Logging words

I’ve been intending to start writing my next play for a few weeks, now.  But the siren call of the TV or dirty dishes keeps luring me away.  I have a deadline to produce a first draft in about a month, so I really have to get moving on it!  I also have to submit a ten minute play (that I have to write, as well) in about two weeks.  Mama mia!

I’ve been telling myself that I need to commit to two pages a day.  With a daily goal of two pages and the likelihood of writing more than that on a few occasions, it shouldn’t be too hard to meet my deadlines.  However, with each day missed, that goal seems less and less attainable. 

Yesterday, my wife told me about a weight loss website a coworker showed her: myfitnesspal.com.  I had seen it before, but I decided to sign up because there’s only two months left in the year and I still have 13lbs to lose if I want to meet my New Year’s resolution.  Remember yours...?

Anyway, it’s a free website (so far) that allows you to log what you eat and how much you exercise.  I remember reading somewhere that the fact of recording your activities is more effective to weight loss than any diet.  It’s about awareness.  A lot of calories are consumed through mindless snacking.  You’re watching TV or bored or whatever. 

Myfitnesspal.com also encourages you to get some family or friends involved.  For example, as I bit into a homemade brownie last night, my wife asked: are you going to log that brownie?  Of course, I was. Damn.  Busted.   Later in the night, after my wife had gone to bed, I saw the pan of brownies.    The thought of biting into that gooey chocolate goodness, started me salivating.  But then I thought, “I’d have to log that.  Am I really that hungry?”  The answer was no, so I didn’t eat the brownie.

Anyway, it’s time to do the same with my writing.  Again.   I need to log my output.  Instead of having a page count, I think I’m going to go for a word count.   I want to have a daily minimum of 500 words.  250 of those words need to be playwriting related, but blog writing and journal writing will be included as part of my daily total.  I am expecting to exceed those goals but I want to keep the minimums attainable and not too scary.  500 words a day translates into 3500 words a week. 

I can do this.  This blog is approximately 450 words, so now I only have to write 250 words of script and I will have met today’s goal.  Let the writing begin!

Naming Names

They say you should write about what you know.  And what are you more knowledgeable about than the events that you have experienced?   Alas, you tread dangerous ground writing about things that friends and acquaintances may recognize. 

After one of my performances of my play Cast Away, someone came up to me and asked, “Which character was X?”  X being the real name of one of the people who were involved in the experience that inspired me to write the play.   The problem is that no character was X.  There was a character inspired by X, but the character was also modified to make the play more dramatic.   

Much of what I wrote in the play simply didn’t happen in real life.  Conversely, a lot of it did.  So where did the boundaries of fact and fiction lie?  For the regular audience member, I don’t think it matters.  I was trying to tell a story about persevering against the odds, so obviously I increased the odds against the protagonist.  Drama = conflict.

Y, another person involved in the original experience, came up to me and said such and such didn’t happen.  You’re correct.   I made it up.  My play isn’t about what happened.  It was inspired by what happened and in the process, it became something new. 

“But people are going to think I did it,” Y continued.  They are?  The regular audience member doesn’t know who you are or that you were involved in the experience that served as the inspiration for the play.  They’re not going to make that connection.  And the people that do know you, know you wouldn’t do that.  It’s pretty obvious to me (again) that the character and the real person are very different people.  In fact someone else came up to me and asked who that character was based on because they know that Y didn’t do that.  You’re correct.  I made it up.  

Now Z, another person involved in the original experience, has contacted me.  They heard that I portrayed them in a negative light.  The character isn’t Z!  I feel especially bad about this because I like Z and I wouldn’t want them to think that I was dissing them.  I guess this particular example gets a bit grey because I did take an experience that happened between me and Z and attribute it to another character and I changed what actually happened in real life.  But this wasn’t to make anyone look bad, it was to service the story.

Should I be worrying more about how the story will make some people feel or try to make the story as effective as it can be?  Ultimately, only a few people were directly involved in the experience that served as the inspiration and I’m hoping that many more people will see the play.   Should I be concerned about the needs of the few?

