ironcowboyphantom

[ironcowboyphantom]

Why is it that I am always the person people ask to accompany them to the ER and yet nobody has ever agreed to accompany me on any of my ER trips. What kind of grievous injury does a guy have to acquire to get a little company here.

[ironcowboyphantom]

kitteeeeennns

Bianca loves her foster babies

[ironcowboyphantom]

oh my gosh this is HAUT COUTURE. patchwork black jacket! YES PLEASE!

Its so subtle, and yet very precise and clearly a LOT of work.

I love all your patchwork incorporated into your wardrobe. It just makes everything so unique and interesting to look at!

Finally got some pictures of the black patchwork jacket on me! Unfortunately the different textures didn't really show up in the full body shots on account of the background being too light, so I'll have to try some other time with a dark background.

They showed up pretty nicely in the closeups though. All the silk satin and wool and corduroy and ribbed cotton and other stuff. Mostly scraps from projects I've done over the years, plus a few little offcuts from nice black wool pants I've hemmed at work. I covered all the buttons in black cotton velvet.

This was my first time making this style of cuff and I think it turned out very nice.

[ironcowboyphantom]

Rainbow trout!!

[ironcowboyphantom]

The Neurodivergent Writer’s Guide to Fun and Productivity

(Even when life beats you down)

Look, I’m a mom, I have ADHD, I’m a spoonie. To say that I don’t have heaps of energy to spare and I struggle with consistency is an understatement. For years, I tried to write consistently, but I couldn’t manage to keep up with habits I built and deadlines I set.

So fuck neurodivergent guides on building habits, fuck “eat the frog first”, fuck “it’s all in the grind”, and fuck “you just need time management”—here is how I manage to write often and a lot.

Focus on having fun, not on the outcome

This was the groundwork I had to lay before I could even start my streak. At an online writing conference, someone said: “If you push yourself and meet your goals, and you publish your book, but you haven’t enjoyed the process… What’s the point?” and hoo boy, that question hit me like a truck.

I was so caught up in the narrative of “You’ve got to show up for what’s important” and “Push through if you really want to get it done”. For a few years, I used to read all these productivity books about grinding your way to success, and along the way I started using the same language as they did. And I notice a lot of you do so, too.

But your brain doesn’t like to grind. No-one’s brain does, and especially no neurodivergent brain. If having to write gives you stress or if you put pressure on yourself for not writing (enough), your brain’s going to say: “Huh. Writing gives us stress, we’re going to try to avoid it in the future.”

So before I could even try to write regularly, I needed to teach my brain once again that writing is fun. I switched from countable goals like words or time to non-countable goals like “fun” and “flow”.

Rewire my brain: writing is fun and I’m good at it

I used everything I knew about neuroscience, psychology, and social sciences. These are some of the things I did before and during a writing session. Usually not all at once, and after a while I didn’t need these strategies anymore, although I sometimes go back to them when necessary.

I journalled all the negative thoughts I had around writing and try to reason them away, using arguments I knew in my heart were true. (The last part is the crux.) Imagine being supportive to a writer friend with crippling insecurities, only the friend is you.

Not setting any goals didn’t work for me—I still nurtured unwanted expectations. So I did set goals, but made them non-countable, like “have fun”, “get in the flow”, or “write”. Did I write? Yes. Success! Your brain doesn’t actually care about how high the goal is, it cares about meeting whatever goal you set.

I didn’t even track how many words I wrote. Not relevant.

I set an alarm for a short time (like 10 minutes) and forbade myself to exceed that time. The idea was that if I write until I run out of mojo, my brain learns that writing drains the mojo. If I write for 10 minutes and have fun, my brain learns that writing is fun and wants to do it again.

Reinforce the fact that writing makes you happy by rewarding your brain immediately afterwards. You know what works best for you: a walk, a golden sticker, chocolate, cuddle your dog, whatever makes you happy.

I conditioned myself to associate writing with specific stimuli: that album, that smell, that tea, that place. Any stimulus can work, so pick one you like. I consciously chose several stimuli so I could switch them up, and the conditioning stays active as long as I don’t muddle it with other associations.

Use a ritual to signal to your brain that Writing Time is about to begin to get into the zone easier and faster. I guess this is a kind of conditioning as well? Meditation, music, lighting a candle… Pick your stimulus and stick with it.

Specifically for rewiring my brain, I started a new WIP that had no emotional connotations attached to it, nor any pressure to get finished or, heaven forbid, meet quality norms. I don’t think these techniques above would have worked as well if I had applied them on writing my novel.

It wasn’t until I could confidently say I enjoyed writing again, that I could start building up a consistent habit. No more pushing myself.

I lowered my definition for success

When I say that nowadays I write every day, that’s literally it. I don’t set out to write 1,000 or 500 or 10 words every day (tried it, failed to keep up with it every time)—the only marker for success when it comes to my streak is to write at least one word, even on the days when my brain goes “naaahhh”. On those days, it suffices to send myself a text with a few keywords or a snippet. It’s not “success on a technicality (derogatory)”, because most of those snippets and ideas get used in actual stories later. And if they don’t, they don’t. It’s still writing. No writing is ever wasted.

