The strange impact of self-healing on my writing

This is a story with an unexpected twist.

I’ve spent most of my life being – or trying to be – a good person. I’ve also spent most of it running away from darkness. From depression, from hard feelings, from self-hatred, from hurt and rejection. I’d managed to crush it down into a tight mass deep in my chest that was, effectively, a nuclear bomb threatening to go off at any moment.

Over the last few months, I’ve been going through a process of healing. It isn’t the classic, rather saccharine “giving love to it” type of stuff. I recall most powerfully the advice of Adyashanti, who says that we shouldn’t look for the light, but go to our darkest places, our biggest hurt, our greatest contradiction.

You can’t run away from this stuff; it catches up with you eventually.

And indeed, it has. My whole life came to a halt because of it and I’m only now building something new from the ashes of what was burned down about three months ago.

The strange thing was that this had an impact on my writing. And it wasn’t that I suddenly allowed myself to be a better writer in terms of voice or style, or that I suddenly found the confidence to put myself out there and get Amnar onto Podiobooks and into the charts.

It was, oddly enough, that all the bad guys in Amnar got better.

Amnar is, like all creations of people, something of a reflection of me. And in that sense, it reflected back my fear of looking at the darkest parts of myself. The Amnari were great, yes, but although people commended me on the nastiness of the bad guys, or the complexity of good-bad-guys like Vasha or bad-good-guys like Arandes, I could feel it was out of balance.

I felt, personally, that it was too obvious that the Amnari would win because they had the power. They have the dragonlords, and the Tiomke have no equivalent, and they have the Ai Ta’Sifradan, which in some ways made the whole thing a bit like America being attacked by, say, the Channel Islands*.

It was what led me to begin to develop the Tiomke, also known as the Duum State, and to decide to introduce Tiom himself as a character. The book The Inheritance, which as usual ignores most of the classic rules of putting together a story and works with couplets more than individuals (Tascha and Arandes, Daar and Io in two separate subplots), then has a mirror between the ascension of Vasha into the higher eschelons of Tiomke leadership at the same time as Io Inherits her role as Guardian Defender.

You need to see the bad guys to appreciate them, their standpoint, and understand better why they do what they do. At last, being prepared to at least start looking at some aspects of the chattering of my own monkey mind that are really dark and really hurt, made me start to develop much better bad guys and present a greater balance in the context of my fiction.

I love this. At last, Amnar is beginning to feel more balanced, and a better piece of work. I myself am still dealing with deeper and deeper levels of dark, as I get stronger and better able to handle it. And as I do so, the Amnari plots develop and new ideas spring forth, making this a far more interesting and powerful world and story.

*That isn’t a comment on the political landscape of the Channel Islands, by the way. They’re just suitably small in comparison with America.

TGIAD 2.0: Snowflakes and abductions

Click on the picture to listen to this week's podcast

It’s TGIAD, or Thank God It’s Amnar Day (so named by the great Toaster Ferret). I release the next chapter in the book Amnar: The Awakening, and take a moment here to write about what happens in the episode here on the blog.

If you’re new to all this, you can download the first book, Amnar: The Awakening, from Podiobooks.com.

We’re now into Amnar: The Inheritance, the second book in The Awakening series. You can subscribe by clicking on the picture to the left.

Io in Nas Isca

Io’s feeling pretty disoriented by what she’s experienced in the last two days, and now she’s in for even more.

She’s never actually been outside Duum before, and the change in climate is a big shock, about as big as the cultural shift to a place where she has more freedom to move. She doesn’t really get any chance to explore this, however, as being Capillai-nisi, most of her time is dictated by others.

Heavy editing

This chapter is pretty short compared to the written version. I’ve been experimenting with different styles which work better for podcasting, and some of the more thoughtful pieces featuring Icaan seem rather long and slow for an ideal podcast episode.

Much of this episode is taken up with Io, still in shock, coping with her shifting relationship to Daar. Pretty much everything she’s ever known has been torn apart in one go, over the space of a couple of days, so she hasn’t had time to think about it. Grief is at the forefront of her mind, so she really doesn’t appreciate much of what she sees and experiences in her first few days in Nas Isca.

