pjthompson (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
pjthompson) wrote2005-08-23 03:27 pm
pjthompson) wrote2005-08-23 03:27 pm
Entry tags:
My name is Pamela and I'm a neurotoholic
I was having a conversation this morning with a friend and loyal beta reader in conjunction with this quote of the day:
"In order to swim one takes off all one's clothes. In order to aspire to the truth one must undress in a far more inward sense, divest oneself of all one's inward clothes—of thoughts, conceptions, selfishness—before one is sufficiently naked."
—Søren Kierkegaard
He asked, "I wonder how long it takes to strip down completely?"
I said, "I don't think it's a process that ever ends. I think there's always another layer. The onion is never peeled completely."
He laughed. "I guess that's why I'm still in therapy."
"I can't afford therapy anymore so I do it vicariously through my characters."
Which, of course, was mostly just a smart alecky thing to say. I'm not really doing some extended Mary Sueism in my fiction. My characters ≠ me. Bits of me are probably in most of them, but if you add up all the bits they don't all come from some hidden corner of my psyche. They're more an amalgam of people I've encountered, myself, my friends—and something else that I can't quite explain which comes from Some Other Place. I don't label what this place might be—my subconscious, the land of Booga-Booga, whatever. It's just Other and I have a superstitious feeling it's best not to think about it too hard.
On the Other hand, putting my characters through sh*t does help me think about the sh*t in my own life and work on it. Doesn't make any of my flaws go away, doesn't "cure" me of neurosis, but such things aren't possible, anyway. The most any therapy can do, whether it's lit therapy or the couch variety, is give you coping skills to work around those neuroses.
Except sometimes, of course, when it doesn't help you work around those neuroses. Backsliding is common, whether it's in religious conversion, coping strategies, or addiction. It really is just one day at a time.
And no, not everyone in California is in therapy. Just every Other person. :-)
Other news of the day: My first beta reaction to chapter one of Charged With Folly was good, but my friend wanted to know how I got such a "weird" idea. I told him that I was just falling asleep late one night when the central image popped into my head and I had to pop out of bed to write it down. "It was a gift," I explained. "You don't argue with gifts, you just go with them."
"In order to swim one takes off all one's clothes. In order to aspire to the truth one must undress in a far more inward sense, divest oneself of all one's inward clothes—of thoughts, conceptions, selfishness—before one is sufficiently naked."
—Søren Kierkegaard
He asked, "I wonder how long it takes to strip down completely?"
I said, "I don't think it's a process that ever ends. I think there's always another layer. The onion is never peeled completely."
He laughed. "I guess that's why I'm still in therapy."
"I can't afford therapy anymore so I do it vicariously through my characters."
Which, of course, was mostly just a smart alecky thing to say. I'm not really doing some extended Mary Sueism in my fiction. My characters ≠ me. Bits of me are probably in most of them, but if you add up all the bits they don't all come from some hidden corner of my psyche. They're more an amalgam of people I've encountered, myself, my friends—and something else that I can't quite explain which comes from Some Other Place. I don't label what this place might be—my subconscious, the land of Booga-Booga, whatever. It's just Other and I have a superstitious feeling it's best not to think about it too hard.
On the Other hand, putting my characters through sh*t does help me think about the sh*t in my own life and work on it. Doesn't make any of my flaws go away, doesn't "cure" me of neurosis, but such things aren't possible, anyway. The most any therapy can do, whether it's lit therapy or the couch variety, is give you coping skills to work around those neuroses.
Except sometimes, of course, when it doesn't help you work around those neuroses. Backsliding is common, whether it's in religious conversion, coping strategies, or addiction. It really is just one day at a time.
And no, not everyone in California is in therapy. Just every Other person. :-)
Other news of the day: My first beta reaction to chapter one of Charged With Folly was good, but my friend wanted to know how I got such a "weird" idea. I told him that I was just falling asleep late one night when the central image popped into my head and I had to pop out of bed to write it down. "It was a gift," I explained. "You don't argue with gifts, you just go with them."