by Kai | Dec 21, 2021 | writing well, religion, naming conventions, Books, Life, Pen names, and more, Personality, Announcements, planning, Reading and Reviewing, Sabrann Curach, Kai Viola, content, tapping the well, Kairis Viola, Featured, The Art of...., Kai Ellory Viola, Fiction, things you don't know about me, Health, Gaming and hobbies, Writing, About D Kai Wilson-Viola, A day in the life 2021, Geekery, writing habit, News, #mondayblogs, Mental wellness
(Don’t Google that, if you plan to watch Loki, the TV series, as the titular character sings it).
I’ve been equal parts restless, equal parts full of wanting to get on with changing things, but not having the energy to do any of it. So, as is my usual tactic, I’m actually travelling today. I’m going home.
Tomorrow morning, I’ll be heading to my temple, called Goddess Falls. It’s known as another name in Edinburgh, but I’ll be taking my lightsaber with me in the morning.
Travelling, thinking, going home
We’re hoping that we get to go (so, either this’ll be going out as I’m on the road – in fact, I should be just getting to our end destination), and my tradition is to think and write and make notes, and hope that nothing goes wrong while I’m out of touch. Maybe do a bit of crochet, which I’m teaching myself.
Mostly though, today is a holiday. So Joyous Yule, may the wheel bless you as it turns, if you celebrate. And Merry Christmas/Happy holidays too!
And books?
Every week, I talk about putting out books, about editing, but I’ve been slow. Really slow, so I’ll keep trying but honestly? Pressure has never been my friend, but I’ve got to start moving on with my books. So, I’ll be thinking about that too while travelling. We’ve got little TV trays for our knees, so I’ll be travelling with one of them, my diaries, and my surface. Just in case.
Going home though… it is in my bones. I’m a Gaelic gal to the core, to the point that I feel home in my very soul. I bring a little bit of it back every year for my shrine.
Today also marks the 25th year of being a standing High Priestess. Solitary, but still… it means this year I think I’ll be talking about my beliefs, my dreams, and what I’m doing it with my books to honour that stuff.
But…regardless. I hope your Christmas period is good. I hope you see those you love. I hope you get to spend time with your family. I’ll be taking time out with mine.
Kai is a writer, author and avid reader. A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.
by Kai | Oct 31, 2011 | Nanowrimo, Featured, Free for all, Gaming and hobbies, Nanowrimo 11, National Novel Writing Month, The Home Office, Writing, writing habit, Books
We move through our lives at a constant pace. We can accelerate or decelerate ourselves with a limited amount of success, but the speed we do things at, at our base rate at least, is probably something we’ll never change. Some of us rush headlong into everything and batter through life as fast as we can, hungry for as many new experiences as we can pick up, and tired at the end of each day because we’ve packed in so much.
Others go as slow as possible, savoring every step, and realising, deep down, that they can’t do everything they might want to.
My problem is I want to savor everything, but I want it all. I have too many hobbies, and too little time on my books for new stuff. I book far too much into my life, mostly because I can. My laptop became both my freedom and my curse, because now, there’s a whole world of reading and writing out there, and I get nothing done.
Facebook is a horrible blessing. I can meet and hang out with so many wonderful people, and keep an eye on my friends, and there are some really cool games on there, but, lets face it, I’ve got a nasty habit of refreshing my page again and again, and then wondering, at 2pm, where my day went.
Worst of all, I’m a person that moves through life with a momentum that pulls others along behind me. And lately, I kinda feel like I’m out in the middle of a great big ocean, with no chance of finding the new land I was aiming for. But it feels like I’m stranding other people now and I don’t like that feeling.
Momentum is working out where you’re going and I think that’s the biggest thing for me right now. I need to work out which map I’m working from – someone else’s or my own. If I’m working from someone else’s, where can I adapt it so it’s all mine – or if I’m going to dive on in headlong and do it all myself, I need to work out where I want to go – there are *so many* choices right now.
What I do know is tomorrow begins my ninth Nanowrimo. I’m really looking forward to it. It gives me another month to work out and plan the roller coaster that is about to be my life. One way or another, things will start resolving and working out the way I want to.
Plans are coming soon, though. I’m happy to report there *is* a plan, but it’s difficult to see whether it’s the right choice right now. So I’m going to have a bit of fun with my writing for a bit, and see where that takes me. It’s too easy for me to lose sight of what I wanted to do when I started out online – which was writing. I’ve gone all over the web since, looking for something that’s ‘all me’ but what I am, underneath it all, is a writer.
Kai is a writer, author and avid reader. A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.
by Kai | Mar 9, 2011 | content
Image via Wikipedia
My partner and I have chatted over the last couple of days – and one of the things that has come out is the fact that I need to buckle down and deal with my university assignments. And it got me thinking – there’s a lot of changes I need to make over the next few months.
