Obsession vs. Addiction

Obsession vs. Addiction

Am I an obsessed writer or am I addicted to writing? I had to do some research on this one. Let’s see what I discovered.

Obsession – the domination of one's thoughts or feelings by a persistent idea, image, desire, etc. – Yes, I’m an obsessed writer.

Addiction - the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming, *as writing, to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma.  YES, I’m addicted to writing!

* I took out, as narcotics, and replaced it with as writing.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder – A disorder characterized by repetitively repeating actions over and over, compulsively.  Meh!

The phrase obsessive–compulsive has become part of the English lexicon, and is often used in an informal or caricatured manner to describe someone who is excessively meticulous, perfectionistic, absorbed, or otherwise fixated. Although these signs are present in OCD, a person who exhibits them does not necessarily have OCD, but may instead have obsessive compulsive personality disorder.

Aha! My discovery led me to believe I am OCPD! OCPD is a chronic non-adaptive pattern of extreme perfectionism, preoccupation with neatness and detail. And I’m addicted to writing, seeing that when I’m not writing, it seems to cause me severe mental trauma. Each day I wake, I go to my computer, not to surf through the web, not to play facebook games, it’s to WRITE.

It has been in my blood since a young age. I began with pen and paper, journals and notebooks and yes, I have many saved notebooks cluttering my basement storage bins. It’s funny, I went through my bins a couple of weeks ago, to see what I managed to bring with me when I left home ten years ago. Lo and behold, I left with not much more than the clothes on my back, a few cherished nic-nacs, and loads of books and writings!

Being the sentimental fool that I am, I cried over the things I didn’t manage to bring with me, but I also cried over the things I DID manage to bring. I think I’ve told you of the time I left home, my son and I, for a safer haven away from a mentally abusive relationship. I left all my once cherished material possessions behind, and moved forward in life, whatever that entailed.

My writing is the only thing, locked up safely in my heart and soul that no one could ever get me to leave behind. Instead I dove in and never looked back. While I have family back home, they all but left me out here to fend for myself, and I’m okay with that, I had to grow up some time.

Now what I do with my time and my life is write. That is the only piece I obsessively control and will never let go of. While material possessions can always be replaced, what you have inside you can never be replaced, only crafted and finely tuned.

So to you my fellow writer’s who can casually use writing as a hobby, my hats off to you. But to you who are addicted to writing; waking, living and breathing the written word, then you know what I mean when I say I’m addicted to writing! As to my OCPD, I love being meticulous and a perfectionist in my writing, so all is well in the written world of words for me.

Computer Woes

Even if happiness forgets you a little bit, never completely forget about it. ~Jacques Prévert
***

As one blessing comes in, one must go. It seems the computer is doing it’s crazy little game playing that I’ve come to expect upon start up every morning. I wake at 5:30 in the quiet peaceful stillness of the morning, the ultimate time to get some writing done, but by 7 a.m. I am still sitting here trying to get this thing to work.

After it finally decides, “I’m warmed up”, it works for everyone else and the muse has slid into the back of my mind, I’ve forgotten what I wanted to write, and so yet another wasted morning of writing has slipped through my fingers.

I remember about nine years ago, when the computer first came into my life. I hadn’t owned one or ever dreamed of having one. I had never used a microwave, my clothes were hung on a clothesline and life was simplified, and I never sought out more. The writing I did was with a pen and paper, and the only markets I sought were poetry contests in the local paper.

At that time, I had not seen the inside of a library for decades, my son was the center of my world and life went on. Although I craved for more, I had no idea that there was a world out here wanting me to embrace the colors and all the beauty. I assumed life was what you make it, and my life was made to be a domestic goddess, a household engineer if you will, or simplified, a housewife.

My husband at the time didn’t ‘let’ me work outside the home and with every job I did obtain (working for family who had business’) my husband became more and more paranoid, untrusting, and downright obsessive. I wanted to run to the hills but I had no license to drive, so where were my two feet going to take me? Not far I can tell you that.

To make a long story short (yes, I’m writing my memoirs) my life changed the day my brother-in-law gave me a computer, FREE! It was then that my writing took off. I searched google like it was an infinite library of sources, I wrote and wrote and spent way too many hours on this thing! So much so, the obsessive hubby tossed me and my son out!

I didn’t turn to my controlling family, I turned AWAY from Baltimore and headed to Texas! Guess what, there was a world out here waiting for me to embrace the beauty and all the magnificent colors of God’s palette. And embrace and move on I did.

Eight years later I sit enthralled in the writing world. I’m allowed to do my work, write, and no one is obsessive about my use of the computer. The ex has not seen his son for eight years, nor paid one red cent child support, which goes to show, I did the right thing in getting out and saving my son. But God also showed me, I was saving my soul.

Now if only I could get this thing to work! *BANG* *knock* *KICK* *pull* *TUG*
Just trying to ‘reboot’!

***

Freedom has its life in the hearts, the actions, the spirit of men and so it must be daily earned and refreshed - else like a flower cut from its life-giving roots, it will wither and die. 

~Dwight D. Eisenhower