Frank Herbert strings a sentence together is marvelous. It’s prose elevated almost to the level of poetry. Even if Herbert wrote in some other genre, I’d love getting feedback from someone who had such mastery over the English language!
But of course, Frank Herbert does (I mean, did) write science fiction, and there are precious few Sci-Fi authors who handle the sciency stuff so artfully. When you read Dune, you might not even notice all the ecology lessons sprinkled throughout the book. That’s real science. You’re learning real science! But the science is integrated seamlessly into the story, like any other aspect of setting or plot would be. I’d love to get a little guidance from a man who could pull off a trick like that!
Now I’ve worked with a lot of beta readers over the years, some good, some not so good. The not-so-good ones make writing feel like a chore, with lots of rules and regulations. Based on what I’ve read about Frank Herbert, I don’t think he’d be like that. Shortly after Herbert’s death in 1986, Sci-Fi author Ben Bova wrote this about him:
He knew pain. But to Frank, pain was something you got around, one way or the other, so you could get on with the main business of life: having fun. Creating great novels was fun. Being with friends was fun. Living life to its fullest was the real goal of existence, and he did exactly that. Life was a banquet, as far as Frank was concerned; his advice was to pull up a chair and enjoy yourself.
Someone who sees writing as fun—pure fun—just another part of the sheer joy of living? Now that sounds like the best recommendation for a beta reader anyone could ever make.
P.S.: Oh, and if I were beta partners with Frank Herbert, that would mean I could give him a little feedback too, right? Because I would like to talk with him, just a bit, about gender roles in his books. That’s one thing I think he could’ve handled better.
Hello, friends! Welcome to the Insecure Writer’s Support Group. If you’re a writer and if you feel in any way insecure about that, click here to learn more about this amazingly supportive group!
I’m feeling a little confused right now, both about my “real” life and my writing life. A lot of stuff seems to be happening. Very little of it makes any sense to me. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to say for this month’s IWSG post, but then I saw the optional IWSG question:
Quote: “Although I have written a short story collection, the form found me and not the other way around. Don’t write short stories, novels or poems. Just write your truth and your stories will mold into the shapes they need to be.”
Have you ever written a piece that became a form, or even a genre, you hadn’t planned on writing in? Or do you choose a form/genre in advance?
Oh, that’s an easy one! I always know I’m writing science fiction. I have never been interested in writing anything else, not even for a moment, not even once!
At various points in my life, writing teachers have tried to convince me to be more flexible. They’d ask me to try something different. Sometimes they would insist, as teachers do. “You never know,” they’d say. “You might like it!” But I did know. I was not going to like it. Not unless I could sneak a Sci-Fi element into the assignment somehow.
I’ll admit I was surprised to discover how much I enjoy writing short stories and novella length fiction. When I was young, I assumed I wanted to write Sci-Fi novels. But by writing in shorter forms, I can tell more Sci-Fi stories. And that’s the thing I want most. That’s the thing I’ve always wanted most: to tell more and more and more Sci-Fi stories!
And you know, with all the weird and confusing stuff going on right now, it is nice to feel confident about at least one thing. I write science fiction. That’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted to write. That’s the only thing I ever will want to write. I may be questioning a bunch of other stuff about myself right now, but I can at least feel confident about that one thing.
Hello, friends! Welcome to Sciency Words, a special series here on Planet Pailly where we take a closer look at the definitions and etymologies of science or science-related terms. Today on Sciency Words, we’re talking about:
TULPAMANCY
Do you have an imaginary friend? A “real” imaginary friend whom you can talk to and who can talk back to you in return? Does your imaginary friend often say things you weren’t expecting him/her/them to say? If so, you may have been practicing tulpamancy. You’re a tulpamancer, and your imaginary friend is a tulpa.
When I first heard about tulpamancy, I thought it sounded awesome. But tulpamancy comes with a lot of talk about mental energies and thought-form meditation and psycho-spiritual awakenings. It didn’t sound very sciency, but I decided to ask my muse what she thought.
