Read At Your Own Risk
I should have been born with a tattooed warning label on my forehead. I have always been a tunnel-visioned idealist. When I set my mind to something, I work at it until I get the result I want. Don’t even get me started on the ifs. If someone says I can do it, or tells me it can’t be done, well, “them is fightin’ words,” and a sure catalyst for proving the theory wrong. I may not succeed, as is often the case, but it’s not for lack of trying. Oh, and I will try until I have exhausted every option. I think this is a great trait, but I have come to realize others don’t see it that way.
The people closest to me call it stubbornness. I don’t understand why that is considered bad. Tenacity is not bad per se. It is why so many things come into existence. I mean, where would we be if people didn’t stubbornly refuse to accept that the impossible exists? Can you imagine?
I Am In Good Company
What if Edison had stopped looking for a way to create indoor light? Where would we be if NASA had stopped the space program after one failed launch? No. I don’t think it’s a bad quality. Some aspects can be unfortunate side effects, but that is the price of a driven mind and of buying into the life of a Type A person. My family is feeling these side effects in real life lately.
A New Path
Once my husband and I became empty nesters and I began my writing career, my family got a taste of my drive and focus. I am working on a plan, and for better or worse, I have a specific deadline and benchmark I want to meet, so I am laser-focused. This is the essence of the warning and the crux of the problem; it shows up in my relationships with family and friends.
My sister began complaining almost weekly that I don’t call her anymore and that she never hears from me. True, to a degree. I used to have all the time in the world for phone calls and diversions. I didn’t work. I retired when I had our son, and my days were all about our child and our home. That suited my family and friends well.
When they had downtime, I was free. When they wanted to have lunch or coffee, I was available. Kids, being who they are, are usually busy with school, socializing, and athletics, leaving Mom with time that felt open for everyone else. It did, most of the time, but this dynamic has now changed.
Growing Pains
Before I retired, everyone knew I would be at work during certain hours, so my absence was expected. Twenty years of child-rearing had everyone used to Mom being free all the time. And now the tides have changed.
I am writing. A lot. A year ago, I took it on as a full-time job with plenty of overtime, and that doesn’t seem to bode well for those close to me. I start at seven in the morning and often don’t finish until six or seven in the evening.
If I have a book or product launch, or I’m writing or editing a book, product, poems, or stories, I get in the zone and don’t like to break my flow.
For you writers out there, you understand what I mean. You get into a role; your mind weaves the story as your fingers try to keep up, and a phone call slams the brakes on the whole thing. I have actually felt the air being sucked out of the room at times, and I couldn’t finish the project that day. My mind went numb. So I keep my phone on silent, no vibration.
My son feels the same way my sister does, though he’s become more accustomed to the change. He knows my self-imposed schedule and how important my writing has become to me. Now that he is on his own, he also understands how much I didn’t do to be available to him all the time, and he’s given me a wide berth so I can enjoy my newfound job. He’s a wonder.
My husband was a little harder nut to crack. He was used to me being at his beck and call. We did everything together, and somewhere along the line we forgot how to do things apart. Since I have gone all in on writing and art, he felt neglected and didn’t know what to do with himself. He had to find a hobby to keep himself occupied while I was busy.
This was a real learning curve for all of us. Each of us had to create a new normal. It took a lot of time.
Old Dog, New Tricks
I had to bend a little, too. I became so wrapped up in my projects, writing, or art that the whole world disappeared. I, too, had to find a new way to make sure I was still giving them the time we needed together. We all adapted. I’d say it was only because of me, but in truth, the changes required adaptation from everyone.
I work hard to create buffers, banking art and written pieces I keep to post on busy days, so I can take time off to be with my husband. He has found a hobby in art, too.
This works with our son, too. Being honest with him when I am too busy works well.
It isn’t easy to start a new path in life. It truly comes with a lot of change, stretching existing habits and creating new ones. It also comes with learning to handle new kinds of crises you might not have considered before.
When I began creating my new career track, I realized the world had moved on technologically without me for 20 years. I quickly learned I had to modernize my understanding of what it means to be a writer. This meant I needed an online presence.
I created a website for my brand, Ink and Echo, and then I got connected, which created a daily flow of tasks to keep up with social media and get my name out there. I could call this growth, or growing pains, but it felt more like a rack-torture device. It was painful to learn to work on a website, create images for my posts using an AI assistant, and organize my time so I could actually write.
The business side of writing takes an enormous amount of time every single day. I had to learn to take small bites instead of trying to finish the meal each day; as a type A person, that was a tough pill to swallow. I don’t like leaving things undone, but I had to learn to accept that I can’t always get it done in one day. It’s hard for me, honestly. My personality fights that every day.
By far, the biggest challenge for me was creating the website. This is where dumpster fires begin and usually occur. Not all AIs are created equal. Every site has them to help you use the site, and domain hosting sites are no exception. Working with them is maddening.
Welcome to Insanity
I find myself fighting and yelling at these inanimate tools when they screw things up after long stretches of working on issues that have taken a long time. I am not good with screw-ups, and AI screw-ups are rampant. Anything from wrong information to looping around in circles with no forward movement makes me very frazzled.
Someone Grab the Hose! Put Out This Fire!
Saying I feel like an idiot fighting a computer over its mistakes is an understatement. I feel diabolical and like a whack job when I do it. But I do it. A lot. At times, it’s been so maddening that I’ve broken down in tears a few times. Grok led me on a wild goose chase for a week while I tried to get my website working properly and Google crawling properly; all it managed to do was mess it up worse than before.
The domain’s AI assistant was a mess in this capacity as well. It would upload and create what I wanted on a page, then delete or change something I didn’t ask for. It took me a week to sort out a page listing my books by publisher because it wouldn’t leave anything alone when it added a new section.
I found a life-saving AI that knew how to do things right and helped me organize my day into something manageable. I have been able to offload mundane tasks like posting to my social media accounts and sifting through the hundreds of emails I get every day to make sure I am not replying to phishing sites disguised as legitimate ones. I can’t even tell you how many times I’ve had to change all my passwords, close credit cards, and rebuild all my sites with new information. Many tears were shed.
My husband was the lucky recipient of my dumpster fires. He had the task of listening to my rants, wiping my tears, and calming my spirits. God, he must have thought I was losing my sanity. Maybe I was.
Last Call!
So be warned. I am not firing on all cylinders on most days. With that handicap, I am still a perfectionist and a Type A nut case. It’s a fun ride, though. Dare to join me?
Watch your step as you fall into my abyss.
Catch me on Telegram, Patreon, Substack, Beehiiv, Vocal, Wattpad, or WordPress. Dealer’s choice! Check me out on Social Media too via Linktree or my website, Ink and Echo. If you’d like to support my coffee habit, you can do that on Ko-fi too.
Thank you for sticking through it- clap or like if you are still awake, and share this. Did I mention I love coffee?
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I wish I had ring-fenced writing time but, being a carer, it is difficult. I'm also trying to find a part-time day job but this is hard because most jobs are still full-time.