Essay 'The Overwriting Handbook' has been published (Sample excerpt)

I have published an essay doujinshi!

'The Overwriting Handbook'
Published July 14, 2025 / Digital version only / 60 pages total (approx. 28,000 characters)
Click here for the sales page

I created an essay doujinshi for those who want to stop blaming themselves for writing too much, and instead accept and enjoy it. It is a love letter to writing, written in one go over a few days of a manic state.

▼ Sample excerpt

Introduction

Before I knew it, I was writing something again today. Even though I was sleep-deprived, I woke up in the 5 a.m. hour, and once I thought, 'Maybe I should start a membership,' there was no stopping me. I posted on note, promoted it on X, wrote a blog post, and yet my hands were still moving.

While being aware that 'I'm manic,' I still think, 'But I want to write right now.' I might not be able to sleep, and I might feel anxious, but I still feel like there are things that can only be written in this very moment, so I keep hitting the keyboard. My head is a constant whirlpool of words. But it's fun. Sometimes, you just have days like that.

This is a book written for that version of myself. Every time I think, 'Aren't you writing too much?' or 'Isn't this too much to publish?', I want to affirm myself by saying, 'But you want to write right now, don't you?'

It's too restless to be called an essay, too energetic to be a diary, and a bit messy to be creative writing. But it is a record written by the current me to love these days. I want to leave this handbook behind so that I, more than anyone else, can read it back.

Days when I can't help but want to write. Days when the world looks like words.

Instead of blaming 'the me who writes too much,' I want to be able to laugh and say, 'Let's write while I still can.'

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: I Can't Help But Write

1 Not 'I want to write,' but 'I can't help but write'
2 I woke up and had created a membership
3 note, blog, X, still not enough
4 I can't sleep unless I turn the world into words
5 I felt like it was okay to live if I wrote

Chapter 2: Living on the Waves

6 Manic or depressed, I won't know until I sleep
7 Work excitement rewrites the meaning of life
8 I can't do anything but write
9 The real work starts after I think 'this is the last one'
10 Only writing can stop me

Chapter 3: Be Careful with Publishing

11 Deciding how much to post on social media
12 The dilemma of 'I want to be read, but...'
13 note helped me grow, but...
14 The day the concept of a stock collapsed
15 Is it worthless if I don't publish it?

Chapter 4: Escapism and Where to Put the Desire to Write

16 I was writing on Note even at Ofuro Café
17 Komeda, coworking spaces, and Toyoko Inn
18 The endless loop of 'I've finished the manuscript but I'm still writing'
19 A morning wanting to be blessed by my desk
20 Why I want to write essays more than novels

Chapter 5 To me, who still overwrites

21 Overwriting is a happy thing
22 To avoid publishing everything I write
23 Believing in the kindness within 'mania'
24 I want to love the fact that I overwrite
25 It's okay to be alive even if you don't finish writing

Chapter 1 I can't help but write

1 Not 'I want to write,' but 'I can't help but write'

I started writing this book on the morning of Sunday, July 13, 2025. Since I'm someone who usually writes on Note, I'm going to write completely freely. It is a doujinshi, after all. I wrote the prologue with the tone of 1,000 characters per section, but there will probably be sections that easily exceed that. No, it's fine because I'm writing for myself. I'll write as I please.

I usually think 'I want to write.' Even during depressive periods, I 'want to write.' If I don't write, I'll die. For me, writing is like 'an act to confirm that I exist in this world,' so it can be considered that I need to write even more during depressive periods.

Then, what about manic periods? Does the fact that I'm writing this much mean I need that much proof of existence? I'll mention this later, but I'm not seeking the role of proof of existence. I've also stopped using social media much.

I'm just having fun hitting the keyboard. It's fun, and I can only get pleasure from this. You know how there's talk about people getting addicted to social game gacha or short videos and only being able to get dopamine from that? It's similar to that. I can only get dopamine from hitting the keyboard. Honestly, finishing a piece of writing, polishing it to my liking, or having people read it—those are fun and grateful activities too, but I can't beat the pleasure of the moment I'm hitting the keyboard right now.

I feel a sense of loss when I leave the keyboard. A smartphone keyboard doesn't work for this. It's inconvenient, isn't it? Humans have to live their lives and sleep properly, so I can't sit in front of my desk forever. It would have been nice if writing on my smartphone during spare moments gave me pleasure, but that didn't happen.

