At the beginning of this year, I knew I needed some type of enrichment. Days were blurring together, and I had very little to healthily look forward to apart from getting through another shift at work.
I felt lost, and the voice in my head was convinced that my stagnation would be my eternity. Instead of accepting it, I decided that this year, 2023, would be my year of change.
I am terrified of change, but my constant state of dissatisfaction was so much worse to endure.
New Year’s Resolution
To solve all of my problems, the first goal I set for myself was to write a book. Every year, I tell myself that this is going to be the year. I will complete a draft, and I’ll be able to accomplish my childhood dream of becoming an author, inspiring others the way I’ve been inspired.
Of all my attempts at my self-made annual disappointment, this year has shown the most promise. I made a point of writing everything I think down, sending myself messages on Discord and compiling things into one document. It wasn’t until I moved everything into one document on my computer that I realized I had roughly 30k words of bare-bones ideas down for one story (well, that’s a lie; sometimes I write snippets of story that are about 1-4k words each).
I’ve been able to expand on it, and now I’m just shy of 50k words. In previous years, I topped out at about 15k words before abandoning the goal.
This last month, I had a bit of an idea drought, so not much was done aside from necessary editing. To motivate me forward, I bought some book-sized paper, printed my semi-final first few chapters, and I put those into a binder. It worked wonders for rekindling my energy for the project. I am not sure if I’ll be able to finish it by the new year, but I’m much further along than I ever thought I could be!
Reading Goal
To combat the Groundhog Day loop I felt stuck in, I set out to dive back into a hobby that I haven’t had a strong connection to since high school. Since I started reading again, my sense of time restored to a point where I can now keep track of what I did each week. Previously, I was lucky to remember what happened in what month.
Around the beginning of January, I did my first stock-up of books. I can’t remember exactly, but I think I ended up with six books after visiting two stores. They were popular, the ones everyone on my side of the internet happened to be talking about. I figured if I started there as my first step, I would naturally find more that suit my tastes.
As of writing this (3 August 2023), I have read 19 novels this year. I also have 8 more started, but it’s been difficult for me to pick a book up and read this past week because of some stress going on with other changes. Now that a good amount of it has passed, I hope that I read at least one of the stacks on my nightstand before the end of the year.
I better, considering I have almost 40 books in my unread collection, and they are collecting dust.
Quitting My Job & Starting University (Authorial backstory, too, I guess…)
I mentioned that stress from other changes have kept me from reading. Where it is my “year of change,” I figured I would start where I was the most miserable.
At the beginning of July, I quit my job. For the last 4 years, I’ve worked a couple different food service jobs. I’ve been injured (permanently, which was a lot to suddenly deal with during a pandemic), suffered through creepy customers, harassed by management, and subjected to questionable work environments at best—health hazards at worst.
In quitting, I wanted to focus more on the future I want to make for myself. As an adult, I’ve had to come up with goals and dreams that I starved myself of as a child. I lost a lot of my old hobbies and interests during my numb period at the end of high school and beginning of college, so recovering has taken a lot of time. I isolated myself, and it benefited me because I had to learn to put my needs first.
While getting my Associate’s, I took two creative writing courses. At the end of one of them, I had a novella. Looking back on it 6 years later, I have many critiques for my 17 year-old self’s writing. I have now defaced my 54 pages of terrible plot with enough notes to give me a migraine, but one thing I will never criticize myself for was the decision to get it printed. At that point, it was the best decision of my life.
Having it printed restored my lost emotions. It made me feel whole when I was hollow for years. Since then, I’ve made it my goal to become an author. However, writing my own ideas doesn’t pay bills, so that was how I ended up stuck in food service.
Now that I’ve quit, I surprised myself by saying it was time I try to get my Bachelor’s. The stress from the last couple weeks I mentioned earlier (and took the scenic route to explain) was from the application process and fixing things that went a bit wrong. I also had to wait over a month to know whether I was admitted. It was fun.
I actually tried to get my English: Creative Writing B.A. right after finishing my A.A. in 2019, but I had to drop it after a semester. I was burned out, and I desperately needed a break. Taking things at my pace, adjusting to adulthood, and focusing on my needs helped me get to where I am today. I’m ready to try again.
Proofreading
Becoming an author, or even just having a role in the book publishing industry, is where I want to focus. I took an online course to help me learn the ins-and-outs of proofreading, so I hope to make use of those skills, too. I learned more than I thought I would with it, which surprised me. Where this is an informal blog, and an even more informal post, I’m not focused on being a perfectionist here with my writing. I am paying attention, though. More than I used to.
It wasn’t that anything I learned before needed to be corrected. Taking that proofreading course expanded the knowledge I had in ways that I never knew it could. It was interesting to see the finer details.
I’ve written these last paragraphs as if I’d finished the course. I haven’t yet, but I am incredibly close to it. I need to do more studying in order to reach the confidence I want to have in myself to do a great job. Either way, I’m glad I took this particular step.
The Months Ahead
This post ended up longer than I intended it to be.
Approaching the last quarter of the year, I guess the goals I have yet to accomplish have started to overwhelm me. I never set a target number of books to read, and I know that it will take time to earn my degree and settle into a new career, but I am impatient. I think it’s fair to be impatient when excited about change, though.
My posting schedule will slow down as I make time for school, potential work, and other life events, but I don’t plan to stop updating this blog. It’s been the highlight of my summer, and I enjoy rekindling my love for reading.
Thank you for being here and supporting me, my little hedgehogs. I am forever grateful to be able to share my interests and hobbies with those who share this corner of the internet with me! 🦔
Sorrin Reads 