From inside the chrysalis

The realization has been growing in the past several weeks and months that I have not written much of the kind of serious material that I used to do.

Okay, not exactly true.  There have been dozens upon dozens of pages of written work that I have been producing, for the past nine months.  But it hasn't seen the light of day because it's all for the book I'm writing about having manic-depression.

(Well, that isn't exactly true either.  Every so often I'll play a game with my friends on Facebook, telling them that if my status gets so-and-so many "likes" that I'll post a sentence from my manuscript.  Sort-of my way of beta-testing the tone that the writing is in as I'm writing it.)

No, what I mean is: I haven't been writing any serious contemplations or musings on my blog in what seems like forever.  And I'm wondering why that is.  Especially because I've been told that those have been some of the posts that have consistently drawn a readership here.

Maybe it's because I'm changing as a person.  And I think that writing the book is the biggest reason.  Yes, it's taken up a lot of time and energy that would otherwise be spent blogging from my heart and soul.  But it's also compelling me to develop as a writer.

More than that: I'm metamorphosing as a person.

Dad's passing certainly figures into the equation.  It took a lot out of me.  It took out things that only now am I really beginning to recover from.  But I think that I'm coming away from it stronger as a person, and I know that Dad would appreciate it.

For those of you who have asked if I'm ever going to do "serious" stuff again here: yes.  Absolutely.  I have every intention of doing so.  But for now, I have to see where this goes.  Where God is taking me.  What He is making me into.  I'm inside a chrysalis and I have no idea what it is that I'm supposed to be when I emerge from it.  All I can do in the meantime is continue to grow and change and experience the delights of mere becoming.

More and more, the title I have in mind for my book is being more appropriate.  Four words.  Four syllables.  But those four words are packed with meaning.  And if (or "when" as my friends keep telling me) it is published, the final sentence is going to really slam home what manic-depression has done to my life.  But that may not be all a bad thing.  I'm still growing toward that as a person.  Which is going to make that last sentence as much a thing of wonder for me as I hope it will be for you.

In the meantime, I keep writing.  I keep evolving.  I keep being shaped and molded according to His will and not my own.  But I do think very much so that after seeing how far this goes, that I will come out of it a stronger person of the pen.  And I'm looking forward to writing more of that kind of stuff for y'all.

Categories: personal reflection