I Observe, With My Eyes

Beyoncé and Jay Z have done a lot of questionable shit in their lives. 

Like...a lot.
Just last month, Beyoncé stole the visuals of her video for Spirit off some South African artiste. She didn't even leave room for doubt - it was just, copy, paste.
And how many stories have we heard about Jay Z and fucking people over? If it isn't Dame Dash, it's Kanye. Yes, Kanye is a mess but even before he was a mess, he told us that Jay Z liked to steal his creativity. I guess he's a true capitalist.
Now he's trying to sell this NFL deal as "the next phase" of the struggle when what it is really is, "Okay well, now the struggle is interfering with my money so the struggle can fuck off."
The very worst part is that some people will twist themselves into pretzels trying to defend it as a "positive" thing. I've the phrase "A seat at the table" being mentioned by Killer Mike, and Charlemagne who should know better is trying to sell it as a new lane.
It's not a new lane.
Jay Z is basically the butler in Django Unchained right now.

It's so disappointing but at this point, nothing is surprising anymore. Anyway, nobody contracted Jay Z to fight against oppression, so I guess he's free to do as he pleases. I guess the people who follow him are also free to do the same although their reasons are murky too and stem from the erroneous belief that billionaires must know something the rest of us don't and so if we just follow them unquestioningly, they will lead us to some promised land. Nobody seems to be awake to their own exploitation by these people they follow blindly, to the end of making themselves richer. Jay Z gets his influence from the idea that he brings the black population with him. Like sheep, who are following the wolf to slaughter.
I want you to think about something. When there is a recession such as the one Trump is about to cause, who gets laid off? Do the billionaires tighten their belts?
No, they do not.
Unless you count letting people go from their organizations as tightening their belts.
The only thing that matters is the bottom line and "keeping the shareholders happy." and so people are let go so that profits remain the same. The poors and whites are so against socialism because they've been primed to react like Pavlov's dogs to the word. Yet all capitalism does is keep them poor.
The rich want you to remain poor. That's how they control you.
But what do I know anyway? I'm just here living from hand-to-mouth right?

Meanwhile, Miley and Liam broke up. If you've been following this blog for a while, you'll know I predicted this even before the wedding. Look, I don't know what ya'll are seeing when you look at them to think that they are 'well-matched' because chile...I cannot find one picture of Liam with Miley where he looks happy. Or even looks at her. She looks at him...all the time. But he's always looking away. Basic Body Language school will tell you that that is a sign of being out of sync. They never but never mirror each other. It was a disaster waiting to happen...
Why didn't any of Liam's family attend the wedding? Not even his mother was there, none of his brothers...you cannot say they could not afford the fare from Australia. I waited and waited for someone to point that out but no...Miley and Liam were supposed to be some perfect couple.
Bitch, please.
First of all, Liam is gay. My gaydar pings HARD when I look at him. But give him time to realize. then he'll go look for the guy he was with in hunger games wotisname and they'll live happily ever after.
Trust.

this is what in sync looks like

I've recently been experiencing a crisis of confidence when it comes to my writing. I'm editing Marcus Devereux (Book 5, Child of Destiny series) and I'm just feeling like...no. I don't like it. 

This has never happened to me before. I hear it's a common thing with writers but yeah, never happened to me before now. 

And it makes me want to go back and rewrite all my books. I gotta shake this shit off. So I'm posting an excerpt here and if the spirit moves you, you can give me a critique which will let me know if I'm crazy or I really should scrap the whole thing.

Okay then, here goes nothing.

Anxiety Mistakes You Don't Want to Make

Good morning.
I have an assignment deadline to complete soon so naturally, I'm writing a blog post.
Hey, one cannot just have breakfast without distraction.
And I have been remiss in my posting. I apologize. Blame it on the reason I'm writing this post.
Let me recap.

Once a year or so, I get this run of bad luck where everything, and I mean everything seems to go wrong. I seem to be slap in the middle of that time right now and I can tell you, it's not a fun place to be. Right now, the light bulb in my office and my living room aren't working. These are the two rooms I use most in my house. My electrician niece has decided she hates me so she keeps blowing me off. I can't just get some stranger off the street to come and fix it. And of course, church mice are doing better than me right now financially. Oh and my fridge suddenly stopped keeping things cold, the repair people took a week to even answer my calls, another week to find the problem and then, a few more days before they fixed it. If I had money for groceries this might have been a huge hassle but since I'm hand to mouthing it, I make sure to only buy enough food for the day. It's been crazy.
I stopped using tap water to cook though and I haven't been sick since so there's that.
It's small every day irritabilities made bigger by the fact that they keep coming.
Oh and I also got told, right in front of my salad, that the reason I don't get lucrative contracts on upwork is because of my location and race.
I mean, I knew racism was real but it really hit me hard that one. I had thought I finally had a place where I could be judged solely on my work but no...here we are. It made me tremendously sad to know that much as I was hurt and it was shocking, there are people who live with that sort of second classery in every area of their lives.