A side note on high expectations, imposter syndrome, and perfectionism

Obviously, “Setting a ridiculously low goal” isn’t something I invented. I actually got it from those productivity books, only I never got it to work. I used to tell myself: “It’s okay if I don’t write for an hour, because my goal is to write for 20 minutes and if I happen to keep going for, say, an hour, that’s a bonus.” Right? So I set the goal for 20 minutes, wrote for 35 minutes, and instead of feeling like I exceeded my goal, I felt disappointed because apparently I was still hoping for the bonus scenario to happen. I didn’t know how to set a goal so low and believe it.

I think the trick to making it work this time lies more in the groundwork of training my brain to enjoy writing again than in the fact that my daily goal is ridiculously low. I believe I’m a writer, because I prove it to myself every day. Every success I hit reinforces the idea that I’m a writer. It’s an extra ward against imposter syndrome.

Knowing that I can still come up with a few lines of dialogue on the Really Bad Days—days when I struggle to brush my teeth, the day when I had a panic attack in the supermarket, or the day my kid got hit by a car—teaches me that I can write on the mere Bad-ish Days.

The more I do it, the more I do it

The irony is that setting a ridiculously low goal almost immediately led to writing more and more often. The most difficult step is to start a new habit. After just a few weeks, I noticed that I needed less time and energy to get into the zone. I no longer needed all the strategies I listed above.

Another perk I noticed, was an increased writing speed. After just a few months of writing every day, my average speed went from 600 words per hour to 1,500 wph, regularly exceeding 2,000 wph without any loss of quality.

Talking about quality: I could see myself becoming a better writer with every passing month. Writing better dialogue, interiority, chemistry, humour, descriptions, whatever: they all improved noticeably, and I wasn’t a bad writer to begin with.

The increased speed means I get more done with the same amount of energy spent. I used to write around 2,000-5,000 words per month, some months none at all. Nowadays I effortlessly write 30,000 words per month. I didn’t set out to write more, it’s just a nice perk.

Look, I’m not saying you should write every day if it doesn’t work for you. My point is: the more often you write, the easier it will be.

No pressure

Yes, I’m still working on my novel, but I’m not racing through it. I produce two or three chapters per month, and the rest of my time goes to short stories my brain keeps projecting on the inside of my eyelids when I’m trying to sleep. I might as well write them down, right?

These short stories started out as self-indulgence, and even now that I take them more seriously, they are still just for me. I don’t intend to ever publish them, no-one will ever read them, they can suck if they suck. The unintended consequence was that my short stories are some of my best writing, because there’s no pressure, it’s pure fun.

Does it make sense to spend, say, 90% of my output on stories no-one else will ever read? Wouldn’t it be better to spend all that creative energy and time on my novel? Well, yes. If you find the magic trick, let me know, because I haven’t found it yet. The short stories don’t cannibalize on the novel, because they require different mindsets. If I stopped writing the short stories, I wouldn’t produce more chapters. (I tried. Maybe in the future? Fingers crossed.)

Don’t wait for inspiration to hit

There’s a quote by Picasso: “Inspiration hits, but it has to find you working.” I strongly agree. Writing is not some mystical, muse-y gift, it’s a skill and inspiration does exist, but usually it’s brought on by doing the work. So just get started and inspiration will come to you.

Accountability and community

Having social factors in your toolbox is invaluable. I have an offline writing friend I take long walks with, I host a monthly writing club on Discord, and I have another group on Discord that holds me accountable every day. They all motivate me in different ways and it’s such a nice thing to share my successes with people who truly understand how hard it can be.

The productivity books taught me that if you want to make a big change in your life or attitude, surrounding yourself with people who already embody your ideal or your goal huuuugely helps. The fact that I have these productive people around me who also prioritize writing, makes it easier for me to stick to my own priorities.

Your toolbox

The idea is to have several techniques at your disposal to help you stay consistent. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket by focussing on just one technique. Keep all of them close, and if one stops working or doesn’t inspire you today, pivot and pick another one.

After a while, most “tools” run in the background once they are established. Things like surrounding myself with my writing friends, keeping up with my daily streak, and listening to the album I conditioned myself with don’t require any energy, and they still remain hugely beneficial.

Do you have any other techniques? I’d love to hear about them!

I hope this was useful. Happy writing!

[ironcowboyphantom]

Ohhhhh she s so MAD. I wish to offer her shrimps of condolence

ahh the grrito, a close cousin of the purrito. Only much angrier.

She got a bath to try and soothe her skin a bit. I think she's got a food allergy, so she's also being switched to a chicken free diet for a few weeks to see if her skin improves.

[ironcowboyphantom]

It’s crazy and fucked up that being yourself is actually the solution.

[ironcowboyphantom]

trauma therapy has been swell

[ironcowboyphantom]

Hussein Bicar (Egyptian, 1913-2002), Waves, 1980. Gouache on paper, 42 x 30 cm.

[ironcowboyphantom]

he's free now

[ironcowboyphantom]

OP YOUR MIND!!!! ahhhhhhh

okay. so. hear me out. The Goblin Emperor AU where Maia and Setheris are sent somewhere closer to the coast than Edonomee, thus allowing Maia’s illegitimate pirate aunt to check in on her nephew within the first year or so.

