User blog:DB Baxter/An Update, and a Favor to Ask

Hello, everyone!

Now, I know a select few of the people reading this have been following the multitude of blog stories and RP ideas that I had posted over the past 6 months or so. If you have I would like to thank you for reading and for your support. However, I am afraid that I have some bad news.

Effective immediately, I am cancelling and repealing any and all current stories that I had been working on up until this point. I know for the grand majority of you, you don't really care as you were not reading it anyways. As for the few who are sad to learn about this, I apologize. The reason I'm doing this is because I felt that I truly needed to move on. In case you weren't aware, I've suffered from a multitude of breakdowns and rants that have been egged on by paranoia, depression, low self esteem, and a long list of failures. I am just now beginning to move on from this troubling ordeal, and I have found that it would most likely be fit that I start over from scratch. I'm doing away with everything from an age in which everything was built upon paranoia and fear. I think it would be absolutely necessary in order to turn a new leaf.

However, this does not mean I'm going to completely drop everything. I will still be around in the RPs that I am currently in (as I know the major problems that arise from a sudden and unexplained departure.), and I will still continue to produce new blog stories and hopefully new RPs.

Now that that minor announcement is out of the way, I have a favor to ask.

Everyone has a reason for being here. Some are here to write and display their talents for those willing to listen. Some are here to cope with stress and depression. Some are here to simply have fun. I'm here for a bit of a different reason. I suppose you could fit my reasonds under the "writers display" reason, but the problem there is that I'd have to have a talent to display.

I came here to practice. I dream of one day being a playwright, screenwriter, or author. And I came here hopping to hone my skills get better. But, as you all know, I don't feel like I've gotten any better at this. Like, I look back now and I look back 2 years ago from when I first started. Unfortunately, there isn't much difference between then and now, unless you count much more frequent drop outs.

The point is, is that I feel like I've failed to accomplish what I had set out to do. And I know a lot of you ask me why I can't stay positive, and why I can't just look on the bright side. And to answer that question, I'd like to point to this scene frow Whiplash: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6vTI5g198E

Terence Fletcher, in this scene, has a point. Imagine if Steve Jobs had been told that his first stay at Apple was "ok" and that he did a good job on his products. He wouldn't have pushed himself harder to make the Iphone. Imagine if Michael Jordan's high school coach told him he was pretty good at basketball, and didn't cut him. He wouldn't have practiced as hard, and we might have never seen the greatest basketball player that ever lived. The point is, I don't want to hear "good job", unless I've actually earned it. Not just because of that "A for effort" nonsense.

That's why I ask for you guys for a simple favor: be honest. If i've written something, and it's one of the worst things that you have ever rea in your entire life to the point where you need to punch a wall, then tell me. If something is awful, then I'd like for it to be called awful. Don't tell me it was "alright". Because then I'll think it's alright, and I'll just produce more like it. And that is the absolute worst possible thing that can come out of me being here.

Now, I know what the problem with this kind of philosiphy. I'm not a strong willed man. I'm not strong, I'm not thick skinned, and I give up far too easily on things. And then I end up whining and complaining to you guys, and then I end up feeling bad about it and typing a long spiel to everyone about how sorry I am. And trust me, I know it frustrates you. It frustrates me, as well. I don't choose to have act like this almost every day. It just happens. One minute, I feel great and on top of the world. And the next, I'm falling from the world and tearing my hair out trying to think where it went wrong.

And I don't know what to do.

I've gotten the advice of just pushing foward, but what good would pushing foward do if I still have these massive problems weighing me down. I loathe myself, I'm paranoid about what other people think of me, I'm paranoid that all the compliments I recieve are just pity points, and I'm paranoid of how I don't seem to be growing at all from this. I could push on, yes, but there isn't much pushing can do when these things are still chained to your back and weighing you down with each passing step.

I'm clueless on what I'm to do. I want things to change, but I'm not sure they can change. I want to get better, but I've been trying that for two years, to no avail. I want things to take a 180 degree turn, and I want to be able to call myself a friend to you guys, and not just some loser from Kentucky who's paranoid-induced rants you have to deal with on occassion. I want to change. I want to be better. But I don't know how.

I'm sorry. Truly, I'm sorry. Trust me, I've been trying to change. I've been trying to not be paranoid, to not be a nuisance, but every time, I'm sucked right back in. I try to think my writing is good, and i end up loathing every word written. I try to think I'm a good person, but then I end up offending someone or making a large group of people frustrated. And the cycle just doesn't end. It's day in, day out. Year round. I wanna break this cycle. I need to break this cycle. For me, and for you.

But I don't know how. And I need help. But I'm not sure what help is left.

Anyways, now that this has basically dribbled down into a mad raving, I suppose I shall end here. I ask you, my friends (if you consider yourself that), for help. I know you've probably given all the help I need, and no longer wish to. And if you don't, that's fine. I'll understand.

Thank you for reading.

- D.B.