To Write is to Despair

To write is to despair. Indeed. If you write, it is because you have all these ghosts pushing to get out from you, as if you were a jail, an asylum, better, with all these characters wondering what they are doing there inside you.

I will tell you: Your characters only upset your night's sleep. This will continue unless you gently or violently decide to extract them from your heart or mind and throw them over one blank page where they belong. And there, they will be agitated and confused until they get their bearings. But then, the contrary may happen. They may grab your hand and take you where they want to go. But this is all in your desperation.

As an author in your despair, to make your characters tell and do things, they must first recognize who you are, their father, guide, and mentor. They won't know but guess that you are their god, the owner of their lives on the pages, their souls, and their past, present and future.

Of course, this exercise exhausts you, and most of the time, you fall into despair because it's natural that you worry for them as a parent worries for their children's future. And think of what is in it for you, the author, who is unloading in your characters, your dreams as if they were their dreams, scenes from your dreams, your past, present or imagined situations because they are all yours. However, your characters may want to appropriate them in many cases.

So, be aware of these situations before falling into despair. Happy writing.