I just can’t justify it to myself.  Once I started writing the play, it became its own entity even though it was inspired by actual events.  I remember writing a short story once about a mother who becomes possessed and when my father read it, he said, “But your mother is so gentle.”  It wasn’t about my mother! 

People are always going to look for patterns or people in your characters.  And some people will find what they are looking for regardless of whether you put it in there or not.  Ultimately, you are telling a story and that should be your first priority.

Finding out who your inspiration was is like finding out how to do a magic trick.  There are always going to be people who want to know “how you did it”.  Most people are content to enjoy the show.  Just make sure that you put on a good show! 

How do bloggers blog?

I started this blog with the best of intentions to chronicle my journey as a playwright.  But the darn thing is that I'm a lazy bugger and I sometimes find it challenging enough just to get in my quota for writing, let alone writing about my writing! 

Even when I just kept a journal, I found it difficult to make the time to write about things when I was in the midst of them.  If you go through my journals -- and I don't recommend it, they're filled with lots of "man, I should really write more" -- you will notice that I rarely have written about stuff when it is happening.  It's usually just afterwards or weeks later.

I had intended to write about my experience preparing for my show Cast Away.  Well, I opened it two days ago.  Checking back, I only wrote six blogs about it and four of them were before I really got started.  You know, I think if I had kept up the blogs, I might have gotten the script done sooner.  Which would have allowed me more time to tinker with it and given me more time to learn the lines.  But I won't go there.  In this post, anyway.  ;-)

Fall down seven times, get up eight times.  So, this is me dusting myself off and getting up.  I will try to be better writing blogs.  It was reading Nancy Kenny's blog that inspired me get back on the blog-wagon.  I recommend checking out Nancy's blog.  People only see our projects up on stage and it's helpful to see what it takes to get them to that place.  And what do we do when we're between projects.

Blog on!

Be Careful What You Wish For

I just finished writing my sixth play.  Yay!  But I was troubled by a previous wish.

I have been wanting to write a full length play since the beginning.  Unfortunately, my plays only seem to want to be one act plays.  50 minutes or less.  It's not a bad length for a Fringe show, but if you want to get your work looked at by a big theatre, they want a full length play.

My current play, Cast Away, tried to fulfill my wish.  When I didn't want it to.  I had submitted a proposal for The Pearl Company Canadian Theatre Festival and it got accepted.  Uh-oh.  How long was my play?  Uh... 50 minutes?  Like most of my other plays...

Well, when I started writing it, the play didn't want to be 50 minutes.  It wanted to be twice as long as that!  But I had already confirmed that it WAS 50 minutes!!  D-oh!

I finished the first draft and then I had to cut.  Mercilessly.  I cut and cut and it was still longer than 50 minutes.  I cut my darlings.  I slashed anything that could be taken out without being missed.  When I couldn't look at it any more, I sent it to my friend and he suggested more cuts.  And it refuses to shrink.  :-( 

It's a one man show, so I'm rehearsing it now and whittling a sentence here or a line there.  But I keep thinking to myself.  Next time I'll write it first before submitting the idea.  Or be careful for what I wish for...

Do One Person Shows Suck?

I was going to write this post a month ago, but procrastination got the better of me.  I'm glad it did because the Hamilton Fringe Festival happened and I got to see quite a few one person shows.  It gave me empirical evidence for the conclusion I had already reached.

I'm working on my one person show called Cast Away and I was angsting about one person shows in general.  Are they effective, I wondered?  And then Brad Fraser, a playwright I respect and admire, posted this on Facebook:

Honestly, the majority of one person shows (and there are excellent exceptions) are like being masturbated on by someone you're not particularly attracted to.

It was followed by many people concurring.  Not exactly the inspiration I was looking for.  :-(

I think I know where Brad is coming from (but without the graphic metaphor).  Drama is about conflict and it's hard to have conflict when there's only one person on stage.  Even when there's two people onstage, sometimes.  Put three or more people on a stage and someone's going to cause problems.  Someone's going to gang up on someone else.

