We’re rapidly approaching midnight, so I need to get this finished before I’m stuck writing two posts tomorrow.

Today was another excellent day. I was on two panels, both of which went fairly well. I noticed while sitting on the panel, listening to other panelists speaking, my imposter’s syndrome reared up. The voice in my head said “You shouldn’t be up here” so loud it seemed the people in the audience should have heard it.

Several times I walked through the halls of the hotel alone, and the brain weasels were there, trying to bring me down. “You’ve been too happy for too long, Brian. You should be sad again. It’s what you deserve.”

I’m not sure where it comes from. I pushed it down and focused on the happy things. All weekend, I have visited with friends and people I admire, and they have all been so supportive that I’m not sure what to do with the positive emotions.

My excellent friend Mike Baltar bought my book this weekend and read it entirely. He told me it was a page turner, and he was excited to get to the end. It’s everything I want and hope to hear, and I thanked him with as much grace as I could while a part of me wanted to reject the praise, the way someone’s body might try to reject a transplanted organ.

Nothing at this convention has been bad, for me. All of my internal drama is internal, and I don’t know why I do this to myself.

I’m winding down now, getting ready to go to sleep. There’s one more day, and one more panel for me to attend, and it’s one I’m looking forward to as it is The Greatest Writing Advice I’ve Ever Received. I think that one is going to be a lot of fun.

Tomorrow, Melissa and I will need to return to home and all of our normality. There’s been so many good and happy events this weekend, I should have plenty of fuel to fight the brain weasels for a long while.