The Power of Decisions

According to Time, the average person makes up to 5,000 decisions per day. 

And for some people, that number is probably even higher. When you think about it, each action we take is a decision: going to bed at 10pm or continuing to watch a movie until midnight; hitting snooze or turning your alarm off (and getting out of bed); making coffee, taking a shower, putting on make up, getting dressed. Teeny tiny decisions every day. We decide what to eat for breakfast, when to leave for work. At work, we decide whether to schedule or postpone meetings, whether or not to email a client back or wait. Thousands upon thousands of decisions, sometimes lasting only a fraction of a second -- but some last even longer. 

There is nothing quite like the agonizing argument I have with myself every weekday evening. I should work out, I text my husband, but in the back of my mind, I whine: But I don't waaaant to. You should -- it's good for you. You ate a bagel for lunch. But I am so tired. I barely see Danny... Back and forth, until I decide one way or another. I decide which route to take home. I decide what to make for dinner. I decide... I decide... I decide. 

And at a certain point, we just aren't able to make decisions anymore. That's kind of the funny thing: the more decisions we force ourselves to make in a day, the more difficult it is for us to make those decisions -- which means, it's more difficult for us to be creative. To be creative -- that is, to create, to write or draw or scrapbook or anything -- we need to be able to make decisions that impact what we're doing. Should we use this word or that one? Should a character be named Angela or Angelica? So if we've used all of our decisions on the minutiae of our lives -- whether or not to work out, raspberry or strawberry smoothie, nonfat creamer or milk in our coffee -- then we have a harder time actually being creative people. 

For people who are terrible at making decisions, it's even worse. 

I've always agonized over decisions. Sometimes, I fantasize about how my life would be different based on all the decisions I've made in my life. When I was younger (that is, under about 13), I would often wonder if the decisions I often agonized over -- chocolate or vanilla ice cream, going to Portland for my birthday or the coast -- really had an impact over my life. Would I have more friends if I was a vanilla ice cream person? (I am decidedly a chocolate ice cream person -- and I have since found that people who favor vanilla tend to be more personable and outgoing than me, so perhaps I'm onto something there.) 

I like to make decisions alone, but I also secretly like to have people make suggestions to me. I always text my husband and my mom when a big decisions comes up -- and while both of them usually reply, "I don't know, you should decide" or something to take effect, I kind of always want them to tell me what to do. I'll always frame it as "well, I decided this" -- but really, I like to leave the hard stuff up to other people. I often wonder if I have a hard time making big decisions -- whether or not to be short term disability insurance, whether I should plan for a pregnancy in 2015 or 2016, how much money I should save every month for property taxes and insurance -- because I spend so much time agonizing over the little things, like whether to buy lunch that day or if I should work out. 

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There is one thing I know for absolutely sure: 

When I spend a lot of time making decisions -- whether it's little things or big things -- I have a harder time getting work done, being creative, and writing. I don't write in my journal; I'll fall behind on creative projects; I'll put off scrapbooking, my favorite hobby. 

So what does that mean for me? If I intend to live a more creative life -- which is a goal I have for myself -- what can I do to keep myself from taking away all of my decision-making power? 

One of the most important things I need to do is have a routine. I used to be one of those people that did the same things at the same time of day, no matter what. Throughout college, I got up at the same time, worked out at the same time, ate at the same time, went to sleep at the same time. I had a routine I did when I woke up, when I went to bed, when I did my homework. I was a human of routine. The farther I've gotten from school, the more I've gone rogue -- and in that time, I've spent a lot of time making stupid decisions. (Should I brush my teeth now or later? Just kidding, I'll spend 20 minutes sitting on the living room floor picking out a movie -- the Hobbit, Venture Bros, or Blade 2?) 

Right now, I'm working on a routine. Planning outfits, planning meals, planning workouts. Not having any excuses. Not allowing myself to change the decision I've already made. If I've already decided to wear jeggings and a sweater tomorrow to work, if I've already decided to pack my gym bag and put it in the car and work out after work, if I've already decided to make lasagna for dinner, then I've already removed the burden of those decisions. I've created a somewhat streamlined day for myself already. But I can narrow it down even further. I can just know I'll wake up, shower, put on make up, make coffee, pack up my car, and leave. No deviations -- I've already decided. If I know that, I'll be more prepared to be productive at work, to make creative decisions, to get home from a good workout and write. 

I want to be a more creative person and part of working towards that goal means altering the behavior I've allowed myself to get away with out of pure laziness. It's time to get things in order. It's time to get my decisions under control. 

