Good, bad, and okay things

The Mahabharata, Twisters, Blood of the Virgin, Wolverine and Deadpool, House of the Dragon, the MANIAC,. the Persian History podcast

Hello friends. I wrote a story recently (I'll probably post it someday) about how I've always wanted to be a world-historical genius, but I feel like my work isn't really there. Like...it's good work, but it's not genius. It's not going to fundamentally reshape anyone's feelings about life or art.

I'm not saying it never will, or that I'll never get there, all I'm saying is I'm definitely not there yet. But, you know what? People read my work! Like...kind of a lot of people. It's been such a strange, healing journey to seriously commit to Substack these last few months. I always used to feel before that for my writing to have meaning, I needed to gain traction in the publishing world—I needed to sell lots of copies or get awards, essentially. But it turns out, I can be happy even without those things. All I ever wanted was for my writing to be appreciated for whatever (perhaps minimal) value it had to offer.

You know, at one point I was whining about not being a success, and someone wrote a comment, "Do you really think there's a level of success at which you'll be happy?" And the answer was...yes. I do believe that. I don't think there is a hedonic treadmill. I think good things are good and bad things are bad, and it's kind of silly to say that human beings don't recognize when they're in a bad situation that isn't bringing them satisfaction.