My muse and I have been working together for quite a few years now. When it comes to what does or does not belong in my writing—and that includes what does or does not belong in a Sciency Words post—I trust my muse’s judgment. She’s usually right. Usually. But after doing more research on tulpamancy, I think this may be a rare instance where my muse is wrong.
The word tulpa comes from Tibetan… sort of. In 1929, Belgian-French adventurer and spiritualist Alexandra David-Néel published a book called Magic and Mystery in Tibet. In that book, David-Néel claims that by following certain rights and rituals of Tibetan Buddhism, she was able to conjure a “tulpa” out of the realm of human imagination and into the world of physical reality.
David-Néel’s tulpa took on the form of a jolly monk, a Friar Tuck-like character. Other people could (allegedly) see and interact with this jolly monk. Unfortunately, the monk grew “too willful,” according to this article from Nova Religio, and David-Néel was forced to destroy him.
The word tulpa is phonetically similar to a real word used by Tibetan Buddhists. Beyond that, however, Alexandra David-Néel’s account of creating and destroying her tulpa has little to do with actual Tibetan Buddhism. This seems to be a case of Western occultism/paranormalism with a bit of “orientalist window dressing,” as that same article from Nova Religio puts it.
Okay, yeah, this still doesn’t sound like a sciency thing, does it? But in recent years, the practice of creating and communicating with imaginary friends has become the subject of serious psychological research. The first scientific account of tulpas and tulpamancy appears to be this 2016 paper by Samuel Veissière. As Veissière describes it, tulpamancy is a little like multiple personality disorder, except it’s non-harmful and non-pathological. In fact, tulpamancy may even help reverse the symptoms of certain mental illnesses.
To quote this paper from Research in Psychology and Behavioral Science:
In cases of disorders that involve delusion and misperception, the tulpa often becomes the voice of reason during bouts of irrationality. One respondent diagnosed with Schizophrenia writes how his tulpa can not only identify between hallucinations and actuality, but that they developed a technique that allows the delusions to be “zapped” away. There are reports of tulpas alleviating the desire to perform irrational routines in individuals diagnosed with OCD, and others claim that their tulpas innovated workarounds for their dyslexia.
Think of it this way: much like your real friends, your imaginary friends are there for you when you need them. And since tulpas essentially live inside your brain, they understand better than anyone else what’s really going on in there. And if they see that something’s not right inside your head, they want to help, as any good friend would.
Now I’ve never been diagnosed with a mental illness, but speaking from personal experience, I can say this: my muse really has served as the voice of reason from time to time in my life. When I’m feeling lazy and unmotivated, she tells me to go write. She also reminds me to take breaks from writing, eat healthy meals, and get plenty of sleep at night, because: “A healthy writer is a productive writer!”
As I said, I’ve learned to trust my muse. She’s usually right. Usually. But she still insists that tulpamancy shouldn’t count as a Sciency Word.
So dear reader, what do you think? Do you agree with me that tulpamancy has become a scientific term, thanks to recent psychological research, or do you agree with my muse that this is a bunch of New Agey pseudoscientific nonsense? Let us (and I do mean us) know in the comments!
P.S.: For anyone who may be curious, my muse made her first appearance on this blog in this 2015 post for the Insecure Writer’s Support Group.
Hello, friends! Welcome to July’s meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group. If you’re a writer and if you feel in any way insecure about your writing, then click here to learn more about this amazingly supportive group!
Dear Muse,
I’m sorry. These last few weeks, I haven’t been doing much writing. I haven’t been doing much drawing either. I’ve fallen behind schedule on so many of the creative projects you wanted me to work on, and for that I owe you an apology.
Some big changes are happening in my life right now. Good changes. The biggest and most obvious change is, of course, that my first book is out. I’m a published author now, and I’ve had my first taste of that sweet, sweet writing income!
But any kind of change, even the good kind of change, can be confusing and disruptive, at least at first. I’m saying this not as an excuse but as an explanation. I neglected my work. I skipped drawing sessions and writing sessions. You kept trying to give me ideas, and I kept finding other things to do instead of writing or drawing. There’s no excuse for that.
I understand if you’re mad. I understand if you don’t want to talk to me right now since, from your perspective, it seems like I’ve stopped listening to you. But I promise I am listening. Things are starting to settle down in my life again. In some ways, things will be better than they ever were before… for both of us!