NaNoWriMo 2014

I've completed NaNoWriMo three times. 

I first learned about NaNoWriMo my freshman year of college, but I didn't attempt it until I was a junior. I think this is partly because I was too shy of my writing until I was over the age of 21 and because I always had intensely grandiose plans for novels that never came to fruition (but I was more competent in terms of writing after my sophomore year, so the plans seemed in line with my abilities). 

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The first year I completed NaNoWriMo, I wrote a tepid novel called Cut that focused around a girl named Monica. I don't even remember the plot and my feelings of intense embarassment for 21-year-old me prevent me from opening the file on my computer. It just sits there, an embarrassing reminder of everything stupid I've ever done. 

The second year, I was prepared and ready. I wrote a novel called Succotash (a title I stole from our literary magazine name suggestions, that I liked and was mad we didn't choose). Succotash was about a girl named Erin who attended college in Idaho and hated her life. There were several characters based on my favorite musicians (deeply embarrassing) and other characters based on people I knew (including my future husband). The novel is boring and has no plot, consisting of mostly vignette-length character studies repeated over and over again. If I'm good at anything, I am amazing at character studies. I've reread this novel a few times and while it pretty much sucks, it's not horrible and I could probably dig out some good passages for future writing if I had the motivation. 

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I skipped a few years after college. I vaguely remember starting novels, but not finishing them. In 2011, my grandfather died in November and I don't remember writing anything for a long time after that. The next year, I was working full-time and couldn't make time in-between my work day and crushing depression. 

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Last year, however, I completed NaNoWriMo for the third time. I wrote a novel called Runner's High, that is as silly and stupid as it sounds. I wanted to write a typical crime/mystery novel, but I ended up circling the drain about two weeks in. My idea was simple enough -- a competitive runner witnesses a murder in the woods and helps police track down the killer -- but my lack of research, combined with how bored I became with my main character named freaking Aurora (why, Michelle, why!?), led me to, again, write bored character studies over and over again. The most interesting part of the novel became the fact that the murder victim had an identical twin sister. Really, she should have been the main character, but I was stuck with boring, lame Aurora. I haven't looked at the novel since early December last year and I hope to never have to again. 

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So what's on my plate this year? 

Every year, before the start of November, if you register with the NaNoWriMo website, you're encouraged to "create a novel" -- basically, to cement down an idea, a title, a plotline to encourage you to actually, you know, finish. The years I've done this have been a tremendous influence in whether or not I actually finish. 

This year, my novel is titled Buffalo. It's about a girl named Lily whose girlfriend, Autumn (I know, I'm sorry) commits suicide -- or is murdered. Lily moves back home to live with her brother, Andrew, and, through flashbacks and phone calls, unravels Autumn's real life. 

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Here's the uncomfortable truth about NaNoWriMo. 

Every year, I know my book is going to be horrible. I know I'm using the worst ideas I've got. I know I'm going to end up getting bored or being too busy and having to write 5,000+ words in a day. I know those things are going to happen, but I do it anyway. And at the end of the month, I'm always elated that I've finished. 

I mean, I wrote 50,000 words in 30 days. That's insane. To me, it's proof that I can do it. The writing might be bad; the plot might have disappeared halfway through; but damn, I wrote 50,000 words which means, someday, when I get a good enough idea, I can do it again. I can. 

Are you participating in NaNoWriMo this year?

Happy Halloween

Homemade chocolate cupcakes with homemade salted caramel cream cheese frosting, topped with sugar skulls and harvest nonpareils. 

I love Halloween. I always have. 

The first Halloween I remember is hazy: I remember dressing as Minnie Mouse, tiny red-and-white polka dot bow adorned ears on a headband that hurt my head (as all headbands do). I was maybe 4, but not much older. I remember being in a car, looking out the window into the dark, and feeling that particular Autumn magic: the feeling of dustiness, of being able to stay up later than usual, the cold of early nights, how oppressively dark it seemed after an entire Summer. The approaching Winter seems closer than ever on Halloween. 

My next Halloween memory is my friend Noelle's birthday party, held at Lone Pine Farm, a Eugene, OR tradition most known for its haunted corn maze. It was Noelle's 7th (or maybe 8th) birthday. We always celebrated our birthdays in tandem: me on October 20, her on November 4. It was a novelty to have birthdays so close together, when so many in our class were March or June babies. I don't remember much of the birthday party. But I remember my mother carrying me out of the pumpkin patch. It was dark out -- maybe twilight, but I remember it dark -- and I held the child "swag bag" I'd received: a green and black flat plastic bag printed with a witch's image, warty nose and gnarled teeth, but smiling and cartoonish, full of cheap goodies and candy. 