The reply came in response to a question I posted on the community forum about why, if my feedback was all four and five stars, could I not get the really high paying clients to respond to me. I was hoping for stuff like:
"Well, there is a certain way they expect you to write your proposal."
Or,
"Do you upload a recent resume with every proposal?"
You know, stuff I could do something about...
The point is, all these things might be my present reality but I know that I can change that reality with the power of positive thinking.

Wait! Wait!

Don't go away, I'm not about to go all motivational speaker on your ass. Except for how...I am.
My problem is anxiety. When things start spinning out of my control, I get anxious. Then I think about how out of control everything is and get more anxious. I wake up already thinking about
"What do I have to do today?"
"Oh my God, I haven't paid my rent yet, gotta get this work done."
"What date is it? Shit, the month is half over and I haven't...."
And on, and on and on...
That's before I even brush my teeth.
It's even worse when my son is home and has problems of his own I need to solve.
Yes! I know he should solve his own problems, I'm a work in progress.
Anyway so instead of starting the day with positive affirmations, a feeling of gratitude and belief that I already have everything I want and all I have to do is wait for it to manifest...
There I am, running around like a chicken with its head cut off, not really getting anything done.

Even so, without that calming centering I need so much yet apparently can't find the time to do, the universe or karma or God has my back. I watched Infinity War last night. Yeah, like, for the first time. And after I watched it I thought to myself, "I gotta write a postapocalyptic post-Thanos fic featuring Sam and Dean where they are terrified one of them is gonna disappear."
By the way that ending was so much bullshit...
Anyway, so I'm thinking that, and getting back to work and one of my former clients (who thinks my work is INCREDIBLE by the way) messages me that she wants me to write another short story for her - the one I'm supposed to be doing now. And I say okay and she sends me her requirements and I say I'm thinking postapocalyptic story and she's like "Yeah! me too, that's what I was thinking too!"
So the universe enabled me to write the fic I wanted to write anyway, and get paid for it.
The power of positive thinking isn't about meditating things into being. It's more about focus and intent and belief.
Anxiety gets in the way of that.
And how do I manage my anxiety? By getting stuff done. If my anxiety sees movement on things that are making me anxious (such as getting contracts) it calms down. That's why I'm able to write this morning (afternoon) because I'm less anxious.
Okay so I really need to go write a story.
Are you excited for the world cup?
I'm rooting for everybody black.

The Trials and Tribulations of Being A Freelance Writer

So in February, I went two weeks with no work to do. It was a stressful time for me because I don't do well with idleness, however exhausted I was from working back to back jobs. It's one thing to decide to take a break, it's another to be forced to do it because you can't find work.
Am I right?

I tried to use my time positively, caught up on some writing. Made some progress with Cinderella by Any Other Name and my other, as yet really named gay African post-apocalyptic romance. I even wrote a bit of Child of Destiny: Marcus Devereux. It was fun, I enjoyed it. At the same time, I was experiencing terrible anxiety about not having paid work.

So I tweak my profile on my freelancing site, realize I'd set my availability to less than 30 hours a week so I immediately change that to 'looking for new work' and voila. My inbox gets full again. Which was a relief because I was beginning to think nobody liked me. Or that my work was bad which is a really unfortunate thing for a writer to think.
If you're not confident in the quality of your work, you can't sell yourself to potential clients/readers. You literally cannot function without belief in your work.So it was all internal lectures and 'You can do it girl' and trying to believe that that's true.

The opposite thing to wondering if no one likes you though, is not being able to say no to anyone who shows the slightest interest in you. It's like, "Oh thank God, you want me? Yay. Okay."
Even though you might be taking on too much or the work is not really something you want to do; or you just know this client is going to be a pain in the ass but money...or the deadline is ridiculous and nobody in their right mind... I might be doing that right now.
I vowed during my forced holiday that I would find a better work/leisure balance. But I can already see myself falling into the work 24/7 mode.

My friend just had a baby.
I'm so excited for her and want to go see her; but I found myself thinking, "Maybe I can push that to some time in the middle of April after I've finished this batch of work."
The gag is, there's always a new batch of work and you really can't take the time and...
So no. I'm gonna pick a day THIS WEEK, put the work down and go see my friend.
I'm also taking time daily to update my "What if" fanfic if you're reading that. I find it helps to pass the time until Shadowhunters season 2b starts in June.
And I'm giving my books some attention, trying to bring something new in front of potential readers daily. A tumblr or instagram post, an excerpt, something.
Would you like an excerpt?
Here's one;