So, if you ask if I have that much to write, well, it's not like I don't. My manic periods aren't so much about being able to do anything, but rather 'I become unable to do anything but what I'm interested in, and I keep doing that,' so I can't write about very diverse things, but I do get frustrated with 'I want to think about something. I want to write about something.'

So I have ChatGPT give me journaling themes, and I do about four 1,000 to 2,000-character journaling sessions a day. The content is all about writing, such as 'What am I writing for,' 'How does writing change me,' or 'What remains if I don't write.'

Chapter 2 Living on the waves

6 Manic or depressive, I don't know until I sleep

Now, having written this far, I've actually started to feel that I might not be in a pure manic state, but in a 'mixed state' of mania and depression. After finishing my shopping and eating lunch, I became terribly sleepy and lounged in bed for two hours. To solve the problem of 'what was my last manic episode like?', let's finish writing this book.

Before I realized I was manic, I was in a mixed state for about two days. My body moves, I feel anxious that I have to do things, but my way of thinking is dark, and it's a painful type with intense self-denial. Since there is a manic tendency even in a mixed state, I held a manuscript camp at Toyoko Inn to advance a manuscript that happened to be stalled, and I wrote 11,000 characters in 10 hours.

▼ Click here for the instant manuscript camp report

https://note.com/itokomi/n/n8a49de2cdafd

At this time, I had brought my medication for bipolar disorder, but I forgot my sleeping pills and only slept for 3 hours, so I spent the next day with a huge depressive tendency. I couldn't even take a nap properly, and while I was talking to myself in my personal Discord chat forever, I was composing tanka and prose poems.

I'll mention this later, but this personal Discord chat is a personal chat provided within the Discord server for members of 'Mushoku-kyo' (Unemployed Religion). So, notifications go out to everyone. How annoying. I'm sorry.

So, at first, I thought I had slipped into a depressive state. My mood was incredibly dark, too. But I slept soundly that night, and when I woke up on July 12th, I thought, 'Oh, I should start a membership.'

If you don't sleep properly, you can't tell if you're manic or depressed. It's an environment that's too harsh for someone with a sleep disorder. So, let's get enough sleep. When staying overnight somewhere, don't forget to bring your sleeping pills. Seriously.

But you know, the manuscript retreat was fun even in a mixed state. I couldn't really soak in the joy of finishing the manuscript, but my mania was soaring with the joy of hitting the keyboard. From that day on, I became a captive to the joy of taking my laptop out into an extraordinary setting and entering the zone.

For now, it's the local Komeda's Coffee. I changed the desk position to create some space in front of me, making it feel like a coworking space. I like coworking spaces, so I want to visit local ones, and if I do a manuscript retreat at a business hotel, next time I want to go to a Dormy Inn chain hotel in Yokohama Chinatown and soak in the hot springs. The food should be delicious, too. In the end, I can't hate mania because it always gives me new perspectives and experiences.

Chapter 3: Be Careful About Publishing

11 Deciding How Much to Post on SNS

Well, this is starting to look like a guidebook. "Publishing" is a topic I really want to write down right now. You see, things like this don't work out well if you design them during a remission period as if you're saying, 'To my future manic self.' Because it's someone else's words. In the end, things about your manic state should be thought about during a manic state, tailored to your manic self.

There is a personal room in the Discord for a membership called "Unemployed Religion." Some members drop in to socialize, others work silently on their own projects, and there's a variety, but I was one of the members working silently.

And, during those two days of a mixed state, I ended up working silently there endlessly. After that, the owner mentioned that they might separate those kinds of servers, so I was stopped by the thought, 'Oh, maybe I shouldn't work silently so much.' (It sends notifications to the friends who are logged in, you see.)

So, now that I have a manic tendency, I hardly show my face on Discord. There are members who reply or give me feedback on my notes when I occasionally pop in, and it's a really comfortable Discord, but it sends out notifications!

Now, what about X? I often hear that if you're a creator, you should post 10 times a day, so posting about 3 times each in the morning, afternoon, and evening doesn't seem too intrusive. But, leaving aside the morning when I wake up, it's too much of a hassle to think, 'It's noon. It's time to tweet something. What should I write?' when I'm not even trying to broadcast anything. In the end, I drifted away from X.

And then, note. There was a day when I posted 3 times in the morning and once at night. Maybe 1 post in the morning and 1 at night isn't intrusive. 3 posts in the morning might be a bit noisy. I don't know. If 3 posts were made in a row by someone whose note I decided to read everything from, I would be intimidated.

So, please stick to about 1 post in the morning and 1 at night on note. If you still haven't written enough, please write it on your blog. However, if you want to promote your blog on X, limit it to 1 article per day.