As I got older, Halloween got more complicated (as all things do), but it always retained that magical feeling of coziness and changing seasons. It was constant. Every year, October 31 and Halloween came no matter what else was going on in my life, no matter where I was or what job I was working. Halloween was a easily measurable space of time, a period of 24 hours where I felt like the world was different. 

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I've always been a big fan of a specific and easily identifiable aesthetic. The set designs of movies I saw when I was a kid impacted me greatly -- especially Hocus Pocus, with the dusty Sanderson Sister cottage covered in spider webs, lighters pushed into the wall, wrought iron ornaments and old hardwood floors -- but also steampunk-y elements, like the design of Tarzan's Treehouse in Disneyland. (I only recently, when visiting Disneyland with my husband, realized the influence of this little-spoken-of treehouse on my appreciation of steampunk, old typewriters, futuristic and yet retro lamps, and mahogany desks.) I've always wanted to live, or even just visit, a haunted Victorian mansion. Most of all, however, I've always referred to my design taste as ink-stained, retro, and Halloween-y. 

There is a coziness in what is old: dusty book covers, desks covered in years of fingerprints built up into a grime, typewriters with keys missing their letters from use, flickering candles in windows. There is something magical and mysterious about it, something beautiful and yet decrepit in the combination of dark colors (black, brown, burgundy) and warm (gold, yellow, orange, bronze). 

I love Halloween. I love the movies, the colors, the sets, the pumpkins, the lights, everything. It's the day where it's ok to be a kid again (and always), the day where the veil between living and dead is thin. It's a day to celebrate, to drink, to look back, to eat as much candy as possible, to appreciate the world we live in (full of rust-colored leaves and vibrant orange pumpkins), to remain thankful that we are here and nowhere else. 

I Turned 26

I've somehow managed to have the same face since I was 6. 

When I was 18, someone who hadn't seen me since I was about 6 or 7 recognized me instantly. I've just one of those people whose face really didn't change as I got older. It's retained its round, babyish quality and it's not going away anytime soon. Everyone thinks it's hysterical, but I recently got asked if I was old enough to work where I work and I pretty much will be carded for the rest of my life.

My babyface has become even more clear thanks to my mom, who, for my birthday, gave me a box full of baby pictures. They are all gems. 

Getting older is fun, but it's also scary. When I was younger, I couldn't wait to be older. I always wrote stories about girls who were 22. I never imagined being 25 or 26, but I couldn't wait to be 22, to be mature, to be fulfilled and happy. Maybe I believed in magic for too long because I really believed I would magically fall into a career immediately after graduating college. I also apparently thought people dropped off the face of the planet after 25, which I hope isn't true. 

As I get older, I become more and more aware of the things I've taken for granted, of the responsibilities that I now have to take on, and of all the things I didn't think I wanted (but totally do). I also think of all the assumptions I made about people. I remember thinking about my mom losing her brother when she was 19 and thinking, "well, it was ok because she was grown up." Dear Lord, young Michelle, could you have been more clueless? 

I recently watched the movie Neighbors, which is just as silly as you imagine, but it also made me think about getting older. There is still a part of me that wants to be cool: I miss going to parties, I miss staying up all night and staying out late. I miss eating Taco Bell at 2am. I miss the dirty party houses and endless Netflix parties. I miss them, but I also find myself exhausted at the mere prospect of staying awake all night. I'm so tired; I have to work in the morning; and really, I just want to watch Key & Peele. Am I officially an old? No longer a youth? Am I over the hill? 

I'm not going to worry about it, really. While I miss all the fun of my college years, I don't miss the drama that came with them or the fluctuating persona. I don't miss having to act certain ways around certain people. At 26, I'm ready to just be myself -- and be old. 

The Only Fitness App You Need: PumpUp

I'm pretty sure I've downloaded every work out and fitness app available. It's an ongoing saga. Some weeks, I'm using Fitocracy and that's fine (except it doesn't list calorie counts, just arbitrary points). Some weeks, I just track my cardio work outs on LoseIt. I've downloaded all kinds of apps that claim to build awesome work outs (pro tip: none of them do). 

A few weeks ago, someone recommended I download PumpUp. They recommended it mostly for the community, but briefly mentioned that you can build work outs on it too. I was intrigued. I downloaded the app and forgot about it for a few days. 