A one person show is basically one honking long monologue.  Some people hate monologues.  They see them as boring, static or even self-indulgent.  But others love monologues.  They can be honest, intimate and revealing.

Judith Thompson, another playwright I admire, likes to start from monologues to discover her characters.  Ironically, I took workshops with both Brad and Judith in the same 12 month period.  Judith had us starting from the monologue and Brad wanted us writing scenes right away.  You say potato...

We listen to comedians do their monologues and make us laugh.  It's essentially a one person show.  Usually in smaller doses than a theatrical show, but the concept is the same.

And really there are a couple of forms of the one person show: lecture and dramatic.  The lecture show is basically a performer telling the audience about something that happened to them.  At the Hamilton Fringe there were a few shows that fell into this category: An Inconvenient Truthiness, A Different Woman: A True Story of a Texas Child, Bookworm, and Confessions of a Fairy's Daughter.  All of these shows were interesting and compelling in their own right, but I could see how they might not appeal to a hard core Theatre Person.

However, there were some dramatic one person shows such as Roller Derby Saved My Soul and When Harry Met Harry.  In each show, a single actor played a main character and some secondary characters, as well.  Both of these shows were dramatic and funny.  And I can honestly say that they were more entertaining and polished than some multiple performer plays that I saw.  And they were some of the best shows at this year's Fringe.  Both of these shows have done well in other Fringes as well, so it's not just a small audience that is appreciating them.

In the end, it probably boils down to a matter of taste, but I wouldn't dismiss one person shows outright.  For one thing, they are cheaper to do than multiple actor shows.  And in the hands of a talented performer, they can be absolutely mesmerizing.  I feel a little better about one person shows myself, having seen so many wonderful shows at the Fringe. 

Now, we'll just have to see how my one person show fares...

Taking the good with the bad

Yesterday was a good writing day.  Today, not so good.  I didn’t get any writing done in the early part of the day and it’s likely that I’m not going to meet today’s target.  Okay, scratch that.  It’s inevitable that I’m not going to meet today’s target.  Avoiding the self-flagellation, I can examine this and see that I really need to get some writing done in the morning or at the very latest during lunch.  I have to commit to getting part of it done on the way to work.  Otherwise, there’s too much pressure to do it after dinner and there may be other commitments to fulfill.

I officially commit to writing a little bit in the morning.  Just “starting” to write is enough to get me going and getting a page in. 

My challenge is that I tend to procrastinate and then binge write to get the play finished.  But, I’m going to be performing this, so I’d like the script to be as good as I can get it.  So, I have to focus.

I’m reading The Success Principles by Jack Canfield.  (Have I mentioned that I’m a self-help junkie?)   Anyway, it’s reminding me that I should probably be visualizing the process – not only of writing, but of performing this piece.  I find that when I am completely focused on a project, I see more things in my life that can be incorporated into it.  I come across stories, anecdotes or images that can be pulled into the piece that I’m working on.

One of the good things about yesterday’s writing session is that I had gotten a little stymied writing the play chronologically.  So, I just jumped ahead to a scene I had worked on before and wrote from there.   Although the piece takes place chronologically, there’s no reason why I need to write it that way.  At this point, it’s really important to get the writing in, so jumping around is fine, as long as it keeps me productive.

Of course, maybe the play doesn’t need to be chronological… 

That’s when a program like Scrivener is good because you can outline different scenes and maybe type up some ideas and move back and forth a lot easier than when writing in Final Draft.   But that’s just me.  I find Scrivener is the closest computer application that lets me think similarly to how I think when I’m writing in long hand.  I can easily jump to a different part of the page to write an unrelated note or tangent. 

I’m hearing a nagging voice that this idea may suck.  But I’m committed to it, now.  If it does suck, then hopefully I can learn something from it.  I’m feeling like I should read a one person play.  As mentioned, I saw a couple of them this year, but maybe seeing one written out would inspire me.  Or maybe I should just shut up and write.   I do have a tendency to want to read instead of writing.

