State of the Scylighter (2024 Edition)

It’s that time of year again!

When I take a moment to reflect on the past year’s shenanigans and set a (general) direction for the year ahead.

As usual, the concept for this year-end wrap-up style article series was shamelessly stolen from the epic fantasy writer Brandon Sanderson. (You can check out 2023 and 2022 as well)

As I am not the famous Brando Sando, though, I have a somewhat different take / structure to the “State of” wrap-ups.

So in this article, we have:

• Top lessons learned in 2024: Exactly what it sounds like
• Best of Writing: Some of my favorite articles posted here.
• Coming up in 2025:Tentative plans for the future

Top Lessons Learned in 2024

“I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don’t know the answer”― Douglas Adams

Here are a few random ideas that have been brought to mind or reinforced in the past year…

1. Trust takes time so DON’T push people. You may think you know what’s good for a person, you may actually know what’s good for a person, but you will never convince that person of it if you try to hit them too soon, too hard, or too often with the info.
   They have to be convinced that you care about them before they’ll listen to (much less accept) anything you say, and the ONLY way to convince them to trust you is to show them genuine care and kindness over a long period of time. And I mean long. We’re talking years, here, maybe decades.
   (Some exceptions can be made for parents, especially parents of younger children — who by nature love you, look up to you, and want to please you. But this is still true to some degree, even for them)
2. Make gratitude your default mode. And go out of your way to thank everyone who helps you, even a little bit, whenever you can. Most people aren’t thanked enough for what they do. It’s encouraging for them, it makes people more likely to be friendly toward you, and it makes you feel better about life.
   Since we tend to remember negative things more easily and frequently, getting into the habit of remembering and being thankful for the positive is a good counter-measure.
3. You don’t have to feel inspired to get meaningful things done. As one of my favorite writer teachers* Brandon Sanderson says, people tend to romanticize writing, thinking of it as if it’s only for tortured creatives with magical muses.
   Actually, you should see it more like a craft & a business.
   And this doesn’t just apply to writing. You can memorize books, develop new skills, become an entrepreneur, or do whatever meaningful thing you want to do if you figure out a solid plan, break it down into a workable process, and commit to getting it done by turning it into habits and routines.
   *Favorite based on the way Sanderson writes, teaches, and runs his business, not necessarily because I love all his books, although I certainly like a few of them!
4. God’s sovereignty has a really awesome side to it. As a silly young person, I used to buy into meritocracy and self-control in a harmful way (“self-control” not as in “control of selfish impulses,” but as in: “the self wants to be in control…even of things it can’t really control”).
   This year I’ve been slowly coming to the realization that God (not me) is in control of everything, from the big to the small, from salvation to sanctification. And while that used to scare me, nowadays I can see how that’s actually a huge weight off my shoulders rather than merely a terrifying plunge into the unknown.
   (Sometimes I admit it still feels like that, but I’m learning more about trust and surrender to a God whose character I wasn’t familiar with before)

Best of Writing

“Writing has laws of perspective, of light and shade just as painting does, or music. If you are born knowing them, fine. If not, learn them. Then rearrange the rules to suit yourself.” — Truman Capote

These were some of my favorite pieces from 2024, including deep-dives on three of the most helpful books I read last year:

What’s coming up in 2025?

“Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.”― Anthony G. Oettinger

And for this final section of the article, I’d like to reflect on things I’d like to keep as well as things I’d like to change in the new year.

Things I want to keep

(“Keep” as in: maintain, persist in, or turn up a notch)

I’ve basically boiled down all of my personal most meaningful life endeavors into five main categories. They are:

1. Bible reading
   This year with the support of some good friends, I’ve gotten more consistent about reading and memorizing the Bible daily. I’d like to keep this up, and make it a true habit.
2. Writing
   For fiction: My goal is to shoot for “10 trunk novels” without wading into the currently-unanswerable questions about whether or not novel writing is something “I’m supposed to do, long term.” I will write at least 10 novels where the primary goal is to raise my skill level as high as possible, and then see where that takes me.
   For nonfiction: Haven’t fully decided yet, see “Things I want to learn more about” section below.
3. Arts
   I would like to finish the art & music courses I started way back, and possibly / hopefully go on to the advanced training as well. I want to be able to have a solid foundation so that I can eventually create professional level work and gifts for friends and family.
4. Languages
   I’d like to combine this with item #1 and one day be able to read the Bible in all the languages I’m working on. In the meantime, I’m using CI to boost my understanding of my weakest languages, and planning to do more extensive reading with my stronger languages.

Things I want to learn & think more about this year

“So many books, so little time.” — Frank Zappa

In 2025, there are a few questions I’d like to mull over:

• What is worth reading?

The older I get the more I realize how limited my time is for reading, and the more I think about the purpose of reading itself.

As a child, reading just about anything is good if only for developing your verbal skills. But as I mature I realize there are some types of content out there that would make your life worse upon reading it rather than better.

And there’s also content that doesn’t particularly improve your mind or life, even if it’s not actively harmful — but perhaps you could argue that it is, since it’s using up your free time which could be spent on something else (opportunity cost).

• What is worth writing?

I’ve always been a writer, and loved writing both nonfiction and fiction, but I lean more toward evergreen content than flash-in-a-pan content, like content around news/politics or shortsighted opinions…the more so as the years pass.

At the same time I have a tendency of holding on to the bigger, more personally meaningful projects, wanting to continually tinker on them and never let them out into the world.

I need to find out what I was made to write about, or for, and be more strategic about focusing on and accomplishing that writing.

For now, I’ve been operating on my old plan of analyzing at least 100 novels and nonfiction books (is that 100 each or 50/50? Haven’t decided), to see what I can learn from them to hopefully become a more brilliant writer. Unless I am given a better reason or plan to change this course, I expect to continue it into 2025.

Oh, and also I have several REALLY OLD nonfiction articles in the backlog, and I want to just finish those, if only to finish them, and we’ll see if there’s more.

…Aaaand that does it for this year’s State of the Scylighter. Hope to see you again next year 😉

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