One of the things I’ve come around to, slowly, is that popularity doesn’t matter. Not on a personal level at least. Professionally, I work in a career that relies on what interest I can raise in my writing, so professionally it’s a different matter entirely. It’s critical to me to understand how to balance my professional and personal life, so this is why I’m clearing out my Facebook, and why I’m changing some of the ‘groups’ I’ve categorized people in – it means you’re probably going to lose access to some of my more personal updates.
Being classified into the ‘professional’ list doesn’t mean that you’re *not* in other lists – but it does mean that if I’m posting something about the craft of writing, it’s probably going to go to that list. It also means I can be more confident about posting leads that people are actually going to use, and tailor my ‘stuff’ to the people who really need to see it.
Also, also, this is my personal blog. I can talk a bit about my mental health ‘stuff’ on here, but ultimately, I try not to let my disorder ‘beat’ me (at least in the terms that people seem to consider when looking at mental health). I’m a survivor, simply because up until recently, I’ve had no choice. Being too self reliant is one of the big problems that my other half talks to me about – I don’t talk to him until my problems are waaaay beyond where I can handle them, which is bad. And I’m working on that.
These changes – all of them – aren’t going to come overnight. Nothing ever does in my household, but what I do know is that I’ve got stupid amounts of work to do, and I’m not doing it navel gazing.
Next couple of posts are going to talk publishing, self publishing and some other ‘stuff’. Requests? I’d really love your feedback and comments. If you’re interested in something I’ve touched on but haven’t talked about yet, tell me 😉
Kai is a writer, author and avid reader. A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.
by Kai | Feb 17, 2011 | Writing, Books, Publication notices
One of the off list conversations I had with the people who were asking me about my stuff, and encouraging me not to be shy is to ask to have you guys urge me.
So I bowed to peer pressure, in a positive way. The following ways are the absolute best ways to get me to – find out about the books I’ve mentioned in the past, urge me to write them, and get access to them, and the writing process before/after/getting your mitts on them. Having a strong fan base will also help me convince publishers that I’m a great bet after the first ‘oh, this is good’.
I’m considering whether I should work to a self publishing schedule for some of my books – I’m not sure whether I should keep slogging on with Elliot Peters and his stuff or just get it out there so that those that want it can get their hands on it, while those that want to wait till it’s backed by a publisher can still support me by passing the book onto others.
Facebook
I’ve got a page for my main book stuff – and as the books come out, I’ll create a page for the big ones – and a short story overall page for the shorter ebooks. You can sign up at D Kai Wilson-Viola’s Facebook Page. As a quick side note, I won’t add people to my main Facebook page if you’re only interested in my books, or I don’t know who you are. This is not to say I won’t welcome you on my fan page, but I have lines that I tend to defend. If you know me from somewhere and think that I should add you, it goes faster either way if you tell me where we know one another from – but I’m always happy to gain new ‘fans’.
Twitter
I have two main twitter feeds – Kaiberie (my personal one) and BooksbyKai – where I’ll talk writing/publishing/share notices and reviews. I add people back as long as they aren’t constantly offering information on making money 😀
Blogs and websites
I’m currently in the process of redesigning my website, so for now, I can’t point you at anything – but what I can do now is point you at my writer’s blog – at writers-bookshelf.
Anything else?
I’d love to hear if there’s anything that you would like to hear or see?
Kai is a writer, author and avid reader. A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.
by Kai | Feb 4, 2011 | Other sites, Personality, Writing
The last few days saw the ‘end’ of the V7N blogging challenge for many of us – a 30 day (starter at least) blogging challenge ran by the amazing Cricket Walker.
But really, it’s just the beginning, because most people that had signed up for the initial challenge have gained freinds, got more in our reading lists that we know what to do with, with lots of inspiration and more.
One of the best things I’ve really loved about it is finding new people to read without being ‘advertised’ to – I also loved all of the comments I’ve picked up.
I was supposed to keep going this week, but I’ve been horribly ill and incredibly busy – writing somewhere in the region of 22k for one client in the next week alone has meant I’ve felt pretty much burned out with writing, so I’m sorry that I’ve been MIA for the last few days – one of the biggies I’m putting in place is, as soon as I get over this bug/pancreatic problem (we’re hoping for the former rather than the latter!) I’m going to be back on the game, blogging more and taking part in *two* new challenges.
The first is an additional stint with the ’30 day challenge’ where I’ve committed to blogging on one of my blogs, daily, and getting my blogging network blog all set up so people can grab me as a guest blogger and see what I’m already writing and offering out for syndication.
The second is ‘learn 21 things in 21 days‘ – for which I’m going to keep generally blogging here about the things I’m learning, motivations and more, and for the second half of that challenge, I’m going to blog at Writers-bookshelf about self publishing and what I’m learning about that – including all of the stuff I’ve got on my roster for learning about publishing on the Kindle and using Amazon’s new services to set up my blogging stuff – all in all it’s going to be a blast!
Kai is a writer, author and avid reader. A mental health advocate, Ludosport athlete and coder. She’s the mother of two young adults, owned by two cats, and lives with her beloved in the Cotswolds.
Looking forward to those recipes.