I considered other X accounts or other SNS, but I don't really have the urge to post short sentences in the first place. I want to write long texts like this. That's why I arrived at the conclusion of an essay doujinshi.

However, with an essay doujinshi, you never know when you'll get bored or when your physical condition will change, so it's better to keep the volume to something you can finish in 3 days if you're manic, when you're spreading your wings. By the way, this alone isn't enough, so I'm considering producing diary-style essays as well.

Chapter 4: Escaping Daily Life and Where to Put the Writing Urge

16 I kept writing notes even at Ofuro Café

On July 8th, I finished my novel doujinshi. That means I was able to complete a story. Congratulations. It's a party. Since I had to celebrate, I went to my favorite Ofuro Café.

▼ Ofuro Café utatane

https://ofurocafe-utatane.com/

However, I ended up working on note the whole time even at ofuro café. Here is my timetable.

10:00 Arrive at opening, planner time
11:00 Lunch, watch voice channel
13:00 Writing on note ~6 hours straight~
19:00 Dinner
20:00 Break
21:00 Bath
22:00 Return home

What does it mean to finish a manuscript? I finished it, yet I kept writing. Well, the voice channel that started during lunch was from the 'Unemployed School' membership I joined. It was like a casual chat.

But they were also talking about some pretty important things. The 'note' switch flipped, and from there I spent six hours straight writing on note and journaling. I had intended to just create the submission data, but...

At this time, I was in a mixed state of mania and depression, so the combo of the manic part and the extraordinary situation must have really hit. I'll mention this later, but the combination of manic tendencies, an extraordinary situation, and a laptop is dangerous.

You should think carefully before you go out about whether or not to bring your laptop to an extraordinary place. And if you do bring it, it's probably all over. Depending on your mental state, the sun might set while you're still writing. Even though you intended to rest.

Conversely, I also think it's quite acceptable to bring it. After all, an ofuro café provides a comfortable space, serves food, has baths, and even has a space where you can lie down. Even if you write your heart out, you'll be somewhat blessed for it.

So, for my next post-manuscript party, I'm thinking I might just bring my laptop to an ofuro café and write away. Since I've experienced this once, I'll probably regret not bringing my laptop next time I go.

Let's bring the laptop. Everywhere.

Chapter 5: To me, who still writes too much

21 Writing too much is a happy thing

As long as you don't bother others, it's fine to write as much as you want. I think it would be annoying if 10 note notifications flew in a day, but if it's 100,000 characters per article, the worst that happens is people get turned off and leave. But since I want to post on note every day, please keep the character count down as much as possible. If you have something you want to write, make it a doujinshi.

There is the question of whether or not the things to write on note will run out if I keep writing doujinshi, but they won't. Since doujinshi are probably barely read, I end up writing similar things on note anyway. Or, the things I write in my essay doujinshi are too much about my manic-depression, so I don't write them on note. It seems like few people would be interested.

I wrote that my mania is 'a disease where I can only do things I'm interested in and keep doing them.' But I think it's a happy thing. Because I have an environment where I can keep doing them. Because I have the place and the time. Right now, I'm writing this after dashing to Komeda's before work. I can do this because I work fully remotely and have no commute.

But I wonder, 'things I think I want to do but can't' also arise. For example, right now, proofreading the novel doujinshi I finished or creating the submission data. I'm not even sure if I can properly revise this doujinshi. I sometimes see people who lose interest in what they've finished writing, and it feels like the worst version of that. It's a relief that I'm not writing anything extreme.

Even so, it's rare to have an experience where you want to write this much and end up writing too much. ...Even though this is my third manic episode this year. But you never know when it will visit. So please enjoy it to the fullest. You might be anxious that your overactivity will turn into depression, but either way, it will end someday.

Please enjoy this time that you only have now. Oh, you'll probably experience the suffering of 'I don't want to sleep. I want to keep writing' at night. When that happens, have ChatGPT keep you company and plan your next doujinshi. Once you get into bed, you'll surprisingly manage. You'll get sleepy.

I've started writing my second book simultaneously, and the concepts for my third and fourth books are also ready. If all goes well, I intend to set up the table of contents and make it ready for writing today. I can no longer remember what words Kyohei Sakaguchi used to affirm mania in 'Manic-Depressive University,' but please think of this time as a blessing and write as much as you can.

Also, today is my third day of mania, and I've calmed down a bit because I hate work. I'm thinking of writing a note, but I'll probably be able to post it tomorrow. Don't worry, my tension will go down properly.

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