Writer's Note: I Really Am Thick

I am so thick it is laughable.  Honestly, if it didn't cause me so much pain, I'd laugh too.  In fact, when I finally am able to learn something, I often do laugh at myself.  I am so consistently wrong that it amazes me that I still often think I am right.

Where is this coming from?  

You have "The Incredible Jessica James" to blame.  

I watched this movie tonight, which is about a playwright in NYC, and there is a scene in the movie that just blew my mind tonight.  The problem is that it is so simple that I felt like an idiot when I had my AHA moment.  

The premise for the scene is this:

Jessica meets her longtime playwright idol at a weekend retreat.  Before introducing herself by name, she gushes over the artist.  When the artist finally gets her calmed down, Jessica asks her a question, a sincere question, a question that many artists wonder about/ask.  

"When do you know you've made it?"

The playwright replies, "I'll let you know when I get the memo."

Jessica replies, "But you won a Tony..."

After a short give or take, the playwright gestures around to signify the weekend retreat they are on, and she says, "Isn't that what we're doing this weekend?"

For me, my heart finally broke of many of these crazy illusions about success, the writing life, etc.  I just...stopped.  It was so simple.  It was so easy.  I couldn't believe how thick I had been.  

As I sit here and write this post, I'm a writer.  I've arrived.  I'm here doing the work, and that's it.  I enjoy being able to write in my own voice to an audience.  That's it.  That's the pleasure.  Everything else is...everything else.  

P.S.  I enjoyed "The Incredible Jessica James".  Jessica Williams is just about as charming as they come.  Thank you, Jim Strouse for your body of incredible work.  I have just now realized how much I enjoy his films.  Check out his IMDB profile here.

Personal Note: What Vacation Teaches Me

The View from my cabin at Odell Lake

I just got back from a short 4-day vacation at Shelter Cove Resort at Odell Lake in central Oregon.  It was 4 days without cell service, without alarm clocks, without commutes, work days, and all the accoutrement that goes with the modern life.  Here are 3 things I was able to take away from those 4 days.

1. No one but me will defend my time.

I need downtime.  Everyone does.  But I am terrible at protecting myself and insulating myself from the pressures of work.  I almost always say "yes" to requests from work, and it is starting to become a barrier to my own personal desires and the relationships with my family.  When I did some poking around and reading about work/life balance and overworking, I ran into this quote:

We often hear of people breaking down from overwork, but in nine out of ten they are really suffering from worry or anxiety. - John Lubbock

This is very much true for me.  I have a tendency to put off my personal desires in pursuit of work, or of tending to my family, which is not to place blame on them.  It is a character fault of my own.  I need to be a better defender of my own time and to be more disciplined in accomplishing my own goals.  

This is the first lesson.

2. Reading is still one of my favorite pasttimes.

I finished a book and a half in the 4 days I was on vacation.  It was marvelous.  Almost every morning I awoke before the others in the cabin.  I turned on the coffee pot and sat with my book.  I pounded through the last half of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck and I almost got all the way through One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories by B.J. Novak.  

It takes me back to grad school where my advisor, John Rember, once told me, to paraphrase, that "the writing life looks like sheer idleness from the outside."  When I spend 4 days in the woods reading and ruminating, I feel like I've gotten something done.  I feel like I can breathe and work and create.  

In the time I spent in the large windows of the cabin, bathed in morning light, I came up with a couple of new ideas for the TV series I am writing. I got myself unlocked from a plot thread that had me pinned for a moment, and I was able to actually dedicate a portion of my mental real estate to my own creative endeavors.  The words of others help me with this.  Reading helps me with this.  Being submerged in the waters of others' creative works gives me hope that my own creativity has a place in the world.  

3. Sleep is my friend.

I'm a terrible sleeper.  Well, once I'm sleeping I'm fine, but I am a terrible self-manager when it comes to putting myself to bed.  I can distract myself with this, that, or the other for hours on end in the wee hours when the rest of my family sleeps.  I used to think this was my most creative time, but I am slowly learning that this is probably not the case.  

Many times, I will find myself distracted by the television, by the internet, by a stiff cocktail, or any number of other things.  What I need to be doing is putting myself to bed so that I wake recharged with the energy to dedicate to my own creative endeavors.  

Self-care...not my strong suit.

I have an eye mask that I know works to put me to sleep, as well as some lavender pillow spray that helps me fall down into sleep, but I don't use them.  I somehow allow myself to engage in "mindless idleness" instead of "mindful idleness."  It's time to change the way I behave in order to encourage more of the latter.  In fact, that may just be my next blog post..."Mindless Idleness vs. Mindful Idleness."  More on that soon.