Dramatic achievements

Amnar’s success on Podiobooks.com has rather thrown me for a loop, so this podcast wasn’t recorded until this morning. I’m still working on a budget of nothing, with no capacity to put money into it unless my financial situation improves. I have found some new image sources I’ll take advantage of, and as soon as I can I’ll have to start improving podcast quality and getting better sound effects. In the meantime, I hope you can still enjoy Amnar as it is.

The English, our weather, and our conversation

Every other day on Twitter there is an exchange of Manchester Tweeters discussing the latest behaviour in the skies above our city. And people from other countries who happen in on these remarks find themselves confused.

Why are we talking about the rain, or the thunderstorm, or remarking on a sudden bout of hail?

I remember a couple of years ago a slew of radio conversations from various noted people (like Bill Bryson, for example) about the English, our weather, and why we talk about it so much. Some outsiders were disparaging; we talk about the weather because we’re emotionally repressed and are too afraid to talk about anything else, and we don’t have interesting weather anyway.

I don’t think either of these is accurate. Weather in English conversation is a complicated thing. It’s a form of social connection, it is, on occasion, a means of recovering a Terribly Embarrassing Situation or a distraction when somebody has just announced something they really shouldn’t in public (such as using the word “vagina” in the presence of the Queen, for example), and anyway, our weather is interesting.

English weather: generally changeable

We’re an island, and our skies are subject to a great many interchangeable forces. That’s why you really should take the Met Office with a few pinches of salt. It’s extremely difficult to predict weather in a place where so many different interactions are taking place all the time.

England doesn’t experience typhoons, monsoons, tornados or hurricanes. But that doesn’t mean our weather isn’t interesting. It’s just rather more safe than elsewhere. It’s also constantly changing. Whereas many parts of the world have only two or three variations on a theme, or alternate between extremes, English weather is highly nuanced. It can be raining in Salford and sunny next door in Manchester.

And of course, none of our services can cope with a lot of it. A few extra inches of snow and the M1 seizes up. The wrong kind of rain can shut down the east coast mainline. It makes life a little more of an adventure than it might otherwise be, without actually seriously endangering lives (normally).

We use weather to interact

When we meet up in England, we exchange remarks about the weather as conversation openers. The weather is a nice subject for the English, who don’t like to wade into chats with strangers that might be too personal. Like every culture, our conversations are governed by very complex and often hidden social formulae, and by the nature of the English personality.

Although things have changed here recently, the English tend to prefer a kind of delicate privacy rather than dramatic displays (Diana’s funeral notwithstanding). The weather is where you start because it’s safe, especially when questions like “How’s your job?” might be met with “I’ve just been made redundant.”

It’s not that the English are prudish or repressed. It can seem as though we’re frightened of emotional engagement with deep issues to outsiders, but actually it’s something else. We respect privacy. The typical English reaction to a crisis is to say “I’ll put the kettle on.” We like practical things to do in a dilemma, and we don’t generally like to intrude onto other people’s struggles.

And that isn’t because we don’t care. We do care, but we also feel that the last thing people want when they’re suffering is to be bombarded with questions or overbearing sympathy.

Every week I attend a Pilates class, and at the start of the session, we all tend to have a light chat to start relaxing. Of course, we all talk about the weather. It’s such a safe topic because nobody can get offended, it allows us all to talk about one thing that affects all of us, given that we’re strangers and attendees to the class come and go as they please.

Knowing how to talk about the weather

The weather is also used as an announcement of arrival by new people in any group situation. It’s a great way to walk into a group where you’ve missed the start of a conversation but everybody notices you’re there.

“Quite a lot of rain today,” you might say as you shake off your umbrella. Or: “It’s good to see a spot of sunshine. It’s been a while.”

And somebody will agree, or mention that where they were it was a bit different, or were they around for the thunderstorm that morning? And then the new arrival is firmly part of the conversation and matters can continue.

Weather is also treated as an event in English culture, from a massive storm to a light shower, which is why interactions on Twitter with other English friends often includes remarks about it. Much of our day to day humour can revolve around it (currently it would appear that one needs to dress for every possible eventuality when going out – waders, an umbrella and a bikini probably not being out of place).

