Human: Know Thyself 

I often wondered what would happen if I didn’t take a drink. Or eat a bag of cookies when I was stressed. Like 70% of the country, I use mildly destructive distractions to cope with everything from mid-afternoon boredom to my son’s impending puberty.

I think for writers, the percentage is more like 100. Something inside the mind of a writer wants us dead. Soft addictions tame that beast momentarily. Yet what I’ve learned over a dozen years of consistent writing is that those tame moments are getting shorter and shorter. As I hit my mid-forties, the universe has decided it’s time for my body to viciously reject alcohol and prove eating a sleeve of Mentos a day, despite only adding up to 140 calories, is a bad idea. Corn syrup is not support, it’s the devil.

I read a quote the other day that said, “Writers are Exorcists.” This is accurate, but the demons we are exorcising aren’t just our own. Something inside the writer is digging for answers to the big questions. The human psyche is a dark place where the average person dare not go, except in story.

We have chosen our modality of psychotherapy, although it comes without a paddle. Writing is done in isolation, surrounded by wafting clouds of fear, our own and that of the collective, so the path of least resistance is often distraction. Although I’ve been curious about what’s on the other side of a binge, I’ve always been home alone with enough chocolate chip cookies to cover it.

But then one fine day in March I was doing my work on the road, sequestered in my car, trapped like an animal with no provisions, only the glow of my laptop for companionship. The beast reared its head and what did I do? I needed to escape myself, so I started driving. I thought I was having a panic attack. I got home safely but not before I cried and thrashed like a toddler. I have the sadistic love of self-exploration so I was determined to get to the bottom of this manic behavior.

But the thing about life is, these opportunities come around again if you’re open to them. And I was. I really wanted to get to the root of this compulsion to run from the work…and there it was, I was running from the work.

Writing may be an illness but it is also genius, a gift from God to help us mere mortals figure ourselves out. Our screwed up society values a narrow band of unattainable things most assume come from minimal effort so it leaves the rest of us with a fake hole within that will never be filled. We think we are supposed to be perfect out of the gate, and when we fall short, we spiral into these binges. It’s no different with writing- expecting it to be perfect in the first time around and when it’s not, something reminds us we’re worthless so we might as well give up and go eat a cookie.

The aha moment came a few weeks later. I’d stopped the alcohol drip so I had to go through this death row detox to let whatever was clawing at my insides out. All the pain of lifetimes gone by was getting excised and I felt it in my gut, and my heart.

Pain of what? I kept asking. Pain of the little girl that got squashed by early influences and soon took the helm of my life. This aha moment exposed the hidden truth that this insecure, scarred little girl has been secretly running the show. She’d often start sentences with “I deserve…” that glass of wine in this impulsive moment. I should kick her to the curb but I can’t because she’s a part of me. We are all working from our wounded child. No wonder our outer world is so childish!

So I thought I found it, all the answers- my own version of Steven Pressfield’s resistance. We all only learn through experience.

But there was one more layer to peel back. I had to keep going with hyper awareness of my actions and motives, and the answer to it all came in meditation, my conversation with God. POTENTIAL. Under the false self, the one wounded by life, was a shiny, perfect, golden-colored self, waiting with no timeline, endless patience and complete love for me. This is my spark of divine potential and it is the true answer to everything. It’s my light that can only shine when uncovered by doing the work to expose it to the world.

I now know my inner beast with blonde ringlets wears battle armor because she is the protector of this perfect, delicate potential. She’s exposed it to the world before, and seen it get squashed and she won’t let it happen again, so she hides it and fights the only way she knows how. I don’t want to get rid of her, I want to thank her for keeping this precious part of me so safe. It’s time to take risks and be imperfect and dive into this endless beauty of divine potential to see where it leads.

Does this mean all my problems are over and I’ll never reach for sugary goodness? No. But I’m armed with insight only going through the pain can bring. I now have awareness to make better choices and know everything I need for success is within me, and it’s within you. I dug my way to it and know it’s the answer. The question now becomes, what will you do with it?

—

Stacey L. Tucker uses the action/adventure genre to bridge science and spirituality in her Equal Night series. Tucker’s first book in the trilogy, Ocean’s Fire, took gold at the Living Now Book Awards and she’s looking to make magic again with Book 2, Alchemy’s Air. She has written for Women’s World, Working Mother, and PopSugar, and speaks to teen groups about self-empowerment and awareness in today’s social media–saturated climate. You can find her at www.staceyltucker.com.

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Alchemy’s Air: Book Two of the Equal Night Trilogy

Skylar Southmartin is not the naïve girl she was a short year ago. She’s made some mistakes and learned a few secrets to life, all the while clinging to the faith her mother instilled in her as a child . . . in herself. And now that she has discovered her life’s purpose within the pages of the ancient Book of Sophia, she knows what she must do: restore a vital memory to the Akashic Library, located deep within the Underworld of Earth. This library is sought after by many who are aware of its existence, for they know the future of human potential rests at its core.

Meanwhile, Devlin Grayer has been elected as the 46th President of the United States and his wife, Milicent, is miserable in her new role as First Lady―especially because the Great Mothers have asked Milicent to use her new status to help their cause, and she has no interest in tackling that task.

With the help of friends in the unlikeliest of places, Skylar’s journey reveals the significance of the darkness within all of us, and its potential to save or destroy the most precious part of us all: our soul.

BUY THE BOOK HERE

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