At which point an agreement is reached: Setheris won’t tell anyone that Archduke Maia is spending 8-10 months of the year on a pirate ship, and Shaleän won’t kick his ass.

This gets extremely funny when Maia abruptly becomes emperor and no one can figure out why he’s super confident, in great shape, and clearly spends most of his time outdoors. He keeps forgetting that he’s not supposed to thee/thou the servants, or know how to throw a punch, or be bisexual in public.

Reactions to this are mixed! Csevet is having the time of his life. So is Cala. Beshelar is horrified, but in the opposite way that Dazhis is horrified. Idra thinks Maia is the coolest person alive. The Barizheise ambassador (the only person at court besides Csevet who knows why this is happening) is s w e a t i n g.

Csethiro still kind of thinks he’s an idiot at first, but like. A hot, charming idiot who can swordfight. Unfortunately she’s into that.

[ironcowboyphantom]

the new bowl, all carved

[ironcowboyphantom]

Oh i love this. Especially all the different papers and the envelope at the end!

For an egg, I need to set up a new junk/scrap journal @stickingandcolouring

A journal! For both junk and scrap! @stickingandcolouring, how'd it go?

What is this blog? | Submit to get Killie another egg

[ironcowboyphantom]

I have no idea if you might be a good person to ask this, but I know you are an intelligent and educated person with small kids whom I have certain parenting values in common with, and also a much larger following than I do, so here goes. My child DESPERATELY wants to be a social media influencer. They are only 9, and will get devices/access/accounts to do this ANY TIME SOON OVER MY DEAD BODY. But they don't believe anything I tell them about the dangers of the internet and why you have to be super careful and not, you know, tell everyone in the world all the intimate details of your life.

I'd like to find a kids book that touches on these themes, perhaps a kind of cautionary tale? That I could give them that they'd take as more reliable evidence than their dumb old parent, but the only books I can find like that are Definitely For Adults. Would you happen to know of any appropriate for tweens?

That’s very kind of you, and I’m sorry that I don’t have books to hand. It’s such a challenging area to think about and you have my sympathy!

Nine is around the developmental age where we’re told that the opinions of children’s peers start mattering more to them, when constructing their personality, than their family’s, with this absorption apparently peaking around age 15 before they start looking for external influences/ actively choosing parental influences to discard (although this is fluid, and kind of citation-needed.) anyway, all models are flawed but some are useful. The idea is that it’s a natural, inevitable and welcome part of growth to start favouring other people’s opinions far more highly than your parents’. This is where a lot of scariness starts, because you have a lot less reassurance that you can do your actual legal and ethical duty (looking after your kid).

And while lots of people on the internet will instinctively take the side of the 9-year-old, and say that one should not exercise any guidance over their mental landscape at all, and should let them form their own opinions, with the good judgment that they have apparently developed magically - the entire point of parenting is to help a young person build good judgment, and it does not happen magically. If you don’t help them build their own judgment, children tend to absorb the Default Culture around them; which is composed of whatever blend of commercialism, gender essentialism, and emotional illiteracy is prevalent in the brain of the most controlling trashbag parent who sends THEIR kid to school to bully everyone else.

So parents do have to be the grownup.

It could be worth working on this with the parents of their best friends, or with their school (our school does a lot of Online Safeguarding Assemblies). It could be worth asking a cool young friend of the family to have a chat.

If they’re already interested in online material, online courses or videos aimed at their age might be more interesting and seem more up-to-date than a book. The internet has certainly moved on from “never tell your age in a chat room” and kids will be very aware of that.

A sneaky way for parents to recalibrate the influence of - well, influencers - is to get the kids involved in absorbing in-person activities, like Scouts, horses, rock climbing, etc. Giving the kid an absorbing new facet of identity, and a peer group who reward each other for achievement, often fills the “I want approval from OUTSIDE MY GROUP, I want REAL approval from THE INTERNET” cup. Of course, this is often a very expensive option, depending on the interests; however, I am a judgement free zone for that, and am of the opinion that this is what money is for.

It could be worth finding out what content the kid is watching, and sees themselves producing, and stress that CONTENT is the point, not that there is a camera (you’re not giving them a camera) and an audience (there will not actually be an audience). My 8-year-old is pretty into stop motion and makes a lot of small films with Lego (that somehow never end up online).

It’s very possible that if you drill down, your kid would find this need entirely scratched by recording themselves playing Minecraft, spending 6 days learning enough video editing to produce a small clip of them exploding a pig, which you will have to watch 345 times and put on a WhatsApp group chat for them, and that will be entirely the end of it.

Honestly, kids working out that they get pretty much zero views, and that influencer culture is entirely algorithmic, is probably going to be a sufficient bummer to deter kids from posting more than one thing in the future.

I wish you the best of luck finding resources and people are of course welcome to share any that they found helpful.

[ironcowboyphantom]

very normal cat times this morning

[ironcowboyphantom]

...i have never felt more called out in my life

Being demisexual and bi is funny to me. Anyone can hit it but you must suffer The Gauntlet first