So if you’re not English, and you find yourself baffled by an extended discussion of what to you seems like a mild and uninteresting storm, remember that it’s just our culture, and our weather is a key part not just of our lives but the way we interact.

Answering listener questions: Is Arandes modelled on the Patrician?

I’ve had a comment from Ankher (Robbie), who asked me:

Is Arandes at all patterned after the Patrician? Pratchett almost never uses his POV (possibly only once, I think, in one where he’s still an assassin, but I’m not sure), and they both are always playing a game with the world, and we don’t know the rules.

The very short answer is No. I haven’t consciously modelled characters on any other characters, or real people for that matter, either. There are a group of characters whose POV I never touch, and Arandes is just one of them. Others include Talija, Arist, Isha and Tiom.

All of these characters are engaged in a kind of ‘play with reality’ on different levels, or have secrets, hidden depths that can’t be revealed to the audience. We aren’t meant to know the minds of these people, so they remain hidden to us.

The Patrician, from the Discworld series, is a great example of a manipulator, and like Arandes he toys with people. But he’s also an absolute ruler, too, and is in the business of keeping himself in power by maintaining a balance with other powers that would seek to destroy him otherwise. He manipulates people from a position of power, but Arandes is in a much more complicated position. His power is neither obvious nor absolute.

Arandes is a Servant, or a senior official in our terms. However, he is beholden to the Capillites, whose will he must obey on punishment of death. As a Servant he doesn’t have the same obvious authority as Vetinari. All Arandes’ power games involve manipulating those who rule him, rather than those he rules.

He’s fairly straightforward with the other Servants, with Ta Dasi and the Ai Ta Dasi (the senior officials of Amnar). He simply doesn’t tell them what he’s doing. But with the Capillites, he’s involved in a much more complicated game of power relations.

They’re partly aware of it because he’s not just a Capillite but a Nashima. The Nashima’s position is highly unusual; it makes him a Servant to the Empress herself, Isha. But she can’t order him to do anything, she can only make requests.

This creates incredible tension between Isha and the other Capillites, because it’s very difficult to tell whether Arandes is doing things entirely of his own volition and depending on Isha to back him up if he’s caught, or whether Isha is using him to manipulate situations in certain ways. Of course, this completely ignores the influence of other players like Talija, for example.

The classic example in The Awakening is Arandes’ orders to Zoriel which send him up into the Holy Complex. It’s easy to blame Arandes but he says he was given instructions. The question is, who gives Arandes these instructions and why?

In short, although Arandes is very much playing a game, there is a sense that he might well be only part of something much bigger. Rather than being the chess player, he could be considered one of the pieces, but with a greater awareness of what’s going on than the others on the board.

Or… maybe not… You never really know, and you can’t know, at this stage.

What Sam Vimes taught me about making things happen

Another week, another bunch of episodes of Amnar: The Awakening hit Podiobooks.com, and the book hits the number 1 slot in the daily charts again. A simple post on a ning forum I’ve joined suddenly results in a highlight by John Kremer on his blog.

I’ve been trying a combination of marking the various things that have happened and focusing on what needs to be done next, or even right now. I discovered a good key to getting on with this work, and keeping it going.

And Sam Vimes was the man who taught it to me.

Who is Sam Vimes?

Sam Vimes is a character in the Discworld series. In one of my favourite books, he jumps into another time and has to find his way back to his wife – in the process of giving birth – as well as save lives in the time he’s in.

He desperately wants to go home, right then. It’s painful, because he’s got nothing to hold on to.

But, he says, you do the job that’s in front of you.

Hard times for the dreamer

I spent a couple of months at least getting bogged down in desperately wanting things to be different. I tried to make them different, and kept running into brick walls. It’s painful, wanting things to be other than the way they are.

Nothing was shifting, so I decided I’d do something I really could do. There was a job in front of me, so I got on with it.

If I thought for a minute about the size of the goal, or what I was going through and how difficult it might prove to be, I’d never get started. In fact, I didn’t, for ages. My situation having been very harsh for a long time, I was collapsing under the strain.