So dear muse, I’m eager to get back to writing, and I’m eager to get back to drawing. And if your you’re willing to forgive me, I would really appreciate your help.
Hello, friends, and welcome to another meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group. Do you feel insecure about your writing? Are you looking for support? Then this might be the right group for you! Click here to learn more!
Each month, the Insecure Writer’s Support Group offers an optional question, something to help get these I.W.S.G. posts started. This month’s question has to do with secrets. What secrets do we writers have that our readers would never know based on our work?
At the moment, my biggest secret is that I’m suffering from a bad case of imposter syndrome. My first book is coming out pretty soon. In fact, it comes out tomorrow. I worked really hard on it, and… well, I just hope people like it.
But what if they don’t!?! Oh no! People will think I’m a hack writer, a fraud, or something equally reprehensible!!!
A lot of my friends, both online and in real life, have been congratulating me and telling me how excited I must feel. And yes, I do feel excited. But I’m feeling other emotions as well. There’s a cyborg character in my book who can select which emotions he wants to experience and which emotions he does not. He can turn his emotions on and off with the flick of a switch.
I wish I could do that. I’d leave my excitement running and switch everything else off. But I’m no cyborg. I’m only human, and being human is not so easy. The best I can do is set those other emotions aside with the promise that I will deal with them later. In the meantime, I need to keep blogging. I need to keep marketing my work. And above all else, I need to keep writing, because this book that comes out tomorrow—that book is just the beginning.
P.S.: For those of you who may be interested, my book is a novella-length Sci-Fi adventure story entitled The Medusa Effect. It’s the first in a series of novella-length Sci-Fi stories about a journalist who travels through time, covering the galaxy’s biggest news stories before they happen. Click here to buy the book on Amazon, or you can read it for free with Kindle Unlimited.
Hello, friends, and welcome to another meeting of the Insecure Writer’s Support Group! If you’re a writer and if you feel in any way insecure about your writing life, click here to learn more about this amazingly supportive group!
This month, I should be bragging about finishing the A to Z Challenge. Also, I should probably be plugging my novella-length Sci-Fi story, which is now available for preorder on Amazon (click here!!!). But there’s something else I want to talk about today. Something more important.
There’s a certain attitude that I’m sure we’ve all encountered on the Internet, but it’s troublingly common in everyday life too. I call it this-or-that-ism. In the mind of a this-or-that-ist, everything is either this or that. There’s no middle ground. There’s no spectrum or continuum of possibilities. There are no shades of grey. And if you don’t conform to the standard definition of this, then you must be that.
This-or-that-ists come down hard on a lot of people, but in my experience they come down hardest on creative folks: artists, actors, writers, poets, musicians, etc…. This is especially true when creative people are relatively new to their craft. Why? Because when you’re just starting out, you obviously aren’t a huge mega success yet; therefore, you must be an abject failure.
As you may have guessed, there are a few this-or-that-ists in my life, people who feel the need to inform me that I’m no J.K. Rowling, no Stephen King, no James Patterson. And since I’m not one of those super rich, super famous authors, well… I think you know what the this-or-that-ists are insinuating.
Fortunately, there’s always been a little voice in my head—I call her my muse—who keeps encouraging me.
So today, I’d like to say the same thing to you, because if a few words from my imaginary friend can help me, then perhaps a few words from some guy on the Internet can help you. So to anyone who may need to hear this:
Whoever you are, whatever you’re trying to achieve, I believe in you. I think you can do it. I know you can do it. So your work isn’t perfect yet? That doesn’t mean it’s a disaster. You aren’t a runaway mega-success? That doesn’t make you a failure. Keep practicing, keep learning, and keep improving. And no matter where your own journey takes you, remember that you are worthy of respect and you are worthy of love, and your work deserves a chance to be seen or read or heard.
In a world full of this-or-that-ism, these are things that need to be said more often to all creative folks.
Next time on Planet Pailly, is this COVID-19 thing over yet? No? Okay, then I am not lowering my guard.
Planet Pailly 