Stay Awake

[Sabine]

favourite things.

1. Clouds at sunset.
2. Large bodies of water.
3. Falling snow.
4. Stars.
5. A clear mind.

[Sabine]

mood.

"If I didn’t define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people’s fantasies for me and eaten alive."
Audre Lorde.

[Sabine]

the days when you don't feel like writing.

I take zero credit for the following post. It was written by my absolute favourite writing blogger, Chuck Wendig. Go check out his site here. He's phenomenal.

I'm sharing this here as a personal reminder.

& maybe it'll help you, too?
"The days when you don't feel like writing.

Those are the days you have to write.

Even if it’s nothing, even if it’s crap, you’ve got to carve the words onto the page. Even if it’s only a hundred words, even if you only get to move the mountain by a half-an-inch, you’re still nudging the needle, still keeping that story-heart beating, still proving to yourself and to the world that this is who you are and what you do.

They say you can’t get blood from a stone but squeeze a stone hard enough, you’ll get blood.

Blood wets the gears. Blood makes the grass grow.

Effort. Work. Movement. Motion.

The days you don’t want to run, you have to run.

The days you don’t want to get out of bed are the days you must get out of bed.

The days you don’t think you can fly are the ones you gotta jump off the cliff.

Writer means writing. Even if it’s just a moment in the narrative, even if it’s just one thought orchestrated and set gently on the page. An avalanche is snowflakes. An ocean is all droplets. Our life is measured in seconds, our work measured in words, and so you have to put the words down.

The act creates momentum. Writing begets writing begets writing.

The lack of act has its own momentum, too — don’t write today, and tomorrow you wonder if this is really who you are, if this is what you’re meant to do, and so the next day you think it’s just not happening, the Muse isn’t there, the inspiration hasn’t lit a fire under your ass yet, the rats don’t feel like they’re gnawing at you and oh, hey, other writers — well, they’re all talented and driven and they’d never think of sitting down and not writing and maybe that’s who you are, not a writer but rather, Not A Writer, and so the gap in your effort cracks and pops and widens like a broken jaw, a yawning mouth, and soon all you see is the broken teeth of your efforts, broken dreams there in the dark of the mind and the back of the throat, and what you Want to do is lost beneath the illusion of what you Didn’t — or what you Can’t — do.

We fight that inertia, we fight the fear and the doubt by writing.

The words you write right now are words you can fix later.

The words you don’t write today are a curse, a hex, a black hole painted white.

You think that forcing it is counterproductive, that it means nothing, that you’ll just spit mud and blood onto the paper — and you might be right, but you might be wrong. Might be gold in them thar hills, might be a cure for what ails you in those droplets of blood. You don’t know. You can’t know. You’re you — your own worst judge, your own enemy, your greatest hater.

If you’re dying in the snow, no matter how much it hurts, you’ve gotta get up and walk.

If you’re drowning in the deep, no matter how hard it is, you’ve gotta hold the air in your lungs until your chest feels like it’s on fire and you’ve gotta swim hard for the surface.

Writing is the act of doing. Surviving. Living. Being.

From nothing into something. The word of the gods spoken aloud and made real, signal in noise, order in chaos, Let There Be Words and then there were Words.

On the days it’s hard to write are the days it’s most important to write.

That’s how you know who you really are.

That’s how you know this is what you’re meant to do.

Wake up.

Get up.

Write."

[Sabine]

run for the hills.

"Estragon: Nothing to be done.
Vladimir: I'm beginning to come round to that opinion."
Samuel Beckett, "Waiting for Godot."

[Sabine]

goals.

“To love. To be loved. To never forget your own insignificance. To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you. To seek joy in the saddest places. To pursue beauty to its lair. To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple. To respect strength, never power. Above all, to watch. To try and understand. To never look away. And never, never to forget.”
Arundhati Roy.

[Sabine]

the sky's falling, baby.

“We’re apes. We think we’re all sophisticated with our toaster ovens and designer footwear, but we’re just a bunch of finely ornamented apes.”
Mark Manson.

[Sabine]

i bet you say that to all the girls.

“If you remember me, then I don't care if everyone else forgets.”
Haruki Murakami.

[Sabine]

let your flames rise.

"Tell me you're mine, baby
Tell me before I erupt.
Burn up in the sky, baby
Become the dust."
Jack Garratt.

[Sabine]

thursday.

“I have this strange feeling that I'm not myself anymore. It's hard to put into words, but I guess it's like I was fast asleep, and someone came, disassembled me, and hurriedly put me back together again. That sort of feeling.”
Haruki Murakami.

[Sabine]

hills & valleys.

“He kissed me hard and I kissed him back harder, like it was the end of an era that had lasted all of my life.”
Cheryl Strayed.