The answer was to do something. Something I could really get on with.

One thing at a time

My days are very complicated. I get up with a plan, and very often, that plan has to shift if something suddenly happens. I keep looking for opportunities, signing up for new things, exploring new ideas. But each thing is one step at a time, one meeting at a time.

I now have a business action plan that I’m working to, but it’s not all I’m doing. I keep focused as much as I can, and if it hurts then I find somebody to talk it out. I’ve spent a lot of afternoons drinking Chinese tea at Sweet Mandarin for just that reason.

I keep reminding myself of Sam Vimes’ philosophy. Doing the job in front of me, no matter what it is and how much it might hurt, has pulled me out of one of the worst down spells of my life.

Hard times create opportunities. It makes you think differently, and doing more.

Holosync Level 4.2: Exploring radical change

This update is long overdue, as has been pointed out in emails to me. The last four weeks have passed by like a whirlwind, and I’ve been hardly aware of the fact that I’m now four weeks into the second part of Level 4.

Over the last few months, I’ve received some great emails and stories about people’s success with Holosync, for which I’m incredibly grateful. If you want to share stories, don’t hesitate to get in touch or leave a comment. I am working on a blog which will focus in on Holosync, rather than giving these rare reviews, since it seems to be a very popular topic.

One especially good comment came from a man who told me that he had managed to use Holosync to help relieve and cure his depression. His technique was to give himself plenty of time on each level, rather than jumping ahead or sticking to Holosync’s recommended protocol.

It so happened that this comment arrived just as I was considering experimenting with moving onto Level 4.2 a week or so early. What happened that weekend convinced me that often it’s best to follow the advice you’re given – even taking more time on each level – if it’s still affecting you. I had an intense couple of days and it was that comment that convinced me to carry on with Level 4.1 for another week.

What’s always really difficult with writing Holosync reviews like this is that everybody’s experience will be different. I have exchanged emails with people who’ve had similar progressions, but you just can’t tell. There is one key lesson that has come out of this month for me, however.

Change only happens when you’re really ready for it.

I’ve spent the last few years trying to induce change into my life, with very little success. Some things work well, but I always slipped very quickly back into bad habits. It was only really as I started using Level 4.2 that change occurred – mostly because the actions I took changed, and the way I went about doing what I was doing changed.

Awareness is key. Noticing the patterns is the starting point, but often you don’t see them until you’re right into them, and you have to pull yourself up. I’ve found this with my habit of overworking. I avoid painful emotions and thoughts by working every hour I’m conscious. I even create additional suffering just to keep myself busy.

I didn’t really see this until I’d been doing it for a couple of weeks this month and had worn myself out. Once again, it pays to be aware of what you’re doing, and it’s amazing how subtle patterns become when you’re not paying attention.

It has, however, become much easier to notice and accept some of my more obvious patterns of resistance, such as getting depressed or isolating myself. I put a great deal of this down to simply being more aware, more conscious of how I feel and more accepting of how I feel. Rather than judge every mood, they can pass through without comment.

The crucial thing is the journal.

Where would I be without my journal? I’ve found it especially useful for monitoring and noticing when I have a more profound reaction. Just the act of noting down that I’m feeling anger or sadness or tension somewhere inside is enough to shift the reaction I feel to what I’m experiencing.

This commitment to a process of internal change that has been going on now for about three months has now produced changes in how I behave – and that’s bringing about changes in the rest of my life, too.

Some points worth taking away from this are that Bill Harris is right, and rushing through the program does not necessarily reap the best rewards. Slow and steady wins the race, especially if you have a background featuring something like depression.

Really making the most of the time is another great thing to do. I’ve read reviews full of complaints about having to sit still for an hour a day. Make the most of the relaxation in that time. Staying still is a wonderful opportunity to come back to groundedness. Rest, more than anything else. I’ve found it really beneficial to start my day with Holosync. It changes the emphasis of the day from rushed to well-paced.

Keeping note of what you’re experiencing is another key to success with Holosync. Pausing to experience rather than fighting any reactions you get can be tough, but just a few words in a notebook helps to release those feelings.

