How I Made Leaps Forward In Progress Then Flatlined Again — And The Loss Of Novelty

I’ve progressed, found a breakthrough, then smashed into a wall again. Something feels wrong with me.

A New Phase

October 3rd, 2023 was a day I regained sight of the light at the end of the tunnel, if only for a second. Not in the grand scheme of life, but on a smaller scale.

A less grandiose way of putting it — I made pretty good progress on my 2nd game project, after remaining largely stagnant since August…

…of 2022.

It’s not that I haven’t done anything. I’m aware my memory is selective. I’ve forgotten what work I’ve done. But there’s no denying the writing aspect has been blocked and crawling for ages.

My motivation has been in the dumps forever. I hardly opened the editor to write anything. And when I tried, I couldn’t get more than a few words down.

Despite having the first draft complete for over a year, the goal felt impossible. I learned a lot about conciseness and syntax since I began. And there were plot points and dialogue which I felt were utterly cringeworthy.

I heard how you’re supposed to get words out and edit later. But I’ve nearly had to rewrite the whole darn thing again. I had better ideas but no idea how to integrate them. I thought I was back at zero again.

And so my brain shut down.

Of course, the whole suicidal ideation/insanity arc I had this year (in real life, obviously) hampered my progress. That’s a thing that happened. With everything combined, I want to say I shouldn’t be hard on myself. But I know that’s not happening.

I lost my ability to visualize. My mind had become empty; my actions autonomous. Being unable to imagine was terrifying. I could no longer immerse myself in a scene I wanted to convey.

Instead, I was lost in the void.

A breakthrough of sorts came months earlier. Before, I had been writing linearly and integrating each scene as perfectly as I could. I thought if I were to skip and come back, I’d forget important details.

But I did it anyway. And finalized the writing of about 5 scenes out of 70-something in the process. A fire awoke within me. This was actually possible. I’d be done in no time if I kept this pace.

And then the flames went out.

Another two months passed with nary a word jotted down. The finish line receded into the fog once more. Why was I like this? Others churned out thousands of words a day, and I couldn’t write a single sentence in months.

As I said, I’d lost my ability to visualize scenarios. And so I did the smart thing to do — impulsively Googling one’s symptoms in hopes of validation and not eternal dread.

Surprisingly, it worked. An exceedingly rare instance where social media helped my mental issue and didn’t multiply it.

I read a post about how imagination is like a muscle — it can atrophy. But it was a catch-22. I was stuck because I couldn’t imagine, but to imagine required the release of an idea.

Regardless, I attempted to summon a scene. My mind remained blank. I tried again. Still, nothing appeared. But at some point, the imagery and voices rushed back.

And thus, I regained my imagination. Sort of.

This ability’s return was fine and dandy, but not useful by itself. However, around the same time, I developed another habit with potential for major ramifications.

I began binge-watching shows again.

I had to cease this relentless cycle of doing nothing, feeling horrific because I was doing nothing, and then doing more of nothing because I was incapacitated by these thoughts.

So nearing the end of this year of perceived nothingness, I strapped on my VR headset. Overkill for just streaming shows, but at least I can’t impulsively reach for stuff and switch tabs in a virtual environment.

I watched a new show (to me, at least) based on this mobile game I played. Then another with a character I recognized from a GIF. After that was over, I went and rewatched everything I could remember the name of.

I felt a bit better. That was my consolation prize.

The Carrot And The Curve

This leisurely activity helped my mood, but it didn’t help my circumstances. I made no progress in my endeavors. This was better than doomscrolling, but it wasn’t satisfactory to me.

I’ve talked about how watching shows has unlocked creative ideas and helped me relax. And it has before. Through watching these shows, I’ve noticed what interests me.

For example, the dynamic of an impossible obstacle, an unbeatable enemy that seems so powerful it’s like they’re cheating. The protagonists try and they fail, time and time again. Finally, the characters find critical information, a sliver of hope, and that towering opponent is brought down to eye level.

Ideas like these are what I want to integrate into a story. However, it’s a thought in isolation, not a specific, fleshed-out story. As I’m acutely aware of in the present, execution is much harder than conjuring ideas.

To the point where it feels like just that. An execution. Of my sanity.

I’m getting sidetracked. After a few seasons of binge-watching, I felt uncomfortable feelings returning. A feeling of being stuck and not progressing. Maybe I could utilize this relaxed mental state.

