Creative's Workshop 2020
Perfecting Your Protagonist
Day 50: Perfecting Your Protagonist
A long time ago, sometime 50 days before this post, I had aspirations to maintain several different blogs simultaneously on my website! I was planning on writing maybe one post a week, and here I am now, writing one daily per day, sometimes a prompt response, sometimes several replies on the works of others… wow am I exhausted :sweat_smile:.
The most promising blog I was ready to fill with content was Perfecting Your Protagonist. It didn’t hit me until yesterday, but I had the entire formula ready for success:
Audience: Anime Viewers (Weebs is the internet slang term) Genre: The Heroes Journey but catered to weebs (Isekai but REAL) Idiosyncrasy: I do not fit the “weeb” stereotype while simultaneously not being closeted about my interests in anime.
That idiosyncrasy segment was a bit of a mouthful. Let me explain…
A stereotypical weeb consists of someone who:
- consumes an unhealthy amount of anime content
- has an unhealthy obsession with japanese pop culture
- is an introvert to the extreme and extremely socially inept
- because of the last bullet point, their self-grooming skills are absolutely pitiful
Whenever I mention to people my then-biggest hobby was watching anime because I like to experience stories and themes not commonly portrayed in Western media, people think I’m lying. “You can’t be weeb, you act nothing like one. You’re too normal.” Then I show them my profile on the corporate work Slack and they just become flabberghasted LOL
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I am almost to the point in my life where I can truly be proud of myself. I made it through the public education system, got a college degree (the first in my family!), got a decent job, and am now debt-free. The last two things I need:
- financial independence so I can pursue my creative passions full-time
- a romantic partner I can rely on
I’m gonna be completely forthright with you all and say that last bullet was the hardest thing I ever had to write.
It’s like… almost taboo to say you are single because that opens the hornets nests of questions as to why you are single (first impressions: are you a loser? :sob:)
But I’m starting to see that it’s good to be as vulnerable and as transparent as possible. It instills a sense of trust when you know the exact hand someone else is playing. And when you become vulnerable, you admit that you are not enough on your own and that you want someone else to rely on…
Is this what a relationship is like? :upside_down_face:
Small tangent aside, the biggest reasons I decided to push myself to create the blog was for threefold reasons:
- to have an obligation to keep honing my writing persona
- to chronicle a journey where I would reach out to others to improve within (combating a lifelong series of trust issues)
- to inspire confidence within myself, that maybe yeah, I am worth it
Hitting the halfway point with my dailies, I do see I’ve changed a vast amount since that fateful purple button press.
I’ve stopped dragging myself down worrying about everything I’m not, and instead started looking forward to everything I can be.
@homeroom11 @dragon @wildcat @sabweld @michellebasey @eliturner @Chen @laurasanto