Finally, I’ve noticed that it’s only been at this stage that Learning Strategies Paraliminals have begun to have an effect. I wonder if it’s because I’m more open to change. If you’re struggling to get benefit from them, consider whether you might actually be resisting the change they say they’ll bring about.

The last few weeks have been intense, and I won’t have time until Friday, when I do the month in review, to go over everything that’s happened. There has been a great deal of change and it’s really only the beginning. Feeling my way along with what feels like a new mind a lot of the time has become something of an adventure.

I will be back with another update shortly, and in the meantime will continue working on a Holosync blog for everybody who’s asked for it. Thank you for reading and for all your patience!

Thoughts on a sudden success

If you’d asked me, a week ago, how many people I honestly thought listened to the Amnar podcast, I’d have suggested 10, maybe 12.

When I first spoke to the man who has been so helpful with my PR in the last couple of weeks I suggested maybe a couple of hundred, but I thought that was pushing it. To be honest, beyond the people who write to me or chat to me on Twitter, I really didn’t think anybody was listening.

This is very bad form for somebody on the internet, but I don’t have access to the statistics for my website (it isn’t owned by me), so my first insight into how many people paid attention to Amnar came when it was released on Podiobooks.com.

It went to Number 1 for daily downloads, and then spent a week at Number 2. I was, quite frankly, stunned. I didn’t check the statistics for a week, but it left my eyes bulging to see over 2000 downloads in just a few days. I sent a message to H, who owns my site, and he got back to say we had 40GB of downloads for July.

A little bit of math tells me that if you combine downloads for both sites we’re talking more than 5,500 downloads. In a month.

I had to take a breather at that point.

Generally, I’ve noted on the web that people pay a lot of attention to statistics and noticing how well they’re doing. I’m actually glad I didn’t. I’m also glad that I had low expectations – although possibly not as low as I did have – for Amnar.

I’ve kept my real expectations for Amnar much lower than my imagination will allow. Instead of constantly tracking how well I appear to be doing, I’ve been totally focused on work. And I think a lot of the success has been down to just that kind of work ethic.

It began with the realisation that as long as I was hunting for work, I needed something else to do that would make me feel more positive. Once I was working toward putting the Manchester tweet-up together, I had a goal to concentrate on.

And that expanded outward into learning the new Liberated Syndication system, putting together a good business process for the podcasts on the site and generally spending every hour I could looking for opportunities.

Instead of sitting around feeling frustrated and miserable, I felt as though at least I was working, and on a learning curve so steep it was almost vertical.

I took it quite seriously, too. I made notes on what I did, what worked and what didn’t as I interacted with people helping me. A lot of time was spent thinking of “ways to do things better next time” and responding to opportunities that came along as I was spending all day with Twitter open and available.

I found myself spotting things I’d never noticed before, which led to connections with Businesslink, MDDA, Salford Hundred Venture and a host of other organisations and individuals. I’m still at the start of this, too, but I’ve never felt so good about being so busy.

Several years of working in business as an analyst and consultant has pretty much nailed my feet to the floor as far as expectations are concerned, but when it comes to getting on with it, keeping on with the work I need to do and responding to everything that comes up as I can.

Now seems to be a time of regrouping, and reassessing where I’ve reached so far. It’s been an intense month, and it’s not even over yet.

TGIAD 2.0: Intense politics edition

Click above to listen to the podcast

It’s TGIAD, or Thank God It’s Amnar Day (so named by the great Toaster Ferret). I release the next chapter in the book Amnar: The Awakening, and take a moment here to write about what happens in the episode here on the blog.

If you’re new to all this, you can download the first book, Amnar: The Awakening, from Podiobooks.com.

We’re now into Amnar: The Inheritance, the second book in The Awakening series. You can subscribe by clicking on the picture to the left.

Meanwhile in Nas Isca…

Arandes has been arrested, and the Servants are now on the brink of turning against the Empire that they’ve served for their entire lives. Daar, who never imagined this could ever happen, is now confronting the fact that Io is probably the only one who can change their minds.

