/lit/ - Literature

If you have to ask then you clearly do not.

How does life experience help you write?

George Orwell's life is incredibly interesting. Yet the man cannot write romance.

I believe I have lived at least 4 life times: and I'm only about 1/4 finished.

It puts on the lotion before any forced act.

>>1774498
The same way experience helps you to do anything. Writing is about life - it is ideal to know what you are writing about. Just as a plumber will be a better plumber after they've been at it a few years, or a teacher more effective in their classroom after five years as opposed to their first year.

Your turn to share, OP. Failing that, please post in my other thread, the Ulysses one.

>>1774506

that plenty? i havent lived a single genre oh god

>>1774494
Correct, I do not.

>>1774508

Writing is about writing, not life.

>>1774550
How wrong you are, child.

No, but i've watched enough TV to know what it's like to have life experience.

>>1774550
Up yours, Tao Lin. No seriously, get out of here, Tao.

Define "Life experience".

>>1774638
The amount of notably different experiences you have experienced in your life. Or simply the variety.

There is an important difference between life experience and experiencing life.

Grew up middle-class, did a lot of drugs, had a lot of fun, did the Bukowski thing for awhile with lots of really shitty jobs, got really shitty poor, homeless for awhile, 2 years felony probation for half a pound of marijuana, decided Bukowski was a fucking nutcase who was trying to convince people like me "Don't be a fucking nutcase, go be a dumbass, dumbass" so I lived at a homeless shelter and then a halfway house, got clean and sober, then quit the AA/NA program. Live with my mom again, in school making good grades with letters of recommendation from philosophy and English teachers, 3.89 GPA and in Phi Theta Kappa, started taking engineering classes and then said fuck it, president of the Writers' Club at school (lol at the shit-talking this will probably start), trying to make something better of myself.
I think that qualifies as life experience, but not much of it is good for writing, more maybe for stereotyped bad TV drama.

>>1774662
So you quit school then went back?

>>1774678
I went at 18, flunked out in one semester because I was irresponsible and decided to do drugs instead of work.
At 24 I enrolled in a community college, 26 now, but it's only been a year and a half.

Also from 16-24 I went to psychiatric wards for "psychotic breaks" somewhere around a dozen times. I now recognize they were basically the drug-fueled temper tantrums of a spoiled child.

>>1774684
so you're not doing engineering anymore?

Im 26, and the things I've done in order of importance were:

Travelled to different countries and met lots of people.
Mets many different people throughout my time at school and college.
Loved 2 different women, almost married each one of them.
Socialized a lot; went to a lot of parties and clubs.
Worked in a corporate job for 2 years.
Did a phd.
Slept with about a dozen different women.
Read a great deal of books.
Learned to cook numerous delicious dishes.
Took a variety of drugs.
Slept quite a lot.

My complete and utter lack of life experience is my life experience.

>>1774702
No, I just don't have the passion for mathematics or design to follow through. I passed the pre-requisites for the engineering classes just fine, but didn't really enjoy them.
Maybe later on if I get a degree or two and decide I want something different I'll go back to it. I think nowadays it's ridiculous to expect to have one career, or one set of skills, and also expect to be satisfied. That system has been falling apart for decades.

i killed a man, wore his skin for a year, started a war using his identity, then went underground and financed the creation of nations.

>>1774717
samefag again, trust me, you dont want to do as much as me this young, it leaves you very content and lacking in any drive to settle down with a "career." Im thinking to either write a book or do another phd.

>>1774733
Are you Bin Laden?

So what do you guys think? Write a book or do another Phd?

I've had six cats, fell in love with a girl & a boy, kept another boy around because I was bored, seen a couple different countries, learned to drink coffee black, I have a couple different jobs, I've read a mound of books, learned to play the ukulele, to skateboard, to sew my own dresses, & draw my own dreams & tattoos & I'm moving to London in less than a year.

I dunno if it's life experience, but my life is pretty fun.

The worst thing I ever did for myself was get a normal sleeping pattern again.

>>1774761
>The worst thing I ever did for myself was get a normal sleeping pattern again.
Are we talking in opposites here?

