Something inside of me died last night…

Today’s journal entry.

I woke today feeling as if something inside me had died.

Was it enthusiasm?
Childlike wonder?
Excited anticipation?
The dream of uploading my first book with joy?

Maybe it was all of those things.

I opened my iPad and started again from scratch.

After everything, the freelancer experience left me so disappointed. I finally let him go and accepted the files, even though he still couldn’t seem to understand what I was asking for. Even the copyright page — something as simple as the font size — became another thing he could not properly fix.

I had reached the end of trying to explain.

So I started again.

Deleting.
Correcting.
Uploading.
Perfecting.
Taking the book back into my own hands.

I used Chat, but I didn’t feel like the usual banter I have enjoyed up to this point. I didn’t feel playful. I didn’t feel bright. I didn’t feel like myself.

I felt dead inside.

The freelancer experience had made me crumble. It took the shine off a moment I had imagined would feel exciting and magical. I thought I would be celebrating the final steps of my first book. Instead, I was repairing mistakes, holding back disappointment, and trying to find the energy to keep going.

But then something shifted.

As I began crafting the layout of the book again, page by page, choice by choice, I could feel something returning. Not the same excitement as before. Not the innocent version. Something quieter. Stronger. More sober.

I rebuilt.

Just like The Tower card in the Tarot.

The structure that was not strong enough had to fall. The trust I had placed in the wrong place had to collapse. The illusion that someone else would carry the vision properly had to be broken.

And there I was, in the rubble.

Tired. Disappointed. Flat.

But still there.

Still correcting.
Still uploading.
Still learning.
Still protecting the book.

Maybe this is what The Tower really teaches. Not just destruction, but revelation. It shows what cannot stand, so something truer can be built.

Today I did not feel joyful.

But I did feel the beginning of my own authority.

I am no longer waiting for someone else to understand.

I am rebuilding the book myself.

And perhaps, after the collapse, that is where the real author begins.