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Plot development: Afraid to love again 56.3.4 - 23

rosada

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I am enrolled in a writing class where we do exercises (cartoons, writing their back stories etc) that help us to create characters who then sort of take off on their own and it does seem we are “recording” rather than “writing” their adventures. It’s a fascinating process. Anyway, I’ve gotten stalled as I’ve sort of written my “person” into a corner afraid to risk building new. I asked the IC to help me, “What should I have Mary Ann do to recover from caring too much in the past?”

56.3.4 - 23. Traveler - Splitting Apart.
Seems to say she should leave town, get rid of all her possessions, but then what? Seems like there could be a better solution! Besides I do see Mary as being an alter ego. Maybe I’m having trouble because I’ve always ended relationships by just moving on? But isn’t that one ought to do?

Any alternatives to just killing her off gratefully considered.
 
L

legume

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thanks for sharing your process, i really like the idea of recording rather than writing :)

your character reminds me of myself a little and where i might have been quite recently in my own life. she seems to have burned down the bridges and moved away, she's splitting apart from previous connections. she seems to have destroyed everything she had. yet maybe this is just her way of rebuilding herself and actually nothing is lost, the bridges stay open, the connections are there if only the energy starts flowing in mutual, reciprocal way? i tend to drift away from people i was close with at some point but if the relation was deep enough we always end up staying in touch and still caring for each other in some ways.

and to me "moving on" is something one can go through only internally, to the outside world one might either withdraw or disappear completely or, on the other hand, stay socially overactive while pretending to be coping extremely well. each case appears different but somewhere within, i feel they share the same struggle of learning to let go of the past, regain own self esteem, i guess, and face the present.
 

my_key

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Hi Rosada
Phillip K Dick used the I ching to develop plot and characters in one of his books, as I recall, so he is not a bad role model to be following in the footsteps of.

“What should I have Mary Ann do to recover from caring too much in the past?”

56.3.4 - 23. Traveler - Splitting Apart.

56 - connecting the scattered few
23-something is rotten

Her journey will be wrapped up in stages shedding the skin and flesh of the past. She will be doing this by walking through a series of events that take her close to the edge of what has happened before. Seeing things in a different way, seeing the error of the ways that she was forced to inherit, if you like, and by doing so being able to revise her perspective. The journey is one of strong emotions and inner searching, not only relating to her experiences but also those of the people around her as she grew up. This is not an easy path for her to follow and although she is able to come to a place within herself that finds some respite, many of the wounds are too deep. She feels insecure in this position and saddened by what has been revealed about her life, the people that were around her and still around her and what her life has been like compared to what it could have been like.

I see a darker theme, perhaps one where not all that is rotten has not been drawn in and healed. The inner struggle continues. A tragic figure, a hard life and hard realisations that are not fully embraced - the final step to forgiveness is forgiving ourselves; can she shed the blame and shame - and maybe that becomes too difficult to take.
You say "I’ve sort of written my “person” into a corner afraid to risk building new "........perhaps she doesn't escape from that corner. The story line does not need to be one of " just killing her off". Could even be a twist on stories like 'The Sixth Sense' or 'The Shawshank Redemption' .

Good Luck.
 
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Freedda

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Interesting, and I like the idea that one's 'characters' or creations 'take off' or can take on a life of their own. So, what would Mary Ann say about all this?

I have so many good ideas! And from up here, from my moutainside encampment, it all seems so clear! I know just what to do, and even what to feel ....Why then do I feel so stuck? After all, I left the 'shelter of my familiar' so I could camp out here among the sky and stars, to perhaps gain a wider view, to experience life, but ....

Instead, I've just dragged along my baggage and found yet another temporary camp under the sky and stars where I can once again unpack it, and ruminate on it again, and again, and ... and all this has gotten pretty, what? old? stale? overripe and decaying?

And so again I ask myself, what should I do?