Background

The arrival of Arandes as a Servant gradually shifted the balance of power in Amnar. Whereas Capillites were revered for their wisdom and leadership, the Servants became the most visible form of power in Amnar. The Capillites were actively drawing back, the Ta Dasi were growing more and more influential, and the result is this: the Servants debating whether they should overthrow the Capillites for the sake of the people of Duum.

The Capillites’ inability to cope with Duum and the fallout from the city’s change in power base has given the Servants a great deal of food for thought. Being the kind of people who prefer action to politics, they are discussing whether to save Duum, but also to end the power of the Capillites in the city.

One question remains: What really is the role of Isha, the Empress herself?

Introducing the Servants

This chapter effectively introduces all of the Servants (apart from Solija) in one go. It’s not necessary to attempt to remember names. The core characters from The Awakening remain at the heart of The Inheritance. At the heart of Arandes’ campaign to protect the people of Duum are Cosai and Tascha, the most important of the watchers amongst the Servants.

Bit of a P.S.

Besides stripping podcasts for the Podiobooks, I did some work on the Amnar website. In particular, I’ve added new t-shirts and even a mug to the Cafepress store. They have the new Amnar graphic on them, too. You can check them out here.

Amnar makes a splash on Podiobooks and I go renegade

I honestly wasn’t expecting to have to write a post like this for a while.

I’m actually indebted to Brian Rathbone for pointing it out and remarking on it on Twitter – or I wouldn’t have noticed. Amnar: The Awakening, which was launched on Podiobooks on Monday, reached the top slot for most downloaded book by Wednesday.

By the time I checked, it was at the No. 2 slot, but it was still pretty exciting, given that I’m new to the site and had only been promoting via Twitter and through the current fans.

This is, obviously, very exciting stuff and I’m very happy (not to mention surprised) about it.

In other news, if you’re in any way curious, I was interviewed by the fabulous Jonathan Fields for his Career Renegade series on Monday too. You can find the interview by clicking right here.

It’s been an incredibly hectic, crazy time. I’ve been in touch with BusinessLink, a government agency that supports small, growing businesses and new businesses, and a local agency that gives support exclusively to people in my city.

There’s a lot of hard work going on behind the scenes, and I’m still working on finishing the draft of Amnar: The Inheritance I’ve been working on. To those who’ve also asked for a Holosync update, I’ll do one as soon as I can.

Amnar heads for Podiobooks

Click on the picture to go to the Podiobooks page

At last!

For all those struggling with downloads from my own site, and for anybody not yet listening to Amnar: The Awakening, you can find it on Podiobooks today.

Here.

It’s in MP3 format so there’s no need any longer to hijack your nearest twelve year old geek genius to turn the episodes from .mov to .mp3 files.

It’s been a story getting it all ready for Podiobooks.com and I’m indebted to Evo for his patience with my emergent non-techiness. I’m very much a technojoy person, which means that as much as I love the technology, I like to dive in and press buttons and make lots of mistakes.

I was also slowed up by the rest of my life temporarily swamping me, so that there were times when I wasn’t sure I’d get my podcast out, let alone doing the work for the Podiobooks release.

And then, of course, Liberated Syndication, who hold the media for Podiobooks, went through an upgrade. This caused all the usual fall out issues that upgrades suffer from. Thanks to my rampant loudmouth complaining on Twitter I got some support from the Libsyn guys, and finally learned how exactly to use the FTP rather than hammering uselessly at the harddrive button (don’t ask, really. Don’t ask).

And now, an important point: If you’re already listening to Amnar: The Inheritance, fear not! It will carry on being released on a Friday as ever, and TGIAD will continue as usual. And once I’ve finished that, we’ll be moving swiftly on to the next book, and the next, and the next…

I am planning to release all the books on Podiobooks as well as my own site at the moment, since I know a lot of people already have feeds set up. If, however, you’re one of those people struggling with the format or with the occasional weird problem that’s shown up with early episodes, you might find it easier to head to the podiobooks site as an alternative.

You know, just in case the twelve year old doesn’t want to turn your files into .mp3s.

These are wild times indeed, so I hope you enjoy this release. There’s no natter from me (or anybody else), but just Amnar.