Reset

Call it a reset.

A reboot?

If the word didn’t have so many negative connotations, I would even go so far as to say it’s a creative bankruptcy, because that’s what it feels like: I have so many real and assumed creative obligations to myself and to my community of friends and fans, but it’s been so long since I could dedicate time and resources to being creative, the psychic pressure of that debt has become a source of daunting stress.

What’s been going on?

Well. An awful lot, personally and professionally, both with me and the people I love. I’ve been drained, frankly, and I haven’t had really anything left in me to dedicate to creative endeavors.

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The psychic pressure of my fallow creativity…. call it a creative deficit… has contributed to my overall anxiety and stress, like a stack of unpaid and overdue bills on a dusty corner of the kitchen counter.

So. I’m starting over as a new independent creator; my slate, as much as is possible in the real world, wiped clean.

I’m forgiving myself of that debt.

I must.

It’s my hope that you will forgive me, too.

How Can I Just Decide To Be “New?”

As someone who was one of the first podcasters, one of the first independent publishers; someone with hundreds of original songs and lots and lots of content out there in the world; someone who’s helped scores of creators with their own creative endeavors across the last fifteen years… how can I declare myself as “new?”

If I’m honest about it, the independent creative universe of authors and podcasters and musicians and bloggers is so different and so much larger than when I started creating content twenty years ago, I, who was never more than (briefly) a medium-sized fish in a few small ponds, am now more like a brine shrimp in the ocean.

It doesn’t matter that I’m not literally new on the scene. For most of the world, I’m utterly unknown.

I’m embracing that fact.

I’m taking advantage of it!

A Renewed Commitment to Learn and Share

I have so much to re-learn, and learn, and forget, and discover.

As I do, I’ll document it here, and on the Sonitotum podcast (coming soon…), and in other media as it seems appropriate… so you can learn with me.

I hope you’ll join me, whether you’re an absolute beginner, a seasoned creative pro, or, like me, someone looking to start fresh with a beginner’s mind.

Together, we’ll examine how to build a balanced, mindful,  sane creative life while also touching on craft, practice, resources, tools, and interesting stuff that attracts my attention along the way. The emphasis will be on creative writing, especially fiction, but since I’m also a musician with an abiding interest in the processes behind all creativity, expect me to touch on other forms of creative expression, too.

It’s my experience that art and life are intricately, persistently, and messily intermingled. Tangled, even. So I will be getting personal, at least as personal as is possible while still respecting the privacy of others. It’s a counter-intuitive fact that an experience is more relatable when it’s very specific, so in the interest of creating “teachable moments” (and believe me, I gotta million of ’em) I’ll be as transparent as possible.

Let’s Be Absolute Beginners Together
“…we’re absolute beginners with eyes completely open but nervous all the same…”

Here are some of the ways you can come along with me:

Subscribe to receive new articles in your email as soon as I publish them – click here to sign up!
Join the community of friends and fans receiving my e-mail newsletter.
Subscribe to Sonitotum, the podcast companion to Scribtotum (coming soon — stay tuned to the e-mail newsletter!)
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Subscribe to my YouTube channel.

Here we go!

The post Reset appeared first on the official website of author and creator Matthew Wayne Selznick. Visit his site for more articles and content on how to help you stay human as you built a successful and healthy writing life.