Latest / Dispatched & Dysfunctional / The Toxic World of Writing — Justin Anderson
Transcript
- J. Vaelorin (Justin Anderson): When creating characters, ⁓ in this this kind of was one of the areas that kind of brought me through in writing. it it was a rough spot for me. It it also it made me understand I really needed to assess my personal life differently because I started writing, I felt myself improving, getting better, everything was like okay, I'm getting these emotions out. ⁓ But I didn't know the writing world was so cruel. Like, man, it is toxic. And if they cannot fit you into a box, it becomes a problem. ⁓ so there's different forms of writing. You know, they call ⁓ plotters, people who plan, you know, they plan every scene, every piece. ⁓ there's people who they call panthers who have a general idea, but You know, they just kinda know at the end of this I want the world to blow up and somebody to reverse time. You know, they don't really know how everything goes to get to that point, but they at least kinda know the end point. ⁓ I find myself closer to the second one, but I I I didn't know the language of writing, ⁓ in all honesty. Like I said, I've been writing for over twenty years, but I never learnt the actual wording to communicate like, ⁓ this is pros, this is purple prose, this is this. I just did it. ⁓ so when I was asked those questions, trying to explain how I write was really hard and it became a source of tension in these communities. ⁓ now that I've been doing it a little bit I consider my writing closer to like method acting, ⁓ where you've heard about like actors who get so immersed in their characters where they mentally become that character. ⁓ they live as that character for a period of time. And some of ⁓ have to go to therapy and have to honestly go through like a whole detox of some sort to break their self mentally from being that person because they get so immersed in it. ⁓ that's how I write my characters. I I I more compare it to watching a movie. Like I'm watching that character from inside and then when I step back to put it onto the page, I'm reporting it So it's like living that character's life at the time. And that that gets rough because I'm also living the trauma that the characters are going through. And when I step back into the author seat, I find myself sometimes getting depressed, getting wrapped up to the point where it is mentally, you know, harmful for me. I have to ⁓ step back. And I had to really sit down and talk with my wife and explain there's gonna be times, you know, I realize now and there's gonna be times when I'm writing that I may get done and I may just want to, you know, be around you. I may not really talk to you at the moment, but I still would just wanna be around you, being your presence, you know. Please don't push, you know, because a lot of times and you know, males will close off when you start pushing. It's gotta be like, let us let me open up. But I had to kind of give her that conversation because I realized that I would break sometimes if I went too long and I I would start to get real depressed and I don't know you know, the clinical term for I I call it like passive suicidal thoughts where you're not actively seeking to harm yourself, but you're okay if something happened. You know, if you're driving and you see a semi, you're like, ⁓ yeah, if it just swerved in my lane, I'd be okay with that. And I was like, okay, this writing is helpful, but I have to now put guardrails around it to protect myself.