And before I discourage myself, I have to remember that I thought it was a good idea to start.  Until I finish a draft, I don’t really know what I have.  And if the draft sucks, then I will at least have an idea of what doesn’t work and it will help inform my rewrite.  It’s all good.

Another reason to stop second guessing myself is that I really don’t have a lot of time to worry about it.  It will be what it will be.  And I will learn from that and hopefully grow from it.  I’m going to be pretty busy in mid-July because my other play, Minced is going to be in the Hamilton Fringe Festival.  And there’ll be other shows to see and people to visit with and audience reactions to gauge.

Maybe I should just giving up sleeping for the next couple of months.

Keeping focused

What the heck am I doing?  I let two days go by without doing my quota.  No pages on Friday or Sunday!  The month is going to be over before I’ve even gotten halfway through the first draft.

It’s hard when you keep looking at the big picture.  When you keep looking at how far you have to go.  To be honest, my daily output to get there is pretty ambitious, anyway.  Four pages a day.  It’s completely within my  ability to write that much, but it’s currently beyond my routine.

I feel like Sisyphus, looking at that damn rock that he has to push up the hill.  Forget the fact that it is going to roll back down, just as I reach the summit; it will be a hell of a lot of work just getting it up there.  But the struggle is part of the journey.  It’s part of how you get better as a writer.  It’s like a training run for a marathon runner or playing scales for a musician.  It must be done.

The temptation is to try and play catch up.  I missed writing eight pages, so I’ll write twelve pages today, instead of just four pages.  Or I’ll write five pages for the next eight days, instead of writing four.  But I will stick to the schedule and only focus on getting four pages done today.   Today is all that matters.  Let me be successful today.  I’ll worry about tomorrow’s pages, tomorrow.

As Samuel Bekett said, “Try again.  Fail again.  Fail better.”

Time to start writing.

Drawing up the Battle Plans

Okay, I'm just taking a reality check for what needs to be done to get this play Cast Away written.  I have about six pages of script and various pages of notes so far.  Some of those notes will make it verbatim into the script.  But I do need to establish a plan to get this piece done.

This will be my sixth play and I find that I haven’t yet established a routine for writing a play.  Each play seems to dictate its own process.  I’ve taken many screen writing classes and the emphasis is always on outlining incessantly and then start writing.  With my playwriting, I don’t always know where I’m going to go.  Sometimes the story is just there and I know where I’m going right from the beginning.  Other times I start writing and see where it goes, discovering the story along the way.

Cast Away should be fairly straight forward, I think.  I figured that I would basically tell the story from my first interview for the play being accepted into the Emerging Artist Series (EAS) to opening night.  Then it’s just a matter of finding dramatic things to put in.  Of course, as I’ve been thinking, I figured that I could add some stuff about the creative process.  I’m torn because I don’t know if it will be interesting or not.

I’m toying with playing around with some of my metaphysical attitudes.  I did a bit of that with my play Laund-o-mat at the End of the World.   I angst over it because I know that it will turn some people off and it might give other people the wrong idea that I’m a religious writer.  I can hear Paul Thompson’s voice echoing, “Do what scares you.”

But I really like the idea of the title Cast Away being a play on words.  It’s about some of the cast leaving the show and about feeling left adrift in the creative process.  A possible poster image is of Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam part of the Sistine Chapel.  The image of Adam's hand reaching up to God’s hand.  But in my poster, I would be reaching up, but God would be giving me the finger.  Not sure if it is too scandalous or not.

I’ll let it gestate for a while.

Aside from the creative development of the play, I need to get it written.  The Festival runs from August 18 to 27.  I will have four performances in that time.  So not only does it have to get written, but it needs to be learned and rehearsed.  Do  I self-direct?  I’m leaning that way at the moment.

Ideally, I need to have a first draft finished by the end of June.  Then I can probably fit in two rewrites by the end of July.  That would give me almost three weeks to rehearse.  Hopefully, it will be percolating in my head anyway, so learning the lines won’t be too hard.  But you never know…  Last year I acted in a play that I co-wrote and I found it very difficult to learn my lines.  But I didn’t have as much time to prepare as I do now.

