I’m so glad you answered this question. I’ve discussed this phenomenon with others several times, but never with a definitive conclusion. Knowing the personal traumas related to these stories only complicates the answer. And yet, you still offed the meta-narrator of Fight Club 2. Are you ever worried you’ve predicted your own death?
On the up-side, wouldn't that be a neat trick?! "Dude, it's just like he wrote in the book, you know, that book." To quote Eckhart Tolle, "The secret to life is to die before you die." That's in Camus, too, right?
I love so many moments in that book. The Christmas tree stealing story. The Orchid Lounge story. Especially the story about seeing an employment agency and refusing to leave the office.
Never heard you talk about this before Chuck... What do you do when you're depressed and having doubts about the story your writing? Is talking to other people the way you handle that, combined with workshop?
If a story isn't working, it's time to do something physical. Get out and work. Wash dishes. Walk the dog. Dickens walked twenty miles in a day as he worked out his fiction. The Lake Poets walked with hired stenographers who jotted down the lines of verse as they were dictated.
Same. I've written fiction that wound up manifesting in reality, sometimes (loosely) based on myself, sometimes based on others. I guess the self-help crowd would just say to write super positive things and allow them to manifest but to me that feels like playing a video game using a cheat code.
I write horror so I keep hoping I'm not the guy it happens to! My latest project is actually based around this phenomenon. I'd love to hear about your experiences with it!
I wrote a few pieces where a protagonist develops some weird, fucked up health condition, shortly before this happened to me irl (don't want to get too specific here).
Better example though: I'm working on a novella in which one of the main characters, a professional Pickup Artist/blogger takes an ayauasca trip which causes him to reevaluate his lifestyle. That chapter was published online as a short story back in 2017 or so. Anyway about a year later, a(n in)famous Pickup Artist I'd researched announced that he'd found God after a psychedelic trip and had subsequently changed his ways. I felt pretty tapped in when that happened.
Well, if we all live within the same single mind (which is an oversimplification of many religious, esoteric, etc. teachings - or even some schools of phychology), this mind may chew on some ideas a little bit more. It may be a bad analogy, but great inventions often emerge at the same time in different places, seeminly independently of each other.
This whole, manifestation thing, does nothing more than potentially prove out that we create our own reality. Strange.
I love your premise testing. I guess I’ve been doing a form of that. Except, I have people read my stuff, get off on their reactions, and then never do anything with it. #selfdestruction
I wonder if the rapidly accelerating rate at which our zeitgeist is getting weirder is making this kind of prophesizing that much more difficult. That was part of what blew me away with Adjustment Day, how on the nose it was given the trends it nailed down had only become apparent maybe one or two years prior to its publication. The author Gary Shteyngart said of writing his dystopian novel Super Sad True Love Story that by the time he'd finished his first draft, he had to rewrite it because the culture had changed that much during the time of writing it (I think he began it in 2006 and published in 2010).
Chuck. I'm not sure if you've heard, but there were two suicides the weekend of September 9th on the UNC Chapel Hill campus. A "Public Ivy" school that has prestigious student body. Another tragedy mirrored by your current serialized novel. Uncanny to say the least.
I’m so glad you answered this question. I’ve discussed this phenomenon with others several times, but never with a definitive conclusion. Knowing the personal traumas related to these stories only complicates the answer. And yet, you still offed the meta-narrator of Fight Club 2. Are you ever worried you’ve predicted your own death?
On the up-side, wouldn't that be a neat trick?! "Dude, it's just like he wrote in the book, you know, that book." To quote Eckhart Tolle, "The secret to life is to die before you die." That's in Camus, too, right?
To quote Bukowski:
Camus
always
pissed
me
off
NBA Legend Pistol Pete Maravich did exactly this.
“And if a story sticks around long enough the chances are that some real-life event will occur that seems to echo it.“
You are the 🐐
Love it, Chuck. I find myself reading Nami Mun's Miles From Nowhere over and over. What's your favorite thing about the book?
I love so many moments in that book. The Christmas tree stealing story. The Orchid Lounge story. Especially the story about seeing an employment agency and refusing to leave the office.
Yes! So much fun! What a beautifully broken story. And the ending is amazing too!
Never heard you talk about this before Chuck... What do you do when you're depressed and having doubts about the story your writing? Is talking to other people the way you handle that, combined with workshop?
If a story isn't working, it's time to do something physical. Get out and work. Wash dishes. Walk the dog. Dickens walked twenty miles in a day as he worked out his fiction. The Lake Poets walked with hired stenographers who jotted down the lines of verse as they were dictated.
Thanks so much. So glad I asked!
Man. I had an experience like this once and it scared the hell out of me...
Same. I've written fiction that wound up manifesting in reality, sometimes (loosely) based on myself, sometimes based on others. I guess the self-help crowd would just say to write super positive things and allow them to manifest but to me that feels like playing a video game using a cheat code.
I write horror so I keep hoping I'm not the guy it happens to! My latest project is actually based around this phenomenon. I'd love to hear about your experiences with it!
I wrote a few pieces where a protagonist develops some weird, fucked up health condition, shortly before this happened to me irl (don't want to get too specific here).
Better example though: I'm working on a novella in which one of the main characters, a professional Pickup Artist/blogger takes an ayauasca trip which causes him to reevaluate his lifestyle. That chapter was published online as a short story back in 2017 or so. Anyway about a year later, a(n in)famous Pickup Artist I'd researched announced that he'd found God after a psychedelic trip and had subsequently changed his ways. I felt pretty tapped in when that happened.
I'd like to read that short story. Link?
The third chapter of a nine chapter novella that's been on the shelf since forever (finally almost complete).
http://bullmensfiction.com/fiction/hate-the-game/
Who else love Mr. P even more for the footnotes to this post?
group-based resonance... Some folks try this style and it sounds like a 4th grade recorder concert. Mr. P. does it and it takes us to the future.
The Lie Factory had a Slack channel. Not revealing Chuck's nickname.
Well, if we all live within the same single mind (which is an oversimplification of many religious, esoteric, etc. teachings - or even some schools of phychology), this mind may chew on some ideas a little bit more. It may be a bad analogy, but great inventions often emerge at the same time in different places, seeminly independently of each other.
Creation of reality by the words we write.
What a treat to be here x
This whole, manifestation thing, does nothing more than potentially prove out that we create our own reality. Strange.
I love your premise testing. I guess I’ve been doing a form of that. Except, I have people read my stuff, get off on their reactions, and then never do anything with it. #selfdestruction
I wonder if the rapidly accelerating rate at which our zeitgeist is getting weirder is making this kind of prophesizing that much more difficult. That was part of what blew me away with Adjustment Day, how on the nose it was given the trends it nailed down had only become apparent maybe one or two years prior to its publication. The author Gary Shteyngart said of writing his dystopian novel Super Sad True Love Story that by the time he'd finished his first draft, he had to rewrite it because the culture had changed that much during the time of writing it (I think he began it in 2006 and published in 2010).
Life imitates art imitates life, it seems.
Chuck. I'm not sure if you've heard, but there were two suicides the weekend of September 9th on the UNC Chapel Hill campus. A "Public Ivy" school that has prestigious student body. Another tragedy mirrored by your current serialized novel. Uncanny to say the least.