So despite my past agony from writing, I opened the text editor and my first draft to reference. For some time, I sat there as clueless as I had for the past year. But a sentence or two came occasionally.

With each sentence, I found myself closer to the end of the scene. An hour passed, then two. I was far beyond the few minutes I would’ve given up in. The progress was glacial, but I was moving somewhere.

After an hour or so, I decided it was break time.

And so back into the virtual realm I went.

This was the strategy I devised. The “carrot” was me getting to watch 2–3 episodes of a show. In the between time, I would write/transfer a scene into the final game.

I found myself withstanding the pain of writing my story for longer. By alternating between these two activities, I ensured my mood maintained a decently positive level. Hopelessness wouldn’t cloud my mind.

I’ve tried habits like this before, and I worried I might get too comfy. I could push the boundaries and go for 4–5 episodes instead. Soon, I’d be watching TV more than getting my writing done.

That didn’t happen though. This momentum continued and even strengthened. I had multiple days with 1,500 words rewritten, edited, and finalized. Numbers I never dreamed of seeing.

The flames reawoke once more.

I could still make my goal. Only 4 months remained until my self-imposed deadline. But at the rate I was going, I could finish and finalize the story in just two.

Hell, at this rate, I could write 100,000 words for my third project in just three months. Maybe I could finish the project in only a year, and make up for lost time.

This was my sliver of hope facing my insurmountable opponent. I believed this was the exponential phase of my Sigmoid curve of progress; years of struggles culminating in this moment.

So I wrote at this rate for two weeks, eagerly racing to meet my goals at last.

But deep down, I had an inkling these times wouldn’t last. Many times in the past have I felt on top of the world, only to crash and burn again. So in the back of my mind, I braced for impact.

I finalized over 8,000 words in my game’s script. But that’s when I hit the wall hard. General themes floated through my mind, but the paths through the next arc remained obscured.

Looking at the rest of my draft… it was terrible. Even disregarding the new ideas I had. I’d have to rewrite the rest from scratch. But even nearing this year’s end, the specific plot details still elude me.

The bright future’s receded back into the fog.

I’m back in the flat-line portion of my curve, and I doubt the next ramp-up will happen soon enough. I’m considering that maybe the time just isn’t right, and I should delay my project indefinitely.

After all, there’s a lot affecting me that no amount of binge-watching can fix.

What’s With Me

I feel there’s something wrong with me. Well, I’ve felt effed up for ages, but even more so than I have before. I went to a fireworks show in July, and during the finale, my mind wandered and tuned it out for a few seconds.

I had to remind myself to focus on the barrage of giant explosions right in front of me.

Everything I do feels autonomous. The sights I see literally become out of focus, as my eyes refuse to fixate on what’s in front of me. I know it’s there, I can react to and interact with it. But it’s hardly present.

Remembering feels so difficult. Information is sent to the past and forgotten so quickly. As though they’re waiting to disintegrate out of existence the moment my eyes leave it.

I know the brain filters out irrelevant information, and time perception changes as you age. But even on my birthday, in a belt sushi restaurant with novel experiences, it felt like I never saw half of what I looked at. I enjoyed myself, but everything still was clouded over.

It’s as though novelty itself has become unstimulating.

That’s a terrifying thought. I’m not a fan of sayings that sum up life in a sentence, but I’ve heard how part of ~being human~ is to want to seek new experiences. Because the status quo is boring, and it’s ~our nature~ to desire adventure.

I fear this shroud of haze over my eyes is my brain deeming everything as irrelevant, and therefore filtering it out.

Because that leaves nothing left.

Volunteering as a software engineer brought so much life into me, 9 months ago. On the day of writing this sentence, I logged over 9 hours and 15 minutes of actual development.

Four pull requests with completed fixes and features, with a fifth under review. I enjoy contributing to the project, but feel exhausted and empty. As if I’m filling my time with this work to escape reality. Yet I don’t want to do anything else.

Faster and faster, more and more, forcing myself to stare at the screen and program, but it’s never enough. Because even what once brought me meaning has become the new normal.

It’s become less about moving toward a future, and more about repeating the now.

Because of my roadblock in fictional writing, I can’t see the future with my project either. Writing these articles has become mindless as well. One has to beg the question of what I have to look forward to and move toward.

