I couldn’t help myself – I’m just too excited about the upcoming release of ‘Inteneration’. I wanted to give all of my new readers a chance to catch up, so all of my Kindle ebooks are listed today for FREE! Just check out amazon.com/author/cmcox and download all of my works for free! The offer lasts for today only, so be sure to let your friends know.

ALSO be sure to check out my Instagram account @cmcoxwrites for details on my current giveaway of a paperback copy of ‘Dyad’, the first Rider and installation of ‘The Empyrean Series’.

Writing in the midst of chaos is a valuable skill. I wish I could say I have mastered it. Instead, I’ve learned that as much as I love structure, I need spontaneity and the unexpected. While writing is obviously important to me and my well-being, I can’t exactly maintain a strict schedule. Especially now that I’m a nomadic backpacker.

While I was in Montréal, we went to an art museum. We took a tour of a temporary exhibition by an artist named David Altmejd. The tour guide kept reiterating this idea that Altmejd supposedly believed – the concept that art and life were all cyclical. For David, a series is never finished. He may abandon it or return to it at any moment. He may see how a new series compliments a previous series, or how two completely different works created years apart may go together to create a unified artistic expression.

I love this concept. It feels very familiar to me, this idea of cyclical creation. Perhaps it rings particularly poignantly true for me because of how I experience writing. I read and have experiences; these beget ideas; ideas turn into folders of backstory and hand-drawn maps and outlines; information becomes a rough draft; rough drafts require editing; editing leads to more editing and finally to publication; publication calls for a celebration, usually in the form of new reading material and novel experiences.

So the cycle goes.

I have noticed I tend to work in an unsustainable frenzy or not at all. I take projects seriously, but I also take reading and fun and life seriously, in as much as I intend to fully appreciate them. So rather than trying to fight and guilt my way into a routine I can’t possibly keep anyway as a backpacker, I’m going to try something new. I’m going to embrace the cyclical movement of my creativity.

I foresee this creating an entirely new set of benefits and drawbacks, which I am excited to discover. Isn’t it fun to trade in your tired problems for new ones? ;)