5/12/2022 — I’m on a Mission
“Welcome to the Wilderness” is a blog publication documenting my comic project, Annex:Anima. This is a collection of thoughts and progress reports.
If you’ve read any of my blog posts about this project, you’ll notice that most of what I’m writing about is a mental conversation. I’m trying to reason with myself. I’m working through the things that are getting in my way in hopes that discussing them will help me overcome them or ignore them altogether. As chaotic as this looks, I’m actually really optimistic. Part of keeping this blog and documenting the process at THIS POINT (let’s call it “post-daydream phase”) seems important to me, and here’s why:
If this project “succeeds”*: I want to be able to use this blog as a reference. I want to be able to show an explicit re-telling of a raw creative process from the moment I knew I was going to take the leap. I want to reference this to inspire others and to remind myself that fear is conquerable.
— ALTERNATIVELY —
If this project “fails”*: the result may be just as useful. Here’s what it looks like to over think. This is what goes through your brain when you’re dying to create something but you drown in the fear and the mystery. This could be a warning to others to take time to step back into reality. If this is the outcome, it will be up to me at this point to look inward again and see if I can pick up the pieces.
*I don’t have clear definitions for these hypotheticals at this time. They may become more apparent further along in the process.
So, I’m on a mission.
I’m putting a lot of pressure on myself.
This is for a few good reasons.
Here’s a couple that I feel are currently relevant:
I’ve given up on my creative endeavors many times before and I’m tired of losing battles.
This one’s easy. I’m tired of giving up on these things. I’ve always had lofty dreams. I’ve always had ambition. But most things I creatively attempt which contain my heart and soul in them tend to fizzle out. Often the idea was a means to an end, like a class project that had further potential. In most cases it’s because more interesting things take precedence over an old idea. Other times it’s been a poor critique that just closes up the shop until further notice. I’m sick of these things stopping me, so I’m choosing to wipe the slate clean and start fresh. I’m not sure I can teach myself to forget that I’m a quitter, but that’s where writing comes in. This blog doesn’t exist to fuel my motivation. This blog exists to help me recognize patterns in myself. I want to know where things started to go right, or where they started to go wrong. As I said above, I think keeping this blog as a sort of journal is going to be useful, especially to myself. It’s time to win.
My situation might be unique, but it is probably very normal.
I’m not going to shine my fingernails on my jacket here, but I think I might be onto something. In short, I really think what I’m trying to do WILL have real-world success. I have failed to find much in the way of articles or commentaries on someone’s memoir of developing a creative idea KNOWING it has potential. It’s odd to me. Partly because I’ve spoken to a lot of creatives who are working on their THING and their apprehension is often very apparent or they are talking it up so much that I begin to see the cracks anyway. I feel that humility is important, right? I don’t want to be delusional, but I may already be there. Moving on.
The iron is HOT.
I’ve noticed a big trend in modern media, which is some sort of push to acknowledge the human consciousness as a sort of stand-alone entity. Something separate, yet the same. Something vastly complicated but just out of our perceptive reach. Something that can be communicated with, maybe even reasoned with. Something that may take a sensory-recognized form, be it actually tangible or not. I won’t give detailed explanation to my references here, but I’ve noticed this trend in things like the Marvel movies and shows, a few Anime here and there, and I a couple video games come to mind that touch on it as well. These concepts have existed in literature and have sprung up in various places (even mainstream music sneaks it in), but the modern widely-consumed media has yet to be a place I’ve really noticed the “personified* psyche”.
*relatively speaking. Sometimes it’s not “personified”, perhaps “effectively present” is a less exciting but more concise way to say the same thing.
But, time is of the essence, because I still have a couple of plot elements that make this story seem (to me) a bit on the fresh end of things. I don’t want to adapt and re-adapt the story SIMPLY TO BE “FRESH”, I just want to strike while the iron is hot. I recognize the toxicity of this frame of mind, but I believe it’s one of those things to aim for if it’s possible to hit with precision and accuracy.
Story-wise, I’m trying some things I haven’t yet seen, at least so explicitly, though as time goes on I’m noticing these “plot elements” becoming less unique and more aligned with what may be trending. To be honest, I view this as a very good thing. Now is the time to make my move. I recently read an article here on Medium where the author seemed to want to drop a headstone over the concept of “story”. One of the reasons I’m trying to expand outward in plot devices is because I too have felt like the idea of “story” is something lacking life, at least at this moment in time. I have little-to-no love for much of the modern media I referenced above, I sometimes consume it specifically to keep an eye out for the trends I spoke of. Mostly I avoid it to stave away anything potentially demotivating.
But, in the end, how am I to claim any of it is even “new”? It’s not like I’ve read every book, watched every movie, read every comic, play every video game… I run circles around myself, making arguments in favor of my ideas only to stamp them “moot” at the first sign of impassioned ignorance. I guess it’s just a feeling, but I need to quiet the “monkey brain”.
Regardless, the point isn’t to make something new. As much as I want to bring something fresh to the table, the real driving force is that I love my characters, I’m in love with the story, and I believe it will “succeed” because of those two things alone.
Thank you for reading.
❤ Casey
You can follow the development of Annex:Anima on Instagram
