Part 7: They Come From Inside.

Roll the credits.

Seriously, how many times do I need to say “monsters inside” in a story I wrote called “Monsters Inside?” I’m sure you get my point by now.

You can’t see me right now, but I’m sighing as I sit in my favorite gaming chair that I’ve never used to play games.

I’m getting ahead of myself. Excuse me. It’s rude of me to interrupt without introducing myself.

Hi. I am your narrator, here to disrupt your reading experience and put you two steps ahead of our characters. 

That is, if you can read between the lines. 

I’m joking. You don’t have to think at all to understand me here.

Think of me as your subconscious. I think I’m a genius, and I know everything. Except I know just as much as you do.

Don’t you know writers never know the ending until the end either?

While you’ve been reading this story, you’ve been thinking to yourself, “I know how this is going to end! We figure out the monsters are from inside and we learn how to defeat them with something that’s been hidden in the story all along. The hero’s will win and the monster’s will lose. Roll those credits again!”

I really don’t know if you’re right or not. I haven’t gotten that far yet. It seems likely though.

I don’t like being rude, so I’ll make this conversation brief.

What I came here to ask you is, do you have a monster inside?

Yeah, I thought so.

I bet you can guess what this story is about, at least what the running theme is. I won’t tell you outright if you don’t know, because then this whole thing becomes really boring for you and I, but I can share a bit of this story’s origin.

I am an average working citizen who wishes I could strike it rich and make all my problems, and the problems of this world, dissolve with money. Much like you.

I believe that if I were given money, fame, and power I would do better than the Jeff Bezos’ of the world. I’ll give myself some credit here and say that’s probably true, but what I can’t say is that money, fame, and power wouldn’t change me in some way. Especially if that way is not positive.

We’re all capable of change.

I don’t mean that in a motivational way. Not even a little.

Think of this as a threat from you to you. 

While you have the capability to change and become a better person, you also have an equal opportunity to change and become a much worse off person.

We live in a never ending paradox cycle. We’re either pushing forward towards growth or inching back to our own demise. Sometimes we do both at the same time, like advancing our career and neglecting our family. Writing our first novel while neglecting our physical health. 

Back to the point. We’re all capable of change. We can slowly grow and one day wake up amazing and fully-functional people, or we can digress until we wake up one day and hit rock bottom.

It’s almost as if we can wake up one day and believe we are possessed by monster’s, because we’re so used to how we are that we didn’t see our digression until it was too late.

“I would never do that!”, but you just did. And even though you don’t see it, everyone around you knew you were a king cobra preparing to strike at any sign of a threat.

It’s the grown man balding inside of us. It’s the weight we put on through college. A little bit of extra corona light in the evening turns into fifty new pounds on our body. We only notice when we try to put on our old favorite jeans, and they don’t fit. We go out for a run and are winded before we can leave the street.

We all have the capability to be corona light kids, blindsighted by how quickly we’ve changed. Unable to see how our daily habits will impact our growth. 

There is something important to remember here as well. Some of us are more vulnerable to these changes than others.

Some of our genetics draw us to our alcohol vices. Some of our life situations will drag us toward the less healthy coping skills. Some of us aren’t given enough chances to face our inner selves before they take over. Some of us know what will save us from ourselves yet we’re incapable of doing so because of time, money, or status.

Why does this matter?

Everyone has a monster inside. And regardless of our vulnerability, we remain the only ones who can fight those monsters.

That’s the best way I can put it.

While our characters search for the origin of these monsters, keep in mind that they’re looking for something that doesn’t actually exist. Even in their world, where their monsters take on a physical form, there is no real monster or mother monster to track down. Our characters face the same dilemma we do: Our monsters are always our choice, whether we know it or not.These days they call it mindfulness, but believe me, that’s just a fancy word for “learn how to tame your monster inside”.

Part 8 will be released soon.

Monsters Inside, by Leeann Diaz