Cut to a few days later. At work, I opened the app and selected the plus button which brought up the basic menu. I could Start a Workout, Log an Activity, Track my Weight, or Share a Photo. 

Before this point, I'd been randomly browsing the "community" that was recommended to me as "awesome." The community is sort of like Instagram -- a lot of rail thin girls posting pictures of their tiny salads and flat stomachs or people posting thinspo photos masquerading as inspirational, both of which I can do without. (This doesn't include the multitude of men posting their intensely muscled backs with phrases like get it and never surrender added in MSPaint, which I can also do without.) 

I hadn't been impressed until I discovered I could create work outs. 

My frustration with other workout generating apps centered around the fact that the workouts just weren't good. I can do 20 lunges on my own. I don't need an app to do that. I needed an app that could create workouts for a specific amount of time for a specific goal. 

PumpUp does that. It's great. 

All the workouts I've created, including what I've scheduled for the day. 

When you select a workout, you can browse through all the exercises. 

After you select start now, it times you and tracks your calories. If you need to do 2 minutes of stretching, it times it.

The workouts are so nice. I like that it demonstrates how to do each exercise and allows you to swap out exercises. If you did dumbbell squats yesterday and your legs are still hurting, you can swap for lunges or a similar exercise. It's like a workout video, but without an annoying instructor. Just you and the app. 

Each section is colorcoded. Yellow is warmup; orange is strength; green is circuits (if you've chosen to add conditioning to your workout); dark blue is cardio; and purple is your cool down time. Each strength section, rep, and circuit are separated by timed breaks, so you're forced to give your muscles a rest. (I'm really bad at taking breaks.) It always times your cardio. The interesting thing is that cardio is set after your strength-training; the app explains they do this because research shows you burn more fat that way. That sounds good to me!

Mostly, I love the variety. When you create a work out, you can select what you want to achieve: to tone up, to lose weight, to get healthy, whatever. Then, you can select if you're at home, in a hotel, or in a gym. Then, you can select what equipment and machines you have access to: dumbbells, bands, cardio machines, etc. It then takes everything you've told it and spits out a workout in the time frame you requested targeting the muscle groups you indicated. 

It's basically magic. 

Already I've noticed a change in my workouts and my body. I feel more satisfied when I leave the gym and I've noticed an increase in my strength. I'm up to using 10-pound weights (instead of 6-pound or 8-pound) and I can now do 12 real pushups. I've never been able to do a push up in my life. 

I've always toyed around with buying fancy videos or programs, but when you can create effective workouts on a free app, really, what's the point? It's so much more convenient, especially if you already pay for a gym membership. 

PumpUp combines everything I wanted in an app. I'm disappointed it took me so long to find it. As long as I ignore the community aspect, I can get everything I want in my workout from a single, free app on my phone. What's more perfect than that? 

"Thug Kitchen": Is it Racist or Harmless?

I like Thug Kitchen.

I've followed their Instagram account for ever, allowing the account to be in my peripheral vision for at least a year. That being said, I never paid much attention to it. I didn't cook any of the recipes (I am not vegan; I am allergic to soy; I really hate quinoa), but I enjoyed the tone.

And I'll be honest, I thought the account was run by perhaps a middle class, or upper middle class, black man or woman. I liked the idea of it; I liked the subversion; I liked that it appealed to everybody, but was clearly written in a satirical way. But, like I said, I didn't pay much attention to it and if I had, I would be one of the people who would now be writing sentences like, No one is shocked that Thug Kitchen is written by white people. I'm not one of those people though, which makes the revelation a little more complicated for me. 

More than anything, with the publication of the Thug Kitchen book, the problematic use of the word "thug" by two upper middle class white people comes under fire. When it was just an Instagram account or a Tumblr, we could forget it or look past it. But now, we have to look at it on book shelves, leering at us from stands just inside bookstores. Here's what Jordan Sargent at Gawker had to say about the publisher's somewhat condescending response to concerns from the public: 

"But where Power is wrong is in ascribing that dissonance as purposeful. As has been pointed out in basically every piece criticizing Thug Kitchen, the word "thug" is in the title so that you think of a mean, scary black person. Thug Kitchen uses "thug" the same way as Michael Dunn, who shot an unarmed black teenager for playing rap music too loudly. That the voice of Thug Kitchen doesn't match the character they aim to evoke does not exactly absolve them of their intentions."

