Old Omens: Journal Entry #022

Written: Tuesday. August 31, 2021.

My body clock's not working efficiently for me once again. I had a few days when my body decided to wake up early in the morning. But in recent days, it's gone back to waking up at 9:30 or 10:30 am. It's something to do with the fact that I sleep at around 6-8 pm because dinner time is at 9 pm. I know that I shouldn't be sleeping during those hours, but what am I supposed to do if I'm sleepy?

I could read a book, but that'll make me sleepy, especially with the kind of book I'm currently reading. I could play games, but then again I've been playing games during 12-3 pm. I could watch new episodes from the Tokusatsu show I'm currently watching (Himitsu Sentai Gorenger), but that would mean having to go through the process of opening up my laptop computer, which means having to wait 20-30 minutes in order for it to boot up. This is the second journal entry in a row where I'm talking about planning out the events of the day, or how to efficiently spend my time. I dunno what that means. It probably means that I need to get my shit together. But each day passes, and clearly I'm having a hard time doing that.

It used to be easy to figure out what to do with your day back when going outside was still an option. Now that that's out of the picture, I'm sort of left with fewer options. I could either read my books until I've run out of reading material, play the games I've been wanting to play for a long time now, watch the shows or movies I haven't watched yet, try to sit down in front of my laptop to do some pixel art, or write down a new story idea, or build out new sections of existing story plans that I have lying about, or learn a new skill like Game Development, or sweep the dust off of my bookshelves, or whatever. The list goes on, and those are the things you can do without going outside. And somehow, the decision-making process is way more difficult than you think!

This pandemic isn't going anywhere anytime soon. I have this immense amount of time given to me to utilize. But somehow I've only done a few commendable things to the time given to me. I am not able to efficiently monetize the things that I do in the day. If I go back to focusing on pixel art, I'm just going to be making pixel art and posting it on my Instagram account. It doesn't go anywhere else but that. It doesn't give me a return of interest. It's just a hobby. I could monetize it by recording my art session and posting it on a YouTube Channel, but since I don't have the necessary resources to do so (which is arguably untrue, since I could just use my Tablet as a recording station. But even that's a hard thing to do), I am left with choosing not to do it.

If I go back to reading more chapters of a book in a day, I'll be able to burn through a dozen or so books in a year. That will give me more knowledge, a more solid foundation to my skills as a writer, but even then, if I want to monetize that through writing, I also need to be writing more often. If I go for the reading and writing path, I'll be needing to give my all to doing just that.

"Writing is a demanding profession and a selfish one. And because it is selfish and demanding, because it is compulsive and exacting, you don't embrace it, you succumb to it." Rod Serling said that, and he had a hell of a career that's still influencing new generations of writers out there.

I feel like I need to take a pause from telling this journal my gripes and discomforts on what my life is right now. My life, right now, is the product of the decisions I've made day, months, or years prior. I don't have a right to complain, to be honest. But it's been good to have let that all out. I feel like I've spent that emotion dry. And now it's time to get back to doing the work.

It makes me wonder who my real self truly is. Is my true self the shirking gamer who just wants to have a fun time playing video games, the one that enjoys making videos for the internet to see, or the writer that's been kept tucked away in a little corner, waiting to be brought into the light?

I'm going to try to read a few chapters after writing this down. I'm going to try watching the entirety of the Twilight Zone once again. I feel like that's what I've been missing all this time. I had more balance back when I was still watching that series one episode a day or more. It might be what I truly need.

But who's to say that the other things are not as important? Sure, I've gone a long way in writing, but the other things are at the same path, just not as far as I've reached when it comes to writing. It's this constant dilemma of finding balance in all of the things you want to accomplish in life.

It's the fatal flaw of us human beings. We are never truly satisfied with what we have; we are always wanting more than what is presented to us. "Is this all there is?", Sir Gawain asks the Green Knight, to which the knight replies to him, "What else ought there be?"

I could go on about how that's basically the modern struggles of the young adults right now, but I honestly have no more words to say for this journal entry. My words are spent, but my mind is alive.

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