So, I have thirteen days to get the first draft done.  The piece will be about fifty minutes, so let’s call it approximately 50 pages of script.  That means that I need to write about 4 pages a day for the next 13 days.  On your marks.  Get ready.  Go! 

Let the page count begin.

My next project

In about two months, I will be onstage preforming a one man show called Cast Away.  The only problem is that I haven’t written it yet.  It’s an amorphous shape in my brain and I have some set bits for it, but I still have to write the thing.  I mean, if I was put on the spot and had to perform it today, I could probably improvise my way through it, but it wouldn’t be coherent or consistent.

Since I’ve been having trouble motivating myself to blog, I figured that I would chart my progress developing this piece.   So, let me start at the beginning.

Two years ago, I wrote a play called Cast Party.  When I got involved in acting in Community Theatre five years ago, I met lots of new people.  Stories would be shared as we bonded over beer after rehearsals.  Every show has antics or situations that actors and crew have to deal with, so I find it fun to listen to these stories.  Ironically, I kept hearing stories from one particular production.  It just so happened that in three different shows I did with a few different theatre groups, I ended up working with or meeting most of the people involved in that specific production. 

I was getting ready to write my second play, which was tentatively called Mulling Kilt Attire, inspired by some of those after rehearsal bar sessions, when I saw a play called Scratch by Charlotte Corbeil-Coleman.  It’s a play about a girl’s reaction to her mother’s terminal cancer.  A few of the actors played multiple characters, seamlessly becoming someone different by a change in their physicality.

After seeing the play, I thought it would be cool to have a play where everyone played multiple characters.  It would be fun for the actors to challenge themselves and fun for the audience to see the actors’ versatility.  But I didn’t have a story to tell.  And then I remembered the stories about that production (that I hadn’t seen by the way) that I kept hearing about.  One of the things that struck me was that one of the actors died shortly after the production, but many people didn’t know he was sick.

So, I shelved Mulling Kilt Attire and decided to write Cast Party.  I would have each actor play two roles.  And I would try to incorporate the people that are involved in community theatre: cast, crew and hangers on. 

I submitted the play to Black Box Fire’s Emerging Artist Series and it got accepted.  Before I knew it, I was directing my play.  Without a doubt, it was the worst theatrical experience I ever had.  Actors didn’t show up to rehearsals, some quit, one I had to fire, another actor tried to start a mutiny.  Hai carumba!

But the show must go on, right?  It did go on.  Amidst the pain and betrayal, there were glimmers of hope and wonderful people who helped out.  Every time I was about to throw in the towel, someone or something positive would give me hope.  Since a lot of the audience were involved in community theatre, it was well received. 

People joked that I should write a sequel.  I would always quip back that I was planning to.  And I was going to call the show The Rehearsal. 

This year, I had a subscription to Theatre Passe Muraille and I saw a couple of one person shows that I really enjoyed:  The Cure for Everything by Maja Ardal and Oh, My Irma by Haley McGee.  I thought that The Rehearsal could work as a one person show.  I wrote a few pages, but it didn’t go any further.

I needed a deadline.  Cue the divine music and the celestial sunshine poking through dark clouds.  The Pearl Canadian Theatre Festival was looking for submissions.  I submitted  the synopsis for The Rehearsal, which I renamed Cast Away, and it was accepted.  Like I said, now, I have to write the darn thing.

Marking Milestones

I’m a big believer in setting goals.  And an important part of setting goals is creating tasks that move you towards those goals.  Instead of having a vague goal that you have no control over like “I want to be a famous playwright”; you create something that you can achieve, like “I will write 2 full length plays this year.” 

Ideally, you set long range goals and short range goals.  There’s nothing worse than only setting long range goals and feeling the despair that sets in when the achievement of the goal is too far to be invigorating.  You need baby steps, too.

In a way, you need to cultivate a regular state of dissatisfaction.  To become great at something, you need to be continuously improving.  So, as a goal is reached, it is important to have new goals ready to keep pushing you onward.

