This is MJ. I'm an author, I'm an artist, I'm an analyzer. You can find all my work at
MJMunoz.com. Welcome to episode 34.1 or something like that of Story Over
Everything. Maybe it's really episode 33.9. I don't know. But it's not a full
episode 34 because I had a very great struggle with time management this week.
I had a very great struggle with my availability to do my writing and drawing.
I think I drew more than I wrote but I probably only wrote two days maybe this
week or you know I probably only drew three days this week. So that's pretty
bad. The writing period that I'm in right now for the author's log should have
been from August 26 to September 1st. It's September 21st as I record this. I
didn't draw. I didn't make it happen and I'm not going to frankly. As I go right
into the author's log I can see that the 26th I didn't write, the 27th I didn't
write, the 28th I wrote outline type material and I never got back to it the
rest of the week. 28, 29, 30 or I guess 29, 30, 31 and September 1st. They're all empty.
No words. Zero words written. So that's that's shocking. That's a little dismal.
I'm not happy about that. What happened? Real life got in the way. I don't I
didn't even know that I had car trouble. There were different things that
happened but it's funny I'm actually this is going to be a very short episode.
I will read to you briefly what I wrote in my outline from the 28th but outline
slash story notes. But aside from that I will talk about my plight and I'll talk
about it through lens of the Harry Potter series which I'm partway through
and I was inspired to make a title for the episode which is MJ Muñoz and the
shackles of time or the originally it was in the block of time implying a
writer implying a writer's block. I didn't have writer's block. I just didn't
make time to write. I couldn't make time to write and I thought what would be
better would be MJ Muñoz and the shackles of time or and the 24 shackles
or something like that. And the rotating shackles and the gear bound. Ooh, MJ Muñoz
and the gear bound shackles. I like that. So if you look at the thumbnail for this
episode there's an image that I had made through Bing. You can talk to
the Bing chat and have it do makeup dolly images for you basically. So that's
where that image comes from. It's a book cover idea image for this
book I just made up with a title spoofed off of Harry Potter. So
anyway I just thought that was kind of interesting but I will get into that
after I finish the week authors log. So I'm just gonna read it verbatim and then
move on to talking about my time management woes. So these are authors
note slash outline prompts for myself to write the rest of the chapter and perhaps
the rest of the book. Tut and the Grobug guardians battle the enemy. It's a tough
battle but they think they won. Tut reaches out to Hum and Glimmer and
realizes something is very wrong. He and the guardians rush back to the camp to
help. Meanwhile Shush or Shush yeah Shush Splash and Glimmer are in the cradle
with the Grogrubs. Hum whistle grunt quiver or hum whistle grunt chirp quiver
and the other Grobug cadets are hidden away from the cradle. Are hidden away
from the cradle. They are hiding in three seemingly abandoned nests like bird's
nests. Hum chirp and quiver are together. Whistle has yawn and slurp grunt has
babble and gnaw. Chirp sneaks away while hum is distracted
calling the fears of the Grogrubs and soothing them to sleep. She does it
remotely with her powers. Quiver is lulled by hum as well. Bored chirp wants
to see the grand battle as Tut and the six guardians are holding off the
attackers. My idea is that five or six foes slip through and chirp is attacked
and then things kind of escalate from there creating the conflict for the rest
of the the book basically. But that's all I wrote. So my plan my hope was to write
on the 29th 30th 31st and even today the September the 1st expounding upon that
and basically probably all that time those four separate days would have been
spent minimum writing the battle that the six guardians including Tut had
against the the attackers the foes the enemies and then they would have slipped
through and that would have created more conflict. So hey please God I will get to
that next week. But that's the conclusion of the author's log that is the shortest
author's log in all of all of the history of this show and yeah it wasn't
that it was fruitless it was just that there wasn't enough application of
effort to really you know turn out a good yield but I at least like the fact
that I got that note summary outline chunk down so I can expand upon that.
That's important that's necessary. So anyway moving on from there I only have
a couple minutes and then I got to close this out. It really is vexing that I have
so many time constraints so little time and that so often plans go awry and I
don't know how I will overcome that at this moment but if I ask myself the
question which I am now how can I overcome my tremendous time constraints
I'm sure I will find an answer. I've been cultivating a really good amount of
discipline to make the time for things to happen and slowly I went off the path.
It's been a week or two since I've worked out I've been getting up as
early as I want to I'm going into work as early as I want to I haven't been
doing my intermittent fasting like I want to I haven't been writing like I
want to I did draw two or three days somehow it's easier to just draw than it
is to write for me at the moment I don't again I do not know why that is the
case and I don't know what happened to my discipline because I thought it was
good and solid and strong and I thought I had a really well-established
foundation that would enable me to have success in this arena over and over again
but perhaps I was too proud perhaps I thought too much of myself perhaps I was
simply mistaken but that's uh that's not the case I can see that I don't have
the discipline that I want I can see that I don't have the stick-to-itiveness
the perseverance that I want to have and then I feel like I need to have for
long term long term long term success as a professional writer and I'm kind of on
a quest for that right now like I need that I definitely need that and you know
there's no training montage or you know snippet chapter that's gonna you know
make me able to do that and if there were I'd have to write it and I don't
have the time to write it so I just need to put myself through the paces and be
patient with myself and forgive myself for failing to do the things I want to
do when I want to do them and I don't know embrace happiness just be joyful
and happy that I get to write and when I get to write and keep chasing that I'm
not really sure I don't have the answers I I think a solid answer in life is to
be happy and to you know joyfully pursue that which you desire but that's broad
advice it doesn't get down to the atomic level it doesn't get down to the
mechanics and tell me what to do or how to do what I want to do and it doesn't
help you either so I'm gonna let this be a really short episode and I'm gonna
move on however because I'm doing this because I want to keep them separate if
you want to shortly after this episode is released probably you know 15 minutes
after it's released I will release another story over everything episode
it'll be story over over everything episode 34.5 and it will be a skimming
leaves episode where I'm talking about the first Harry Potter book philosopher
stone or sorcerer stone as it's known in America so you can look forward to that
and I'd be interested to hear your comments and interestingly enough I
don't believe in coincidence I have had these things ready to go for I've had
this one ready to go for a couple weeks now and I'm in the middle not in the
middle I'm in the beginning of book five so I should definitely have time to
finish five six and seven before I'm pressed for time but it's interesting
I'm releasing this episode on September 1st and if you've read the Harry Potter
books you know that September 1st is always mentioned is the day that Hogwarts
begins that's when Harry goes to the station and gets on the train and goes
back to Hogwarts on the you know on the Hogwarts Express so that's kind of
interesting timing for me and it makes me laugh and it kind of tickles me which
is why I went ahead and gave this episode itself a Harry Potter inspired
inspired title and that's why I decided to go ahead and release these as two
separate episodes that way there's the you know Harry Potter one for people who
were fans of that and who want to hear not a die-hard fan but just like somebody
who you know is serious about books and likes literature take a crack at series
and you know hear my impressions and that can be separate from me talking
about my writing woes because you know you don't want to hear about that unless
you want to hear about that in which case you can hear about it here and then
you can hear the you know philosopher's stone casual book chat over there on the
separate episode it'll be on the same feed but still I don't want people
wasting my time I don't know waste their time so there you go it's a little
courtesy for me to you anyway I hope you're well until next time folks this
is MJ signing out I hope you enjoyed that go to MJMunoz.com to leave any
questions comments or other feedback you might have there you can find all of my
analysis art and fiction I cover books tokusatsu comic books anime and more
look around you're sure to find something else that you'll enjoy as well
this has been a story over everything production