My mother and I used to read a lot of Eva Ibbotson romances. And by “a lot,” I mean “all of them.” It was my mother who started giving me straight-up romances, instead of my usual fantasy or mystery novels with romantic subplots. She tried this several times—I don’t know if it’s because she liked…
Category: Keeping Ahead of the Shadows
The Irresistible Lure of Failure
Have you ever heard of the secretive, bizarre 60-hour over-100-mile race that has only been completed by 15 runners since it began 30 years ago? If you answered no, we’re in the same boat. I’d never heard of the Barkley Marathons until this week. When I’m tired, I often watch the Today I Found Out…
Variable Comforts
A Talk about “Writing Diverse Characters” I gave a talk at the Japan Writers Conference about writing diverse characters. Like I said in my post leading up to the conference, I chose to go in with practically no preparation. I ended up so tense that I foolishly rehearsed talking about certain things—and those things were,…
Mt. Kawanori Hike (Including Hyakuhiro Falls)
Ever since I found this list of 15 beautiful hikes within Tokyo, Mt. Kawanori was at the top of my hike wish list. (Okay, fine, Hajijo-jima actually was first. But Mt. Kawanori seemed easier to access, and sometimes I arrange my wish lists with practicality in mind.) A few months ago, my flatmate Edith expressed…
Of Vulnerability, Molehills and Mountains
As you may be aware if we are friends on Facebook, I am currently in a depressive episode. This makes this a first for me: publicly talking about my depression while I’m still in the depths of it, dark and cold and frightened and exhausted. Of Vulnerability As I talked about in my post about…
An Anatomy of a Social Anxiety Discussion
Today, I’m going to write about social anxiety for both the socially anxious, and those whose loved ones may have social anxiety. Prelude When I first started this Keeping Ahead of the Shadows blog series, I had several areas in mind to write about, each tackling a different major aspect of life that is both difficult…
Trapped in My Mind: Big Picture, Little Picture
I’ve always felt a little bit trapped in my own mind. It frustrates me endlessly that while I can flip a switch in my brain to understand any perspective, I can only view one perspective in depth at a time. Generally, since I must be at least a little biased, I let my bias be…
Why WANTING to Exercise is Necessary (For Me)
As you may know from interacting with me or from earlier posts, I am not an athletic person, and generally have had trouble keeping up an exercise routine. Sometimes, I can mitigate this by having an “easy fallback exercise,” but not always. I often grow bored, or I have “more urgent things to do,” or…
7 Ways to Maximize Misery, by CGP Grey
Some of you may already know that I’m extremely fond of CGP Grey and his informational YouTube videos. Well, last week, he posted a video that essentially summarizes what I’ve been trying to do with this blog series. I want to emphasize that I don’t view this as a don’t-do-this-ever list. For those of us…
There is Always a Solution
One of the traps of depression is the way it can at times obfuscate what should be obvious. This is why I sometimes need to remind myself that no matter how drained I’ve been for however long, no matter how difficult it is to get through life from day to day, there is always a…