However, it is also important to acknowledge and celebrate the achievement of big and little goals.  You need to pause every now and then to take stock.  Are you on the right track?  Did you meet a goal?  Can you feel yourself moving forward?

I want to celebrate the fact that I received my first official royalty cheque the other day.  Some students put on my play “Laund-o-mat at the End of the World” for the Sears Festival and I got paid to let them use my play.  Awesome!  This is the first time one of my shows has been put on without my direct involvement.  I feel fantastic!  I feel like a big boy now. 

And no the royalty cheque isn’t that big, but that’s not the important thing.  It is another milestone towards my career as a playwright.  I was tempted to frame the cheque, but I decided to scan it, instead.  I can frame the jpeg, if I want.  J  What’s the fun of getting money and not spending it?

The next day, I found out that I came in third place for the Hamilton Fringe Playwriting Contest.  That’s the first time that I have “placed” in a contest!  Obviously, I would have preferred to win, but I’m pretty happy with being in the top three.  Another milestone!  Yay for me!!

Both of these events are encouraging me to strive harder.  I’m working on a rewrite, so that I can submit to another contest.  And there is yet another contest that I had submitted to that should be publishing their results soon. 

For today, however, I am pleased as punch.  I’ve received two concrete reinforcements for being a writer.  I’ll be sure to check back at this blog entry on the days when things aren’t going so well.  ;-) 

Getting up again

There’s a proverb that goes “Fall down seven times, get up eight times”.  I’ve fallen “off” the daily writing habit.  Again.  It’s been over a month since I was writing daily, so I’m going to dust myself off and start the habit again.

I know why I fell off.  Usually when I complete a first draft of a piece, I take a break.  Unfortunately, that break usually becomes extended.  When I finished writing my play Laund-o-mat at the End of the World, I didn’t write for almost a year.  I didn’t even write in my journal.  I really don’t know why that was, but the same thing has happened after all the other plays that I’ve written.

I finished the first draft of my fifth play just before I broke my daily writing habit.  The good news is that period of non-writing seems to be shrinking with each new work.  Maybe it’s a psychic recovery period.  Maybe I’m just lazy and need to catch up on my tv watching.   Whatever it is, I don’t like it.

At least this time, I kept up with some writerly pursuits.  I took part in a World Theatre Day celebration and wrote a mini-adaption as part of an exercise with my writing group.   I had a reading of my newest play.  I saw some high school kids perform Laund-o-mat as part of the Sears Festival (they won their division and are moving on to the Regionals) -- they did a great job, by the way.  I submitted my play Mulling Kilt Attire for dramaturgy at Pat the Dog.  I’ve entered a couple of contests.  I went to a couple of drop-ins at the Predella Open Studio.  I saw Linda Griffiths speak about playwriting.  I went to a masterclass with Judith Thompson.  Whew!

So, even though I haven’t been doing my daily pages, I can honestly say that I have been still busy with my  playwriting.  But, let’s face it: to be a writer, you have to write.  So, I’m renewing my daily writing habit.  I’m getting up, after falling down.

I kind of feel like I’m back to where I was at the beginning of January.  I’ve also put back that weight that I had lost.  Oh well.  Keep moving forward, right? 

As part of this do over, I will commit to writing at least one blog a week.  I may end up writing more, but the goal is to do at least one per week.  That way, I will have at least 52 blog entries next year at this time.  And hopefully another play or two.  ;-)

Scrivening with Scrivener

I first came across the word “scrivener” when someone gave me Bartleby the Scrivener to act out in charades.  I didn’t do so well and I always remembered that word.  That darn word.  There is an application called Scrivener by Literature and Latte which is for writers.  It is a mac application, but they’ve developed a version for Windows which is in beta.

What is Scrivener?  Basically, it’s a word processor.   But it’s a word processor designed for the early drafts of a project.  You can work on regular fiction (novel, short story, etc.) or scripts (plays, screenplays, etc.).   The nice thing about it is that it allows you to easily break up your work into segments and move it around.  You can also keep all your research material in one place (the document itself) and not have to look all over the place for that information.

