There are a lot of ideas that I want to share with other people, ideas that I've been developing and writing about for over a decade. My book, if it can be called that at this point, is Azarren, a fictional story about five sapient species of creatures living together on a distant planet in a faraway galaxy. These creatures have pioneered amazing technologies, from solar-powered airships to seismic weaponry and computers powered by motoplasm, a gelatinous substance manipulated and molded like DNA. These five Azarren species live together in an Empire that's over 10,000 years old, and for those ten millennia they have overcome every challenge imaginable and emerged stronger because of it. I want to share these ideas because I think they reflect creativity, and I want to share them to make people's minds move and use their own perspectives. But this is the trivial part of the story.
The book is set in the Azarren year 10402. The protagonist is Sehla Arallis, the middle child of the Azarren Emperor, who must embark on a dangerous mission with his two brothers Arzeo and Jiaki to stop their great-uncle, who is attempting the gain the means to re-create history in his own image. In the story, he seeks to re-imagine and re-invent the entire Azarren time line as perfect, paradise-like even, without any of the tragedies that have inflicted pain upon Azarren society. And Sehla is out to stop him from doing this.
I want to share this idea in particular; it is the most important message in my book. I believe strongly in finding and confronting our fears, which is something I've had to learn for years as a sufferer of severe depression and chronic anxiety. I also believe that mistakes and tragedies, while unfortunate, are what cause us to grow up as people, and, hopefully, as a society. We should never omit our own history because it is unpleasant, nor ignore the boons that might be gained for taking time to reflect on our mistakes and what we can derive from them. Sehla, who suffers from depression as I do, sets out on his mission for this reason alone. What gives him pause is that he was very close to his mother, who passed away, as is his antagonistic uncle, who wants to re-write history as much to bring her back to life as for his goal of societal perfection. This will cause a powerful element of inner conflict within the story, but the idea of accepting mistakes and pain, and what we can glean from them, is the central theme of the book and potentially the series.
I want to share this idea through writing simply because it is my greatest tool. It is the thing I am the best at and it is something from which I can derive an infinite measure of new learning. I can share this idea through writing because the written word gives us the most pause for thinking. Spoken words can be moving too, but the image of the page, the searing of those words into our brain, are what we remember the longest, because we alone have interpreted its meaning and spoken it softly to ourselves.
Right now, the book is stalled. I haven't done any serious work on it in over a year, because I've been busy overcoming my own illnesses and doubts to return to the page. Some days I feel fine writing, other days are difficult. That's another reason why I want to write this, how I can spread my ideas; I need to write this story as much for my own sake as anyone else's. Perhaps I need to do this to validate these ideas for other people, but I can share these ideas through writing because, when I want to, I can communicate in ways that move emotions. The trick lies in summoning the belief and the willpower that I can still move emotions, but I'm beginning to believe, once again, that it's possible.
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