I know this blog does little to market me. I don’t promote it, beyond having the link available on my social media profiles, and it’s not exactly engaging in the sense of providing value.

It might have some salacious interest, in the sense that anyone reading gets to understand the frustration of a struggling artist as he tries to discover his place in the world, whether the art he wants to create is viable and whether it’s actually possible to find a way to live with some sense of joy in this crazy world.

There’s a point I reach every time I sit down to really write, where I just want to chuck it all and start over, but that’s not the way the world works, is it?

We can’t just throw the baby out and start again. We have responsibilities. History.

We do not exist in a void – a fatal error I made in my youth before I learned to see past my own nose. Truth be told, that is still an issue at times, and only really became something I was able to move past in the last four or five years.

The Mungk was meant to embody the hopelessness I felt, the constant sense of impending doom, where everything seemed to get worse and worse and every action taken to make things better only drove me further into despair when they failed. Life, particularly in the last few years, has been a hell of an educator in that regard.

I am trying something different with future ideas. Ironically, one of these ideas is similar to The Mungk (and in fact, I have at least two more pending ideas that revolve around ethereal dark entities guiding us toward destruction in the works – based on hopelessness, appetites, addiction and depression, though certainly not so delineated as that).

However, unlike The Mungk, these later ideas have positive resolution. Three wins and one loss isn’t bad, right? Of course, I’m months, if not years, away from having time to tackle these.

Kindness plays a huge role in this, and while I’m a big advocate of kindness and compassion and understanding, actions are what matters there, and outside of family, I’m not sure I’ve lived up to that advocacy. Even inside family, at times.

My incompletion is forever a source of pain, but also a driving force. I’m not sure I could exist if I were already complete. Completeness, perfection – these things imply stasis. Fluidity, growth, retraction, change – these things give us movement, places to go, things to contemplate and discover. Omnipotence is boring. Static.

And static decays, always.

Going forward, I need to focus on kindness. On its theories and application, in philosophy and in reality. In words and action.

Still, I worry it’s not enough. I don’t need to take over the world; I just want my part of it to be better for having me in it – in actual fact, and not simply appearance.

I’m not certain I’m living up to that promise. I certainly haven’t during the last hundred-and-twenty-plus days of enduring misery while writing The Mungk. My goal over the next few months is to do better, to find that spark of potential and come to a better understanding.

And through my actions, maybe put a few of these doubts and worries to rest.

Target: 700 words
Written: 145 words, novella: The Mungk