Read Time: 3 minutes
You’re not fooling anyone.
I know what you really look like underneath that human costume. Yep, I know what you are, and it’s not normal.
In fact, you’re not even from this plane. You’re a stranger visiting a strange land.
But you don’t remember, do you?
Perhaps your memory was wiped before you entered your host body.
I’m pretty sure that’s what happened to me because I definitely lack the skills required to operate this temporary bag of bones.
Thus, my ignorance lands me in unpleasant conversations with the indigenous population.
These exchanges press me to keep quiet or speak in my foreign tongue. I typically choose the latter, ramble nonsense, and wonder why I didn’t just phone home.
Instead, I stick around, stand there, and suck in my stomach.
My discomfort leads the locals to think I’m too rigid and serious. One of them even suggested I should take drugs to calm my nerves.
You see, once at a conference, just as I was exiting an elevator, someone declared,
“If there’s anyone who needs to smoke pot every day, it’s him.”
Whatever.
At least I know what the natives are saying about me.
Know What You Project Into the World
Sometimes, I come across as an extraterrestrial.
But I’m okay with people witnessing my alien oddities. What bothers me are their otherworldly superpowers – how do they make “normal” human behavior look so easy? Were they given an instruction manual I never received?
As it turned out, the elevator guy wasn’t the only person who had issues with my conference oddities.
Another guy went out of his way to tell me how he felt before we parted ways. This other guy and I were grabbing our bags to leave when he said,
“You scare me.”
He muttered something else about how I’m constantly disappearing and reappearing in rooms and went on saying,
“I need to keep an eye on you.”
Why does he care if I’m playing hide and seek with his species?
I left that guy with these words,
“Get home safe. I’ll be watching later.”
Separating Yourself from the Pack
I have no idea how to be “normal” through the eyes of the Earthlings.
That’s a real challenge because I detest feeling out of place. But my distaste for acting like someone else outweighs my desire to fit in, especially when it comes to my creativity.
So as long as I’m here among mankind, I’m committed to performing in the digital realm as myself, the alien that I am. I recommend you make the same commitment because, like we touched on earlier…
You’re an alien, too.
You’re frickin’ E.T. with a glowing storytelling voice like no other.
Are you having a hard time expressing it? Or perhaps struggling to accept your alien origins?
INCOMING MESSAGE FROM THE HOMELAND:
Your alien roots will help you stand out in the crowd of storytellers trying to get noticed.
Of course, getting noticed and being your alien self comes with a healthy dose of truth. So let’s take a quick look at that truth’s good, bad, and ugly:
The GOOD:
Your alien oddities are your greatest strength.
It’s a liberating thing to finally express your true self through your stories. You’ll find yourself sharing thoughts and ideas in ways you’ve always wanted to express them.
You’ll also better connect with audiences because humans love stories crafted in ways they’ve never before experienced.
The BAD:
Your alien oddities are your greatest weakness.
Your uniqueness is exactly what prevents you from being yourself in your storytelling. Your weird ways want to be released, but at the same time, they lead you to erase words, scenes, or concepts immediately after they materialize.
That’s because those elements feel out of this world and different from what the humans expect from each other.
The UGLY:
Your alien oddities will be criticized by the masses.
People will point at you as the visitor you are. They’ll want to know why you think you can get away with being different than them. So they’ll go out of their way to remind you how you’re not fitting into their realm’s storytelling customs.
Then they’ll look for other people to join their lynchpin missions.
Embrace Your Alien Heritage
Too many storytellers waste years on this rock without showcasing their most unique qualities.
We’re only guaranteed this one run with the homo sapiens, so I challenge you to spend it being the odd creator you’re meant to be.
That means you must embrace your birthright. It can empower your storytelling and help you connect with your true fans.
Just be aware your oddities can also become the very thing that freezes your creativity, too.
In the end, you must process that being your alien self in your stories will cause some folks to dislike or even hate your work. But come on, those people were never your real audience anyway.
More importantly, they do not possess the authority to banish you to a galaxy far, far away…
That’s it for this Saturday.
If you’re finding value in the Saturday Storyteller newsletter, consider sharing it with a fellow creative writer.
See ya next week!
— Dave