A Focus on Happily

I needed to choose a name for this blog. Blogs have names. That's the way it goes. My previous blog was called "assisting you shortly". When my wife asked me why I shrugged. The URL was available. It had a nice ring to it. She told me it's idiotic. I told her she doesn't understand.

She understands. Names are sometimes important. They reflect something. In "assisting you shortly", the name reflected the fact that I couldn't be assed to choose an actual name.

In this blog I chose "Writing Happily", and it reflects something. Writing... Well the blog is intended to be mostly about writing.

Happily? Does that mean that I am happily doing the thing I love, which is writing? Well...

I love to write, and many times I am happy to do so. But the happily in the title isn't just an adverb that describes the way I feel when I write. It's a decision that I intend to put an effort into.

Being happy sometimes demands effort. I am not one of those people who just say "Decide to be happy". That's too general, and there are things in life which challenge that decision all the time. But I think I can decide to write happily.

There are things that hounded me for the past months. I was depressed about the sales of my last book. I was sad about criticisms the last book received. And, worst of all, I started being envious and bitter about other writers. When I saw a writer posting his small success on Facebook, I felt angry. It's not like I didn't have my share of small successes, but I wanted his successes as well. And, being disposed to self reflection as I sometimes am, I became sad about this new trait that I developed as well.

So here are some decisions I decided to put an effort into:

I won't give in to envy. If a writer talks about his success I will like it. I will comment on it, telling him "You are awesome!". I can't decide not to feel envy, but I can decide not to let it manifest in any way, and to do the opposite. Envy is disgusting. Stating the obvious, I am not measured by the success of others.

I won't be depressed about sales. When you go into self publishing, you have to be prepared for bad sales. It's part of the deal. So I'll assume it'll happen, and I won't let it sadden me.

I won't be sad about bad criti... Yeah, okay. There's a limit to the power of the mind. Of course I'll be sad about bad criticism. I'll try not to let it consume me, though. And I'll never, ever engage critics (This is an easy resolution. It's what I'm prone to do by default).

Time to be happy with my writing career. Even if it's not a career, but a hobby. Even if it'll remain a hobby. I'll be happy about it. And when everything fails, and I can't be happy about it, I'll pretend I'm happy about it.