Basically: Thug Kitchen is written in a way for you to imagine a black rapper - not a white person, not anybody, but specifically a black rapper. It's AAVE appropriation at it's finest and most icky. 

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And yet, I find myself uncomfortable with writing that last sentence. 

Sometimes I wonder if reacting to all these tiny instances of insensitivity, of dubious understand, we are hurting larger efforts. By being persnickety and constantly talking about the little hurts, are we undermining social justice as a whole? 

I like Thug Kitchen, but I also found it pretty boring sometimes. How funny is one person talking about chickpeas or cold brew coffee, in with an affectation? I don't think it is sustainable, for now or for the future, but it was a funny joke while it lasted. 

We're all nervous about admitting to prejudice. But, as I learned in sociology classes in college, there are greys to racism -- it isn't always a clear cut issue. You can be prejudice, but non-discriminatory. I always say, If people admit their prejudice, then at least they can work against it. Realizing you've been badly influenced by a racist social system and working to correct your own thinking is better than being ignorant and racist, right? 

Which brings me back to Thug Kitchen: is my hesitance to declare Thug Kitchen damaging my own form of racism? 

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It's ok to like things. 

That's what I tell my husband sometimes: it's ok to like things, to laugh at jokes, to like immature, stupid, silly stuff. 

It's ok to like Thug Kitchen. Really, it is.  Is the use of the word "thug" problematic in a lot of ways? Yes.  But will Thug Kitchen destroy anyone's life? No. However, will Thug Kitchen perpetuate a stereotype that could potentially be harmful to someone? Kind of.

In many ways, l like that Thug Kitchen takes a stereotype and flips it on its head: the thug who eats vegan, the thug who cooks, the thug who talks trash and is super healthy. At the same time, it does perpetuate the connection between thug and a specific speech pattern, thug and a slightly violent overtone. That's concerning for anyone who wants to see equality and less hate speech and stereotyping in general. 

I feel like with things like this it's a matter of give-and-take. Am I disappointed that Thug Kitchen is written by two white people -- and not the person I thought it was? Yes. (And I'm in the minority here -- apparently, I'm clueless.) Does that concern me? A little bit.

But was I ever going to buy this book anyway? No, I don't like most vegan foods and I'm allergic to soy. 

I Love Gillian Flynn's "Sharp Objects" & You Should Too

"There is something deeply unhealthy about this book; it's in the characters, in the story, in the relationships, in the sex, and just in the general mood of the novel." - Goodreads Reviewer

"From the first page, I felt the author had just finished a Chuck Palahniuk novel and decided she wanted to be like him when she grew up. Sentence fragments can be fun if you're in the mood for things like 'A belly. A smell. He was suddenly standing next to me.' (Not exact quotes, but pretty close.)" - A Goodreads Review

Harsh words, right? Don't worry, I saved the harshest review for last: 

"The razor blade on the front cover of the book is what one yearns for right after embarking on this read, sharp blade with which to cut every single page, one by one, until they are so neatly shredded that even the memory of what was written on them becomes non existent. And then, one can use the same razor to end one's own life.  I'm still unsure what the author was thinking when she began this book, unless she had some very deep and very disturbing mental issues to work through. This book is dangerous and not because it excites one with a thrilling and suspenseful story. It is dangerous because once one reads it, one loses any desire to look for another book that may restore one's faith in the existence of good books with an uplifting charge. Not only is this book dangerous, but it is sick. Its underlying sickness is that it's emotionally draining and unless readers are looking to load up on more mental baggage (I can't think of anyone who doesn't have enough), I'd stay away from its pain." 

Gillian Flynn, for the past few years, has gotten a fair amount of attention for Gone Girl, a stunning novel about a husband and wife -- and how easy it can be for some people to hide their true selves. A lot of people don't realize she has other novels, too. 

I like crime novels. I have always liked crime novels, suspense stories, horror stories. I read a lot of Stephen King (even though I find his books maddening). Good crime novels are hard to find these days, too often falling into the trap of a singular portrayal (white male cop, period) and specific crimes (drugs, gangs, the mob). I was excited to find Gillian Flynn: she is a woman writing mainstream crime novels with female main characters. 

I liked Gone Girl. I didn't love it, but I liked it. I was mostly stunned by it; I wanted to absorb Flynn's writing style and talent (a common feeling when I read a book I really like). The twist wasn't much of a twist; I had guessed it mostly from the beginning.

This is true of all of Flynn's novels: you're going to know about the twist early on because, well, it's obvious. That seems to be the crux of most amateur reviews: I saw it coming or I wasn't surprised. 