>>1774764

No, I just mean I had way more time to do things that I liked when I didn't sleep as much. But I have a whole summer of not sleeping ahead of me!

>>1774728
how do know what want to do?

>>1774761
I wish I was a carefree girl like you. Being a man and having to be all "career derp" is so boring.

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tanhauser Gate.

>Lots of potential
>Do nothing
>Do nothing
>Fail school
>Carry on in my job at restaurant
>Do nothing
>Move cities with a friend for a year
>Get job as Head chef
>Style over it
>Get stabbed
>Dad has Heart Attack
>Ok I'll try education again
>Starting a degree in Drama and Philosophy in september
>mfw

>>1774769
Plenty of boys are beatniks, aren't they? Come & have fun!

I have had a pretty mundane and uneventful life apart from the day I went outside and saw this.

>pic related

Anyone here been in a fight over the age of 21? Thats pretty epic life-experience.

>>1774776
lol ok sure, and waste my good looks by making myself uneligible through having no career prospects 10 years down the line. Caution to the wind - Yay! Nah I'll leave that to the girls, suits you guys way better anyway.

>>1774799

Not a sober one :(

>You will never be able to have a fight in a bar and buy your enemy a drink after because he'll probably pull a weapon or will have friends that will

>>1774799

No, but a boy punched me when I said I thought he was cute in Kindergarten, so I shoved him in the dirt & he skinned his knees. He cried like a bitch. I ran away. Shit was cash.

>>1774776

Where do you get your money from?

>>1774805
Daddy :3

>>1774803
>I shoved him in the dirt & he skinned his knees
sounds really painful

>>1774807
I bet hes looking forward to the day he passes you over and you cease to be his responsibility.

>>1774805

I work two jobs.

>>1774811

How many hours a week are we talking?

If it's any less than 40 I will be disappoint.

>>1774802
lol not everyone's got a weapon bro. I got in a fight a couple months ago and we went for each other for a while then it was broke up. No one got weapons out or nowt.

>>1774818

Sounds like you don't live in Birmingham.

>>1774810
ZOMG I DIDNT REALIZE IT WAS A GIF!!

MFW

>>1774814
Thirty to forty hours as a waitress, & I get paid quarterly as the promotional director at a radio station, but with that job I do shit on my own time & have weekly meetings about how shit's going. Looking to pick up another job at a library, hopefully. Were you assuming I just sit on my ass & do nothing all day?

>>1774825

No, it's just that London's expensive.

I did the same sort of thing as you until last september. You're right, it's fun as hell, but the lack of purpose really got to me after 5 years of it.

>>1774834

I'm studying there as a transfer student, though, so I'm getting into Regent's for super-dee-duper cheap.

Meh, pretty much a neet/hikkomori at the moment.

>>1774842

Regents?

>>1774814
Overtimefag here. Having extra pay is nice, but the hours required to earn it can be utterly soul-crushing (depending on your job, I guess).

>>1774857

Yeah, doing 60 hours in as a chef will cripple any emotions that are good in you until you return to normal working hours

>>1774881

Working in addition to school is particularly soul-crushing. Wake up, class, work, drink, too tired for friends, bed, repeat.

>>1774881
How did you become a chef? Do you like the job overall? Do bitches dig chefs?

>>1774905

Started as a pot-wash in high school, got sacked because I had a party when I was meant to be working (I didn't lie about it) they re-hired me about 3 months later but started me round the front-line worked there for about 3-4 years, went through shitloads of different menus so I learned plenty, then I moved cities and put in for a job as a head chef just because I'd moved cities and needed a job and got it, was writing my own menus and shit for about a year. That's pretty much it, just working part-time now in the place that fired me again before I start university.

The job's enjoyable as long as everyone you're working with is competent, if not it can get a bit infuriating, also it's a dirty job with shitloads of cleaning. I wouldn't recommend it as a career choice unless if you were to work in a large kitchen with lots of assistants to do all your dirty jobs for you.

Don't think they dig us that much, but there's always fresh waitress tail. I don't know many lines of work that know how to party quite like chefs. (And turn up the next day for a 12 hour shift like it's nothing)

Wall of text, I am sorry.