first world struggles

I’m on the amazing island of Bali again. So fucking-hashtagged-blessed. We’ve worked hard to get here but then hard working never guaranteed success or every woman in Africa would be a billionaire, as the saying goes.

Lunch view

I’ve been so frustrated wanting to get the first draft of Thalia down on paper. I think one of the problems is my writing process. I write like I’m making a pinch pot. I start out with a blob of clay (words) and knead them out into a story, adding clay (words) as I go. I know how the story ends but I’m constantly reading back over my work from the day before and editing it as I go. Previously, writing Hotel Deja Vu, I had no idea where the story was going so I just wrote each day and hoped for the best.

What luxury it would be to spend my days writing, to have heaps of time to knead out the clay, so to speak. I used to think I’d go batty in a studio on my own, but there’s been a shift in the past couple of years. I’m far more comfortable in my own company writing than I ever was painting. Then I needed people around me, music, energy and movement. Now I crave silence and peace.


March is looming and my plan to work more on the publishing side of things in March and October is stymied by the fact that I haven’t got anything to ‘publish’ in March. I guess I could do some marketing for Hotel Deja Vu… yay marketing…

So writing in March and with Camp Nanowrimo in April I might be able to complete the Paris in a Day compilation with the novellas and short stories as well as Alia Henry and the Ghostwriter. As always, time will tell.


At the yoga retreat last weekend, the teacher talked about potential and specifically reaching our potential. Then the first insta post I saw after the retreat was this one….eep, soooooo much judgement in those few characters so it obviously resonated with lots of people hence the likes and retweets. We can’t look at other people and judge our own success on it. Who is to say that person has half the talent? Maybe half the talent and twice the gumption is what’s needed to get somewhere any way…