In which I talk to myself about what’s wrong with me. (part 1 of 1,000,000)

~ Hetty Eliot

I thought I’d write a writer’s block post like everyone else does when they have writer’s block. Why do I have a block? Because of the imaginary little man in my head who criticizes and humiliates me. Based on a true, pathetic story, a real TL;DR. If I ever get to meet God, the first question I am going to ask is, “So what the hell was wrong with me that whole time?”

If I were to confront my Emotion, when I close my eyes and feel, I know I’d find her in my upper chest somewhere. So I head there first. “Hey,” I’d ask. “Why’d you let them get in your head so badly?”

“How should I know?” she answers. “They were mean! They hurt my feelings! They made me go home and cry! They fucked me up!”

 “Well, okay, but how did they fuck you up?” I press her.

“I don’t know!” she insists. “I just am!”

Well, maybe you are, I muse to myself… Maybe you are. “Then there’s nothing we can do,” I say out loud.

“But what about you?!” she cries. “You’re just as guilty as I am! More! You stand here, being all ‘calm’ and probing and blaming me, when you had plenty of chances to make a choice! I’m just fucked up, remember! I’m just a big oversensitive fucked up bitch!”

“Hmm,” I mumble, “Can’t argue with that.”

“See! You’re just like them! Why don’t you just leave me alone and go bother your so-called ‘Reason’? I’m just here bothering no one! Leave me to my own fucked up life!”

“Alright, alright…” I keep mumbling. “Alright, I’ll go ask her.”

“Good! And tell Mommy I want McDonalds!” she yells, and goes back to playing a video game while she waits to start a fight with someone later after a nice healthy cocktail of quarter-pounder-with-cheese and estrogen. 

I head upstairs. Reason and Free Will are sitting on their little thrones stationed in the sinus cavities above my eyebrows. It’s where I get a headache when I think too hard. I know before I go in that it’s a complete waste of time with them. Emotion didn’t tell me, though I’ve already guessed it, that she and Reason connive behind my back all the time, and they don’t tell me or Free Will what they’ve been up to. Reason just mindlessly regurgitates all the crap Emotion told her. And yup, there she is, on the phone.

“Uh, Reason?” I say.

Reason covers the phone with her hand. “Yes, give me five minutes.”

Ok forget it. I’ll bypass Reason and speak directly to Free Will. Just like I was afraid of, she’s been so browbeaten by Reason—who’s been brainwashed by Emotion for years—that she doesn’t believe in agency at all anymore. She just tells me, “I can’t help you. My hands are tied.”

“What the hell!” I ask. “Aren’t you Free Will? How the hell are your hands tied? Isn’t it your job not to be tied up?”

She shakes her head, makes a small sad smile. “Oh, no,” she says. “We know that’s just a myth now. Religion tried it for years, tried to tell us it’s all our fault and we could change on a dime if we really wanted to. And then here come the philosophers to save us! Ha! ‘Pure Reason,’ my ass! Look at her over there! Eats whatever Emotion feeds her and then shits it out as her own as though she came up with it herself. And she’s supposed to help me make a decision? But really, am I even in a position to argue? Look what I’m up against. The two of them. Hormones. Cholesterol. Chemicals. Free radicals. Not to mention society. Money. Junk food. And the Gut! Ha! The Gut. It’s the Gut that’s at the bottom of it all. Well, science is exposing their whole operation now. ‘Oh, we’re just digesting. Oh, all we make is poop. And tell you when someone is lying to you. That’s all, really.’ Yeah, that’s all. They only control, oh, well, everything.”

I just nod. Things weren’t looking good for us, after all.

Free Will agreed. “Yes, you see? Our hands are tied.”

“So you’re saying,” I say slowly, “you’re saying, nothing I do is my responsibility?”

“I’m afraid so.”

“So in other words, I can do whatever I want and not have to feel bad?”

“Well, pretty much.”

“But what about my Gut? Couldn’t I be blamed for not eating better?”

Free Will shook her head and waved her hand. “Eh. If someone says anything, tell them it’s Genetics.” 

(Judging by the comments, I love how no one read past the first two lines. 👍 I’ll remember that next time I read your blog.)

37 thoughts on “In which I talk to myself about what’s wrong with me. (part 1 of 1,000,000)”

  1. Lol, I love the journey you take me on every time you put up a new post. You seem like you want to marry fiction and non-fiction; that’s what I get from your work. And aptly so, because you do it well.

    Hopefully you overcome your writer’s block. I shall wait with bated breath for your next one!

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Yes, Stuart, it is quite a journey every day for me… I either play a character or have imaginary conversations in my head all day. I live in a bizarre world. Thank you for reading my post, it means a lot.

      Like

      Reply

  2. What does TL;DR mean? I like your post and all its sarcasm. You write well and it is entertaining. I wrote on writers block. I’ll post in the comments. I am no expert on it.

    I am always stuck. Sometimes I think we just need to write and not think is it good or bad, or whatever overthinking we do. We just need to write and then we get over it.

    I have started to read the artist way the kindle version.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Hey Bella! TL;DR is internet speak for too long, don’t wanna read. I definitely am an overthinker and I worry too much about what other people think. And it makes me get stuck. If I could get people out of my head, who knows where I’d be in life? Seriously…… Not where I am now, I’d be willing to bet.

