Starting Over, Over again...

OK back to writing about writing.

I stopped because I was actually writing. Really. Put words on paper in the kind of order that encourages someone to follow them to the end. At least that is what I've been told about my writing.  It's readable.  And that is a good thing.

As for the other parts of writing, the revision and submission parts. Not so good.  I have a portfolio of stories, several drafted novels, tons of great ideas and not much completed. Oh, and I left out the poetry.  Not to mention all the other unfinished projects I've devised and begun.

Beginning to get a picture here?

Lots of beginning again.  Lots of something else that I have not put my finger on yet. It's not quite procrastination. It's something more subtle than that.  And that subtle this is what the Alchemist is good for.

I've brought it back to life, the concept of the Alchemist as a real-life character playing out an Adventure.  I had not considered what my next NaNo novel would be and it came to me that I could write her story, the story of the Alchemist Bard and it would be also about me.  Not literally. That would be really, really boring.  But, about the things I have a problem with.  Again, not literally. That wouldn't help me one bit.

I have this idea that putting what we know into story form gives us the perspective we need to see ourselves more clearly.  That is the idea behind writing to learn stuff.  I did it when I created Pod, one of my novel characters.  Created him in order to learn about language learning. He even ended up having a starring role in the final paper I wrote for that English composition class (if fact, the paper stalled until I surrendered to the Call to put him in the paper).

For some reason, I followed a blog link on Holly Lisle's forum and fell in love with the writer's process.  She writes about the work she is doing in the clinics she's taking from Holly.  I had been thinking all week that I need to do something like that, write out my process.  Another manifestation of the Alchemist Bard is as an RPG, role playing game, character. That one is really me.  Seriously. I am mentioning it now because there is, in the gaming world, a version of writing about the writing process. They are called "adventures" and they are little stories that help a dungeon master create plays for particular "campaigns".  Campaigns are the epics that players come to week after week and adventures are the episodes that make up the campaigns. That's my take on it, anyway.  For the moment.

All of the definitions are probably going to change as I adapt D&D to living my own life as an Adventure.  Why? Because I need the help.  Back to starting over again.  When what you are doing doesn't work, you need to try something else or drive yourself crazy.  So, in an effort to not be crazy, I am trying something else.  Using the system of leveling up and gaining experience points from D&D (by the way that's Dungeons and Dragons. Sorry), I'm setting up goals and intentions for this campaign of living my life better.

Why an RPG?  Ahh. That question is better answered by an expert, Jane McGonigal.

And I just got another answer, a more alchemical one.  Because I am a Dragon and I need to be freed from my own dungeon.  That's the campaign.  Now, for the Adventures!
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Alchemy as transformation

Not much to this post, really.  Just setting a set of parameters.

image from http://www.levity.com/alchemy/

I've declared this blog to be related in some way to alchemy.  The usual understanding of alchemy is that is has a relationship to chemistry.  Of course there is the lead to gold thing. Then there's the Philosopher's Stone and eternal life.  Neither of those is what I have considered as the guidance of alchemy.

When I was trying to define my experiences, the ones that seemed to be better addressed in some fantasy and science fiction stories, I focused on magic as a concept. Then I wondered about alchemy and its contribution to the ideas about magic.  From what I've discovered about the actual practice of alchemy, the work of transforming material from one state to another, the one quality that stood out was patience.  Patience and focus.

In the age of sub-atomic physics, the role of the alchemist is that of maintaining the same state of attention throughout one entire phase of the transformation.  We know from experience that maintaining one state of attention can be difficult.  We have all kinds of distractions and doubts.  But, if you consider that a shift in attention might change a process at a subatomic level, distractions and doubts might be a problem.

So, what do you do?  You do the work to eliminate as much doubt and distraction as you can.  That might seem like some kind of psychological claptrap, but, if you consider that we are a collection of electromagnetic (E-M) fields, that E-M fields can and do disrupt chemical processes, then, if there is a way to assess and change the condition of the field, it might be a good thing to do.

Hence, alchemy.  Alchemy, when it is considered as a personal transformation practice, is a way to influence our experience of our reality to the better.

That's my definition as I practice it. I don't practice Alchemy, though.  I write stories, investigate daydreams, study to practice a philosophy called Huna.  All of which include practices that might be considered bardic.  Together, there is a way down the middle that suggests storytelling is a convenient means to transforming ourselves, a form of alchemy.

I will be working this out over time.  Alchemy. Storytelling. Transformation.  Fun and play, if you ask me, though.  Looking forward to having more fun.
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