Reflection 6: I Could Lie!

Practice was getting things moving. I got back to the story. The muse had gotten me upset. It was time to do something about it.

“I don’t have to be upset,” I said to myself. “I don’t have to be depressed. Most of what she said was not real. I can decide to be calm. I can imagine myself calm. I can practice being calm. And most important, I can decide to and imagine myself solving this problem.”

“Can you review the problem?” Asked the metanovel. “Some readers may have forgotten.”

“A problem?” Asked my inner critic. “That would imply some purpose or intention somewhere in this book.”

“I remember what the problem was,” I interrupted and lied. I quickly scrolled back through my draft and reread my interactions with the muse.

“Really. I remember what the problem was,” I said truthfully. “It’s the one where the muse tells me that I have to throw away what I’ve written. It’s in the chapter called “”It’s All Crap!.”

“That was back on page 87,” says my inner critic. “Who can remember that far back?”

“No one needs to,” said the metanovel. “This discussion provides the necessary context. Nice literary device!”

“Than you,” I said. “Now I’m getting back to work.”

* * * * *

“Alright,” I said to myself. “I don’t have to be upset. I don’t have to be depressed. I can imagine myself calm. And most important, I can decide to and imagine myself solving this problem.”

“You already said that” Echoed my inner critic.

“Shut up,” said the metanovel to my inner critic. “He’s on a roll.”

“Go ahead,” said the metanovel to me. “Tell us how you imagine solving it.”

* * * * *

“I don’t have to be upset,” I said to myself for the third and last time. “I don’t have to be depressed. I can imagine myself calm. And most important, I can imagine myself solving that problem. I have to imagine I can solve it because if I can’t imagine solving it then there’s no chance I can solve it. But if I can imagine solving it, then there is a chance that I can. So I’m going to imagine solving it. I’m going to imagine success.”

To imagine success I believed I’d have to imagine that I was smarter than I currently imagined that I was. If I was smart enough, it would be easy to imagine how to solve it. Then I’d imagine doing whatever it was that I had imagined, and imagine practicing it until I could imagine practicing it really well, and then I would actually do it, and that would take care of it.

I started by imagining I was smarter. Then I reviewed the facts. I’d created the muse to help me, and I didn’t want to pass up her help; but to have her help I’d have to destroy the metanovel. This was a metanovel that I’d conceived, developed, and was bringing to maturity. It had become a friend. I didn’t want to destroy my friend.

“Thank you,” said the metanovel.

Either/Or. Could a more intelligent me find a way that could have both my muse and my metanovel?

Then I imagined the answer.

“I could lie!” I said. “I could lie! I could tell the muse that I’ve destroyed all the copies. Then she’ll help me. But I won’t destroy them all. I’ll still have what I created. And my friend.

But that would mean I’d have to lie to her face. I thought. I can’t imagine doing something that dishonest.

If I couldn’t imagine it, I couldn’t do it. And if I couldn’t do it my plan would fail. I had only one choice. I changed my mind. I imagined I could lie. I felt pretty good about imagining lying.

I practiced imagining lying. The more I practiced, the realer it got and the realer it got the more I felt that something was wrong.

I imagined meeting the muse. I imagined telling her I’d destroyed everything. “I’ve destroyed everything,” I imagined saying. “You’re lying,” I imagined her replying. “It’s written all over your face.”

I saw it. I did not believe I was a good liar and I believed that the muse was very perceptive. I believed that the power to see through lies that I imagined she had was much greater than the power to lie convincingly that I imagined I had. In my imagined universe, I had already imagined circumstances that made it certain that I would fail. I had imagined failure and that was what I was going to produce.

“But I don’t have to fail,” I said. “I can become a skilled liar. It would just take practice. The more I practice lying, the better liar I’ll be. I imagine that I can become a good enough liar to fool her.”

I believe that will work, I thought. “I believe that will work,” I said.

I’d need to take time for lying practice, but that was no problem. I could take an interchapter break and practice for as long as I needed to—for years, if necessary.