Perhaps this is depression progressing further, assuming I even have it. Never been diagnosed, but I think the assumption’s fair. I’ve been through many emotions in these past 18 months. From agony to anger to numbness. Followed by violent, self-destructive thoughts.

A tick upward of hope, only to crash back down again. And then came the real threat of physical harm. I hurt myself for the first time by smashing my head into an armrest.

Those urges and thoughts receded with time. But now the emptiness is back with a vengeance. Game development was and still is my central desire. I had a whole plan for writing stories spanning until 2030 and beyond, and how I’d build up to a major project over these years.

But nothing ever goes to plan. I’ve largely given up at this point. I’m on that indefinite hiatus, if I haven’t already been this entire year. Because I’m still stuck on the second step of a whole darn stairwell. And I have no idea where to go.

With that, the last bastion of the future has fallen.

For the first time in my life, I have absolutely nothing to look forward to. Absolutely nothing I enjoy doing anymore. Absolutely nothing that feels worthwhile, even if I do it anyway.

Because it all seems to end in misery.
The good seems short-lived at best.

Limitations Of Habits

This marks the umpteenth time I’ve gone through this cycle. I find a critical piece of information, it unlocks a new path or level, and I believe that now is my time.

I think about how far I’ll go with this newfound superpower in the future. But the momentum never lasts for long. I’m back in the hole before I know it.

Perhaps I’m just a fool for falling for my delusions over and over. But I think I’ve realized something about advice, and these productivity habits I’ve read about.

They only really work when you’re already capable of progress yourself.

I’ve tried blocking time to write. It never worked. I sat there for 15 minutes, just as clueless as I’d been at the start. Fixating on the fact half of this “sprint” was over with not a word written.

Interweaving show-watching with writing was essentially the same concept. Each block was actually longer at 1–2 hours. Though I suppose the leisure helped regulate my stress.

The practice was virtually identical, but for some reason, it worked this time.

This isn’t to say switching was useless. Even if I could’ve finalized my writing without the trick, it certainly made it easier. I bet reaching this same point would’ve taken several torturous months.

The habit worked. Until it just… didn’t.

As aforementioned, I have no idea how to bridge the gaps between major plot points and rewrite the latter half of my story. No amount of organization or “discipline” will change how lost and empty I feel.

My problems are specific, but these sorts of habits are often designed for general consumption. I can’t do something like “just write.” I’ve jotted down 2,358 words in this writing, but reflection pieces have nothing to do with a fictional story.

I can’t just write 1,000 words a day about an interplanetary road trip slash murder mystery (that’s one of my future ideas though). Nor can I introduce conflict through a marital spat between spouses.

Well, I can, but that doesn’t address my current problem. It won’t work with the story I’m (not) writing now.

This is the conundrum I find myself in. So many parameters and constraints, and being unable to find an answer. I know, I’ve heard it before — “Done is better than perfect.”

But failing to tell the story I wanted negates the purpose.
Though I suppose at the moment, it’s not a complete one anyway.

I want to hope the ideas will come someday. I hope this landscape devoid of creativity is only because of my inclement state. I hope I can find the next breakthrough, and regain sight of the finish line.

But if the past is any indication, I shouldn’t get my hopes up even if I do.

But hey. If there’s any ideas on how to introduce conflict and major events in…

A slice-of-life story about a past falling out between friends with feelings of guilt swirling around and melancholic themes of feeling lost in time and the disillusion of childhood innocence, while also framed around a citywide racing competition which ties back into the lost friendship due to the increasing tensions due to the spirit of competition, which exacerbated negative emotions from each of the friends’ familial/personal situations; and also in the present there’s a restaurant owned by another friend which is failing, and the race’s prize money becomes a conflict of interest between letting go of the past and starting again wanting to help the protagonist’s friend and not lose the last remnants of their fond memories, and also there’s a crime wave affecting her as well and so the conflicts of the second half have to match the unnerving vibe of that situation and since it’s a slice of life the race isn’t even the main focus it’s just a driving factor to indicate progression of the story and it’s more about the friendships and moments of life anyway, with flashbacks revealing vignettes of the buildup to the big fight; I don’t even know how I’m gonna write the competition segments without being boring; the story still needs conflict that isn’t too cheesy or cliche; I can’t figure out the details; please end my suffering; why is (not) writing such a pain; AHH —

I’m all ears.Because I certainly haven’t found one yet.