So, for me, next steps are to remember my lessons, to rededicate myself to the process of working hard for a creative life, which sometimes means indulging in pure idleness.  Thanks, John Rember, for the permission.

Personal Note: Picking up the phone

Image Source

The universe has been calling me.  It happens to me more than I like to admit, but lately it has been a full court press.  I don't know if others experience this phenomenon the same way I do, but my life has a way of reminding me what I'm supposed to be doing when I lose my way.  These calls often come in the form of chance encounters, unforeseeable opportunities, and unexpected people.

In the last couple of months, I've seen a resurgence of old friends I met during my MFA program.  They've been reaching out to me to get a coffee date, a phone call, or a writer's group going.  I've also had old friends from unknown quarters in my life offering me the opportunity to engage in creative projects.  The universe is trying to tell me something, and I'm trying to make myself available to listen and participate.

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In the last two months, I've been asked to participate in an oral storytelling project, a writer's group, and, now, a side project that includes writing for the screen.  I'm over the moon about it.  The trick now is to find the time to engage with all of those opportunities.  All of them are worth while.  All of them are being orchestrated by good people.  I have an immediate and powerful creative connection with each and every one of those endeavors, and all of them ask that I return to the keyboard, that I return to the state of empathy that writing requires.  All of them require that I open my heart to the world and begin listening again.

For a long time, I've been very career-minded.  I've been stressed about titles, money, and pride.  All of those things were about me, which is never where I succeed.  When I am narrowly focused on self, I am not at my best.  When I obsess about my position, my notoriety, how I appear to other people, I usually wind up in a box that I have to struggle to escape.  That's been the case in the last couple of years, and I've seen my creative expression dry up as a result.  It's time for a change.

It's time to listen to what the universe is telling me about my own purpose and to stop trying so hard to direct my life to where I "think" it should go.  All of this means taking a risk, putting myself out there, being uncomfortable in certain situations, but that is always where I find personal growth.

There is that famous expression, "Jesus take the wheel."  Well, I'm not overtly Christian, but I can identify with the sentiment.  It is time to allow the universe to take the wheel and guide me a little bit.  Sometimes the best form of direction is submission, submission to your life's calling, to what you are meant to be as opposed to what you want to be.  I'm going to try real hard to allow myself the freedom to do so.

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For any of you who are experiencing the same thing, I hope you find the courage to do the same, and I'd love to hear from you in the comments below.  Knowing that others are experiencing the same thing brings me strength, as I hope this post has done for you.

Man Notes: Opt Out

Image Courtesy of Massapequa Observer

The other night I spent two hours "opting out" of email notifications, social network notifications, and unsubscribing from email lists.  It took me two hours and I still have more work to do.

Part of what got me into this trap in the first place was either not thinking about these kinds of things when I signed up for a new social media platform, or it was when I signed up for every news outlet, literary magazine, or news aggregate newsletter.  I stopped checking my emails, and I was missing personal communications. I had "opted out" of a legitimate way of communicating with people near me.

The reason?

I had too much information pouring over me at all points.  I had 2 email accounts to manage, at least 5 social media platforms to manage (personally and for work), and text messages on top of everything else.  This is just what comes to my phone.  This doesn't even include what would happen when I logged in to a computer.

It was getting to be too much.  Too much for anyone to manage.

So, I cut back.  I went through my emails after weeks of neglect and I unsubscribed from every advertiser, news outlet, and literary magazine.

I logged on to all of my social media platforms and I unsubscribed from email notifications.

I tried to pull the plug on unnecessary and redundant notifications.

I couldn't do it anymore.  I was starting to feel like there was this mountain of electronic notification building above me that I would never surface from, and so I needed to minimize. I needed to back away for a moment in order to get my head on straight.

I have many jobs.  I wear many hats, and I love participating in all of these aspects of my life, but I need to make sure that I am taking care of myself first so that I still have the energy to get up and face the day, to reply to my friends when they write, to respond to birthday invites when they come in, and to just be a better participant in the parts of my life that matter and not spend so much time deleting email notifications that a friend of a friend liked something that another friend once posted from a website I don't follow.

Image Courtesy of Online Trust Alliance

It is always important that we guard ourselves from unwanted intrusions into our personal life.  It is something I'll think about before I hit "accept" on the next web subscription.  I think it is important.