Two choices come to mind: first, to set fire to my camp along with all my belongings, and to see where else I might wander - but this time with less baggage ...

Or ... I can be responsible, stay in this camp - which no longer feels like a wander's home - and slowly watch my heart break.


Or some such thing ...

Best, D.
 
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rosada

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These are fabulous. I would never have been able to come up with anything like this, Seriously, I was so convinced the IC was saying “give it up” that I had come back to the site just now to delete the whole thread!

Not sure what I’ll come up with but you’ve gotten the gears turning.

I’m sure Mary Ann thanks you too!
 

liquidity

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Could simply be an Eat, Pray, Love type situation -- she feels she's at a dead end (23) and decides to travel (56) in order to find herself. She doesn't necessarily even need to give up all her belongings or do anything quite that extreme.

Arguably 56.3 suggests her predicament: "The wanderer's inn burns down. He loses the steadfastness of his young servant. Danger." She's already lost her current situation.

And now 56.4 is going to be what happens next: she wanders ("The fourth line, dynamic, shows the traveler in a resting place, having also the means of livelihood and the axe, but still saying: "I am not at ease in my mind.") She has enough money, but not peace of mind. And so travel is the opportunity for her to expand horizons.

It's a bit like this quote from near the beginning of Moby Dick: Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can.
 

iams girl

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“What should I have Mary Ann do to recover from caring too much in the past?”

56.3.4 - 23. Traveler - Splitting Apart.

Mary Ann finds herself a wanderer in strange lands (56) with no-one other than herself to rely on (56.3) and unhappy with her lot (56.4), yet in spite of feeling exposed and vulnerable as if a lowly seed, she protects her emotions while reawakening to her mandate to grow into what she is truly meant to be (23).
 

Trojina

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I am enrolled in a writing class where we do exercises (cartoons, writing their back stories etc) that help us to create characters who then sort of take off on their own and it does seem we are “recording” rather than “writing” their adventures. It’s a fascinating process. Anyway, I’ve gotten stalled as I’ve sort of written my “person” into a corner afraid to risk building new. I asked the IC to help me, “What should I have Mary Ann do to recover from caring too much in the past?”

56.3.4 - 23. Traveler - Splitting Apart.
Seems to say she should leave town, get rid of all her possessions, but then what? Seems like there could be a better solution! Besides I do see Mary as being an alter ego. Maybe I’m having trouble because I’ve always ended relationships by just moving on? But isn’t that one ought to do?

Any alternatives to just killing her off gratefully considered.


Well there are valid states for women to live in other than being in a couple or being dead (despite what this section of the forum seems to suggest). No idea if that's what you mean, that she can't do anything at all except go into another relationship or die but if it is then that's why you got the answer you did. All that can be shed, that whole idea of lack of validity in a woman's existence if she isn't in a couple she can only die, where else can it go (23). Perhaps before trying to lose herself in yet another seemingly secure relationship (56.4) she could keep on travelling and seek the most important relationship of all, the one she has with herself, with her own soul, with God. If she's a young woman the emphasis will be different if she has the need to secure a base for her kids but if she is older she doesn't need to scurry back into a coupledom at all costs.
 

marybluesky

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56.3.4 - 23. Traveler - Splitting Apart.
I agree: she should travel, leave every thing behind, find a new place to stay even if she's not glad about it. This way she would split the past apart.
 

cavarose

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This post is so very helpful in my transformation of the moment. Thanks to all who offered their wisdom.
@rosada how’d the writing project turnout?
 

rosada

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Thanks for asking, cavarose. Getting the group input here really brought the character to life. Turns out Mary Ann came to realize she'd burned up all her energy (56.3) and simply didn't have the spark to keep moving on even though her heart was not glad (56.4) and so instead she started to make an honest effort to do what she could to be more helpful in the community where she was - which I later realized is what the Image of the second hexagram, hex. 23. Stripping Away recommends.
 
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