Richard Butchins's Blog: Angels stand corrected... - Posts Tagged "japan"
Still breathing but not dancing...
Good Morning
It's actually afternoon, but somewhere it's the morning. So, I am flying to Japan next week which is causing me anxiety mind you what doesn't cause me anxiety. I even get anxious about the fact that I get anxious. Ridiculous.
The thing about anxiety is that it doesn't pay any regard to probability just possibility. So the sun will not go out tomorrow but that's not going to stop me from worrying about it now is it? The entire situation is foolish but the spiny urchin called anxiety; well, it don't care.
I've managed to get to to chapter 8 on my next novel - remarkable - this is the second novel the first is stalled on chapter 11. Now I have no idea why writing is such a painful experience it really shouldn't be but it damn well is - to paraphrase Hemmingway (who'd rather drink than write ) I just sit at my computer and bleed...
It's actually afternoon, but somewhere it's the morning. So, I am flying to Japan next week which is causing me anxiety mind you what doesn't cause me anxiety. I even get anxious about the fact that I get anxious. Ridiculous.
The thing about anxiety is that it doesn't pay any regard to probability just possibility. So the sun will not go out tomorrow but that's not going to stop me from worrying about it now is it? The entire situation is foolish but the spiny urchin called anxiety; well, it don't care.
I've managed to get to to chapter 8 on my next novel - remarkable - this is the second novel the first is stalled on chapter 11. Now I have no idea why writing is such a painful experience it really shouldn't be but it damn well is - to paraphrase Hemmingway (who'd rather drink than write ) I just sit at my computer and bleed...
Japan is confusing
I'm in Osaka in Japan. I'm here on an Arts Council funded project, part of a programme run by Unlimited - it's for disability led arts projects and I'm making a film/video installation.
Japan is a strange mix of the seemingly familiar mixed with the utterly foreign. For someone like me on the ASD spectrum you might expect it to create a higher than normal level of anxiety but it has had the opposite effect. Because I can understand nothing at all the normal pressures of trying to figure out what people mean and social conventions have fallen away, not entirely but enough for me to feel oddly calm and I walk around without knowing what is going on and unable to read all the signs and this is a good thing although it's mitigated by my support worker being here and he can speak and read Japanese - in a way it's given me a better understanding of those further along the spectrum than me. It has also presented me with rather a lot of culinary challenges.
I recommend a visit to Japan for everyone from the west.
Japan is a strange mix of the seemingly familiar mixed with the utterly foreign. For someone like me on the ASD spectrum you might expect it to create a higher than normal level of anxiety but it has had the opposite effect. Because I can understand nothing at all the normal pressures of trying to figure out what people mean and social conventions have fallen away, not entirely but enough for me to feel oddly calm and I walk around without knowing what is going on and unable to read all the signs and this is a good thing although it's mitigated by my support worker being here and he can speak and read Japanese - in a way it's given me a better understanding of those further along the spectrum than me. It has also presented me with rather a lot of culinary challenges.
I recommend a visit to Japan for everyone from the west.
Angels stand corrected...
I have to have a blog...the site told me, my publisher told me, my publicist told me, and even my turkish barber told me, as he was administering the finest of close shaves. So I thought I had better
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