      I have The Artist’s Way on my Kindle too! I just need to finish reading it 😫. It’s been so long I guess I’ll have to start over.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      1. Many thanks for explaining tl: dr. I struggle to read long post too.

        I was an overthinker because well that is a long story. But since knowing and recognising I put a full stop on it and try not to worry so much. Also i say to myself I have been wrong so many times . People have their own lives to think about. And even if they do think about us , so what. Sometimes we need to blind, deaf and just ignore.

        I only started reading it, I am so slow to read it. But I am going to give the 12 weeks ago. Do you wanna be my check in buddy?

        Liked by 1 person

        Reply

  3. “I don’t believe in it (writer’s block). All writing is difficult. Plumbers don’t get plumber’s block, and doctors don’t get doctor’s block. Why should writing be the only profession that gives a special name to the difficulty of working, and then expects sympathy for it?” – Sir Philip Pullman – CBE

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    2. Hmm.. I don’t quite agree with this. I’ve heard of surgeons not able to operate because of anxiety. I believe it can happen in any profession where we can’t do our job as well as we would like to. Writing is such a vulnerable profession as well, it comes from the mind and the heart.

      Liked by 2 people

      Reply

      1. I think the quote was meant to be taken lightly, as a bit if motivation, to get us into writing. You are of course right that every profession can suffer anxiety, or lack confidence and that creates a block. We can freeze at anything in our life, and the trick is how we get unfrozen. If we want to be in a certain career we have to get ourself out of our lack confidence or anxiety.

        Liked by 1 person

        Reply

  4. I once did a thing when a story wouldn’t come out. I swiped my fingers around the keypad on my phone, and discovered that new feature for swiping instead of typing. And!!! I got the idea to have the character do exactly this. It worked because at the start of the story, she was arriving in Antarctica where she had been exiled to a weather station for being naughty at work. Ha ha

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

  5. I used to say writer’s block was BS. I still do, but there are times of the season, biology, reality overdoses that make the tuning in process more difficult than on “a good day.” Checking in with your various core creative mechanisms is a good idea. However, “bad” food can lead more to distractive activities than a creative block. The easiest way to defeat writers block is to get out of your own way, look at the work, read something… but there are times, and the worst ones are when you just don’t give a shit, and finding a shit to give is a blindfolded mental Easter egg hunt.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. For me it’s always someone in my head. That’s what keeps me from tuning in. I don’t sit and twitch my pen back and forth trying to think of something, it’s trying to think of something the imaginary man won’t immediately strike down.

      Although when I don’t give a shit, at all, the block doesn’t bother me because I no longer… give a shit. So it’s moot. It’s the Fuck it that propels me onward.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      1. The man in your head is a symbolic metaphor for not good enough, don4 be an embarrassment. Find our who and why, even if it’s yourself, and give them the finger. I understand living on the thin ice fear. It’s way over rated because 99% of the population wouldn’t know if you sucked or not and are busy skating on their own cracked pond.

        Liked by 2 people

        Reply

    1. Hi LaDonna, thank you so much for stopping by. Yes, I think it’s wise for me to stop caring about what people think to the point where I’m obsessed and it keeps me from doing stuff I want to do. Inner dialogue does seem to help illuminate issues.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  9. I re-read the whole post. Emotions, reason, the soul lives near the sinus cavity. Free-will. You touch on so many deep topics.

    At this time no human being is perfect, has all together. We are in age of duality. It us all upside down out there in the world, cause we upside down in our inner world.

    You are a very smart and clever women. Focus on the good in your life. Make more of that. You do so many good things quietly. Your heart, soul, reason and emotion are solid and strong.

    Focus on the good in your life, and all your good qualities. And you will see the free will, you the Soul, and reason and emotion will become one as you become one.

    So there is the exercise in cbt, ask may 3 or 5 people who really close to you, to list 10 or more qualities that they see in you about. Then, look at all of them. Then get a nice note book, and write a quality on a new page, leaving a page gap. Write 10. Then observe your self daily and write a comment on each of the qualities you used that day. Do this for a month or so.

    It will change your opinion about you.

    So what do I see in you.

    Kind, caring Soul. : example your Friday commitment

    Love for god. Eg. Your Friday commitment.

    Happy when you make others happy.

    Funny – I see that in your writing

    Clever – again I see that in your writing

    Fast to change: eg. You struggled with work, you put thought into action by going into work earlier and life improved.

    Excellent command of English language: your writing in your blog.

    Loyal friend – I feel we are friends and I feel you care for me from the heart , as I wish you the most happiness from the heart.

    Full of life

    Harder worker

    Passion for life
    Creative

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

    1. Oh thank you so much for your kindness 🤗. It means a lot because I tend to dwell on all the negatives about myself and picture all the negative things other people are saying about me. It can make it hard to be friends with other people. They say that if we wouldn’t talk to other people that way, then we shouldn’t do it to ourselves. It’s been a hard lesson for me to learn. But I’m gonna save your comment for when I need it again in the future. And I can return all of these qualities right back to you. Thank you for all your support and encouragement.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  10. This is a really great post on how to write emotions. You start feeling like its internal voices in conflict and end up by the Mcdonalds bit hearing two siblings yelling at each other. Really clever, Hetty.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

Leave a comment