Tuesday, April 29, 2014

A to Z Challenge: Y is for You, Only You

This year, I'm participating in the insane awesome A to Z blogging challenge, which entails posting EVERY SINGLE DAY during the month of April, except for Sundays. Each day's theme corresponds to a different day of the alphabet: 26 days, 26 posts. I'll be blogging each day this month on some aspect of my current work in progress (WIP).

Y is for You, Only You

Updated with new addendum at the end...

I know I may have stretched a little for yesterday's post, but today's is better. Not much better, mind you, but better.

At its heart, this novel I'm working on - and blogging about incessantly - is about love. I can't call it romance, since it doesn't really fit that genre, but it certainly has romance in it. Above all, it's about the long, as in millennia long, journey two souls undergo together.

In every lifetime, these same souls find each other, over and over and over again. And in each lifetime, they find themselves inexplicably drawn to one another, no matter how many seemingly insurmountable obstacles stand in their way, their own fears very much included. They couldn't be more different, and yet they can't find happiness without each other.

So that's today's theme, in its essence: that gut-deep feeling that the person standing in front of you is vitally important; that you are somehow connected, in ways you may never fully understand; that this person, despite all of their faults and weaknesses, belongs in your life. This person is your person, for better or worse.

It's the feeling that each soul will have, over and over again, as they look at the other soul standing in front of them: "You, only you."

The feeling exists, strong and sure, in each lifetime, but the human capacity for ignoring these feelings is endless, until at last the pain caused by this avoidance is worse than the danger of true intimacy. And there is the story.

Now, this is where the original post ended, but blogger Stephanie Faris helped me realize that this post is a bit misleading: the message of the book isn't that these souls are each other's "one and only". As I noted in a response to her excellent comment, the overall message is about overcoming fears and obstacles to be true to who we are. In this story, that's about being brave enough to love. My concept is that we get second and third and tenth and more chances, from life to life, to grow and change, and that's part of why these two souls keep ending up in a romantic situation together. I imagine that these souls always turn up in each other's lives, but not always as lovers. I hope that makes sense...


25 comments:

  1. That is what love is all about--that feeling. I once worked with a woman who was deeply in love with her husband. She said she didn't want to believe he was "the one," though, because if something happened to him, she'd hate to believe there wasn't anyone else out there she could love. I found that pretty powerful--that even a person who was that in love didn't believe there was just one person for everyone.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You know, I actually agree with your coworker! I realized after reading your comment that this post is definitely misleading. The overall message of this WIP isn't that there's one person for each of us - it's more about overcoming fears and obstacles to be true to who we are. In this story, that's about being brave enough to love. My concept was that we get second and third and tenth and more chances, from life to life, to grow and change, and that's part of why these two souls keep ending up in a romantic situation together.

      I know that's NOT what this post is saying...but it's the second to last day of the challenge, and I'm a little fried! I think I'll add a paragraph to it to clarify. Thank you!!

      Delete
  2. Kinda sounds like Cloud Atlas a little, but I'm liking your take on the concept. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Sometimes they don't follow through on those feelings?

    ReplyDelete
  4. I get that. There are people who are destined to be in your life. I'm married to mine. =)

    True Heroes from A to Z

    ReplyDelete
  5. How cool and it makes me think of the Film "What Dreams May Come"-an excellent film about death, the afterlife, Dante and being reborn and a great romance all rolled up into one. My best friend and I always feel like we are soul mates. We love our husbands and all that jazz but my best friend and I are in sync. We come up with ideas and the other may have been thinking the same thing. It is uncanny how many times this has happened. Love transcends time, you just have to be open to it

    ReplyDelete
  6. "until at last the pain caused by this avoidance is worse than the danger of true intimacy" -- that is brilliant. It captures what drives every single love story, methinks.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Makes sense to me! I've done a lot of research on souls, so . . . Anyway, not so different from my story, though in that the gods are the constant and the bodies change. And I'm only dealing with one incarnation. Might be fun to explore others . . .

    ReplyDelete
  8. I don't know if you have any hidden prejudices against the romance genre, but as a writer of it, what you've written here sounds like a romance. I was in denial about the genre of my books for a little while, but then realized romance novels are bashed for many reasons. Not too many of them legit. They're written by women, for women. And overall in this world, things women are passionate about are seen as frivolous and not as good as what men deem important. So don't be afraid to label this a romance if it is, in fact, one.

    Whatever genre you decide it is, I'm enjoying what you've shared!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. GREAT comment, Ava. You're so right about the things women value being seen as frivolous; it's so frustrating, and yet so true. I don't have anything against romance, I've just never identified myself as a romance writer. I've never even written a love story before this! I guess it doesn't feel like romance for a lot of reasons, not the least of which being the highly nontraditional pairings in three of the lifetimes. But, once I'm done with it, I might make you read it and tell me if it's romance or not ;)

      Delete
  9. Now I had to read Stephanie's comment too! Interesting post all the way around and makes me once again more anxious for your book.
    Y is always a tough one I think.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I think you have a great idea here. That kind of love is timeless. Keep writing!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Hey, I like the sheep blog yesterday. Love does come in many forms.

    ReplyDelete
  12. That totally makes sense, and what's more, I also know exactly what you mean about feeling that connection to someone. It's a force of nature ;)

    ReplyDelete
  13. I love the idea of love transcending all boundaries. That's what actually spawned Thanmir War in my mind so long ago (though that was romantic love). The first song I associated to my main character was Shakira - Whenever, Wherever.

    ReplyDelete
  14. Did you find that episode about the El Dorado and the people who created that gold piece?

    ReplyDelete
  15. Soul mates! I like the idea of that kind of love.

    ReplyDelete
  16. If I had to pick a genre, I'd call it epic, because that's sure what a millennium of finding your other half over and over sounds like.

    ReplyDelete
  17. There are all different kinds of love, so it definitely makes sense to me that kindred souls won't always have a romantic relationship :)

    ReplyDelete
  18. 'This person is your person, for better or for worse.' Love this line! In life, for better or for worse comes along far more often than we'd like, and too often ppl give up on the ones they love too quickly. Because sometimes love is just plain hard. And sometimes it's just plain wonderful! =)

    ReplyDelete
  19. I do understand what you mean, and I can't wait until you're done with the book! :-)
    Deb@ http://debioneille.blogspot.com

    ReplyDelete
  20. I truly believe one's life has multiple soul mates that each speak to a different unique aspect of your own soul.

    ReplyDelete
  21. This sounds like a beautiful kind of love in your work.

    ReplyDelete