As I’m writing this, I have a video from Abroad in Japan open on my second monitor. It’s a video in which the host is showing off Kyoto’s Traditional Townhouses. As a fan of anime and many other parts of the Japanese culture, I would love to go to Japan on vacation some time. The townhouses shown in this video have such a great atmosphere that I reckon it would be a very relaxing stay. This video got me thinking about my goals in life. I’ve spent many years trying to just figure out how to deal with my own mental health and my short term plans, and never really thought too much about the future. So let’s do that here and now. They say writing down your goals is the first step towards achieving them, right?
There are really only a few things I want to achieve in life. My first goal, which has been a dream ever since I was a young boy, is to write a series of books. It’s a project I’ve been working on for years, and after many terrible, awful versions, I think I’m finally reaching a point where my story The Necromancer’s Daughter is something I can be proud of. I’ve still got a long way to go, obviously, and I will never have the confidence that what I’m making is anything more than mediocre fantasy, but posting it online for other people to see was a big step for me. Having set a somewhat regular release schedule (one chapter every 2/3 weeks) is also a great motivator for me to keep writing, and not start all over again like I tend to do. The last two rewrites didn’t even change terribly much about the story. The main difference is that I’m paying a lot more attention to my characters’ personalities.
My second goal in life is to make a compilation of short stories into a book. This goal came to me much later in life, only after I started this blog in late 2020, but now that I’ve written a few that I am very, very proud of, it’s something I’m really passionate about. Tomorrow (as of posting this) I will upload my latest short story: The Tomb of Danahsereth. I am very pleased with this short story. It stands well on its own, but also serves as a sneak peek at the story I’m writing for National Novel Writing Month later this year. Out of every goal I’ve set for myself, I think this one is the most attainable. So look forward to a bundle of short stories somewhere in the next few years. Anyone who likes this post gets a free signed copy, haha.
My third goal is to travel. And I don’t want to backpack through the jungle living in a tent. Obviously there is nothing wrong with that. I have an uncle who used to love travelling like that. No, I’m quickly uncomfortable. Maybe it’s the autism, maybe it’s my personality, maybe autism is my personality. Woah, having a breakthrough mid-writing this.
Joking aside, I want to be comfortable if I go on vacation. When I was young we used to go camping and similar levels of (lack of) luxury. My parents were on the poorer side. There was always food on the table, and we could go on a cheap holiday each year, so we definitely didn’t have it bad, but we were also in trouble when the car broke down because we didn’t have that kind of money. Long story short, a combination of quick to set off panic attacks as a kid and the lack of luxury on vacation made me hate travelling for a long time. Only after I started watching videos on youtube about faraway lands with cool places to visit did I start getting the urge to see more of the world.
I have some more long-term goals that are less important to me, and not really worth mentioning right now. What I do want to do is loop back to the start of this text, and how I got to start writing this. The video finished a while ago, and *spoiler alert* I even took a break for dinner halfway through writing this. I had some lovely cheesy pasta that my brother made. But the point I wanted to make still stands. Watching that video made me really want to pursue my dreams more. I pictured myself in one of those townhouses with a laptop just writing a fourth installment in my series. Taking a break to look around the town, have some good food and (let’s not set the goals too high) maybe even some fun company. I think that’s what life is all about, enjoying yourself and doing what makes you happy. Too long have I focussed on just getting by, which was necessary with my mental health, but it’s nice to look ahead too. Especially in bleak times like these, where leaving the house makes you almost feel bad. Hopefully with a vaccine on the horizon, and summer creeping up there’s still hope for us. (It went from -8c to 16c in like a week, global warming please have mercy on us all).
Tell me about your dreams in the comments. Whether they pertain to writing, like mine do, or something completely different. I’m a big fan of working to live instead of living to work, but why do you work? What is on your bucket list so to speak? And what are you doing to get there? I would love to check in on this post in half a decade and tick some things off the list.
Also, do make sure to check back in here tomorrow for my latest short story: The tomb of Danahsereth. When two archeologists go into an ancient underground temple, they come face to face with something that should have been left asleep.
Opal Kaharis 