Self-Care A Thon - Day 7

Today's thought is LEARN.

I've learned quite a few things in the last couple of years... both from experiences and from courses. But I've decided to go for one that I use pretty much every day now.

In the last few years my love of writing has grown exponentially. I joined the comms team at work and started on press releases and internal comms pieces and it sort of just grew from there....

I have stories coming out of my ears... and they all need to be put down on paper. Once they're there, I can make more sense of them. And hey, sometimes nothing will come of them, but if one can shine through - like The Unknown Road did for me - you can use your own experiences, books, films, TV and general life to bulk up and shape those characters into who you want them to be.

But I never thought I would get so far with it, and stick with it. I've not only planned one book, but a trilogy... now that I never thought would happen.

Tomorrow I'm publishing chapters 59 and 60 of The Unknown Road, and it really has been years in the making. I started writing it in June 2018, and over the months and months of writing the book, I've learned how to write better. Even reading the earlier chapters to myself sometimes, compared to the later ones, I can see how much my writing has grown in time.

But even though the book may not get anywhere, and I won't be upset if it doesn't, I will be forever grateful to it for being my first chance to put myself and my writing out there.

At the moment, even not fully published, the chapters have over 10,000 reads (which is nothing compared to the millions (or billions) of reads other books on Wattpad) but 10,000 reads is seriously cool. And in the stats you can see what countries people are reading from, and it is SO COOL to see someone in the Philippines is reading it...!!!

I've always loved writing, ever since I was little. When I was 7 I tried to make up my own language (it didn't go very well and it ended up in the bin at school) and looking back I think I enjoyed English the most at school. But I've always been a slow reader... It used to take me twice as long to finish books friends would finish in days. Now I can read books quicker - I think because I no longer HAVE to read them but because I WANT to read them - and the kindle comes everywhere with me.

But reading more does wonders for writing... or at least it does in my opinion... They allow you to explore different stories, or different angles, to see if you could use it to help your writing. I read a book and I underline or highlight a word I like... and it's only something I've been doing since writing my book. And I'd like to think authors are happy knowing their work is helping to encourage people to go out and write their own stuff. And I like to dream that maybe someone will find that with mine...! *shrugs*

Book 1 is nearly finished.... 8 or 9 chapters to go. Book 2 half written and book 3 is all planned out, so there is a lot more writing to do. And there will be others. There already are. In my head. Brewing.

So there we have it... these last few years I have learned I'm a writer at heart. And it has been the best lesson. And it's something I hope will stick with me my whole life.