I liked Gone Girl, but I loved Dark Places, another of Flynn's novels about a girl whose family was famously murdered in a Satanic ritual (or so she thinks, announces the voice over in the theatrical trailer). I loved that the main character, Libby, was as deeply unlikable as Amy from Gone Girl, but for entirely different reasons. She is a lazy, manipulative, kleptomaniac obsessed with being the saddest story, constantly mourning not really her family anymore, but herself. It's a brilliant book.

Then I read Sharp Objects.

I spent a lot of time thinking about Sharp Objects. It revolves around a journalist named Camille, who returns to her hometown to cover the murder of one preteen girl and the disappearance of another (potentially related). She is still dealing with a lot of personal pain and the return home isn't really what she needed to recover.

As the quoted reviews point out, this is a book -- a town, a main character, a family -- that is diseased. It's sick. This is a sour spot for a large number of readers, it seems. If you're someone who doesn't enjoy reading about the twisted psyche of a small town, then this isn't a book for you. Part of me believes that you need to come from a small town to understand the claustrophobia and sickness of a small town like the one in the book. 

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In my senior year of college, I wrote a poem that included this line: 

Cottage Grove is a town that mopes like a man. 

I come from a small town. Cottage Grove, Oregon, to be exact, a town known for having the largest number of covered bridges in a 5 mile radius of town. The Covered Bridge tour is a draw and now, so are the vineyards, all lying about 10-15 miles west of town -- but people have to pass through from I-5 to get to them. The town is not prosperous; with the recession, sawmills and logging operations closed down and left a lot of people poverty-stricken. My mother grew up knowing everyone in town, but now we don't know anybody. I see a lot of dirty kids. A lot of trash in the river. There is a man who walks the streets of our 3-block downtown screaming to himself. 

Cottage Grove is like so many small towns: dirty, old, obsessed with itself and its false pride, poor. Cottage Grove is like Wind Gap, MO in Sharp Objects: a town with a cruelty that is kept very, very secret. Like most small towns. 

I think to understand Sharp Objects, you have to understand the claustrophobia and fear of small towns, the way it's so easy for small towns to fall into mass hysteria and panic. If you don't, the novel only seems sick, purposefully painful, writhing in its own sadness. 

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I love Sharp Objects. 

I love the sticky, moist writing, so reminiscent of warm, Midwestern towns in the summer. I love the unconventional main character and I love her personal issues. I love how deeply I identify with them and yet, how deeply I want to understand them because they are so foreign. I love the mother, Adora, because she reminds me of older women I know. I love that it is a book that made me feel uncomfortable, but drew me in. 

I loved that it was a crime novel that wasn't about a cop. I loved that I know who the killer was (or who I thought the killer was) from the very beginning. I love that the big twist takes place in about 1 page of text. I love that the prose feels dirty, the way it is supposed to, the way it should with such a sick story. 

Sharp Objects isn't a book for everybody, but it is a book that should not be dismissed. The writing is beautiful; the story is magnetic. It's a better book than Gone Girl. Don't believe me? Read it for yourself. 

Creative Writing & Finding a Path

I used to think I needed to be very good at everything -- and yet, only dedicate myself to one thing. 

I really thought I was most valuable if I dedicated myself whole-heartedly to one passion. If I could make that work, I would be happy, I was sure. 

By the time I was halfway through college, however, I realized there was no way I could dedicate myself to one thing for the rest of my life. It just wasn't possible. 

I want to say something braggy here, such as, I was just good at too many things, but that isn't true. The fact is: I'm flighty. I get obsessed very easily -- and fall out of obsessions very easily too. I'm a trivia based person. I can remember random facts better than I can remember anything else. 

I would get frustrated with myself when I couldn't focus on something wholeheartedly. I would get frustrated when I just started to get good at something and lose interest. 

It took me a long time to realize that the reason I enjoyed writing so much was because it allowed me to be interested in everything.

I could learn about history, nail art, music history, and the life cycle of stars all in one day -- and informed my writing more than anything else. You can't write without research. And research is, honestly, what I love the most because I love immersing myself in a variety of topics for a short amount of time. 

Finding my path took a long time. I felt like I could never fully indulge in my hobbies -- like fashion or nails or fandom -- because I was too busy trying to be serious about one thing.

I love being a writer because in one day, I can research anything that sparks my interest. I don't have to feel like I'm only able to learn about certain things or be passionate certain things.