I read Twyla Tharp’s book The Creative Habit a few years ago.  It’s an excellent book and I highly recommend it.  One thing that I took from the book, which I still use today, is the concept of having a box for ideas related to a project.  Basically, it’s a place where you put ideas, clippings, songs, pictures, anything that relates to your project or that you think will serve as inspiration.

When I start a project I usually create a box file and jot down anything related to the story I’m going to work on.  As I’m writing, I will refer to that “box” when I get stuck to make sure that I’ve touched on everything that I wanted to.

The nice thing about Scrivener is that the file or box is part of the document itself.  So, you don’t have to flip from program to program.  Or search in folders to find that darn document.  (And what did I call it this time??) 

Scrivener is basically broken down into three parts: the document, the research and the trash.  The document section is where you do your writing or at least play with your writing.  Scrivener has different formats for you to use.  To be honest, I’m not crazy about the script writing.  I find it much easier to use Final Draft to write my script and then import it and play around with it in Scrivener. 

The research section is the part I really like.  You can import files (pictures, pdfs, music) into Scrivener and then refer to them when you write.  For example, a character in my current project has cancer and I put some notes in the research part.  Whenever my character is talking about her cancer, I do a quick look at my notes to see if I want to add something or at least inform what I’m going to write.  It’s a mouse click away.

Sometimes, I just start writing a project.  I don’t have an outline and I’m not sure exactly where it is going to go.  I can start writing, import the script into Scrivener and play around with “what” goes “where” and put in a place marker for events, beats or scenes and then go back to it.

Now, there are ways to do similar things in Final Draft or whatever word processing program you use.  But I like the ease in which it can be done with Scrivener.

There are still some bugs in the program.  It is a beta version, after all.  Currently, I have to export my Final Draft into rtf format and then import it in Scrivener.  And when I modify the script and export it to rtf to bring back into Final Draft, the formatting is all screwed up.  Me no likey.   But there will be an update out on Feb. 25, so we’ll see if those things are addressed.

If I was only going to use one tool, it would be Final Draft.  I find it much easier to write a script with it.  But I really like being able to play around with the script and have my research right where I can find it.  I’m going to continue to use both tools for my current project.  I’ll keep you updated.

P.S.  Super Bowl had an impact.  I gained two pounds.  Darn wings.  And chips.  And nachos.  And cake.  And brownies...

Perseverance trumps talent

Everyone knows the story of the Tortoise and the Hare, right? If not, where have you been for the last three thousand years?  Basically a rabbit and a turtle decide to have a long distance race and the rabbit is so fast and so far ahead that he takes a nap before reaching the finish line.  Of course, the turtle keeps moving slowly to the finish line and crosses over before the rabbit wakes from his nap.  Slow and steady wins the race.

Or as stated in Dan Pink’s book The Adventures of Johnny Bunko: perseverance trumps talent.  That’s an important concept for us writers.  You have to plug away at this craft day by day and page by page.   You only get better by doing.  When we see a great piece of writing, we’re not looking at the first draft.  We’re looking at the crystallized, edited version.  It might be the fourth draft or the eleventh draft or the thirty-seventh draft.  We only see the finished work.

Sometimes when you look at your own writing and compare it to more established writers, it’s easy to think that you’ll never get there.  You’ll never be that good.  You don’t have the talent.  There’s only one cure for that.  Write more.  You have to write.  You have to persevere.  You have to strive to improve.

In Malcolm Gladwell’s book The Outliers, he discusses the idea that maybe there is no such thing as talent.  People that we call talented have usually put in many, many hours towards that skill that makes them talented (hockey, music, writing, etc.).   How many hours?  Upwards of 10,000 hours.  And trust me, it takes a long time to spend 10,000 hours on something. 

Ray Bradbury said that you have to write a million words before you become a writer.  This blog is only 717 words.  So, you’d have to write about 1400 blogs to write that many words!  It’s not an easy task.

You better like that thing that you’re going to spend so much time on it.  Maybe the true talent of the “talented” is their love and/or commitment to the skill that keeps them going back to practice and get better every day.  If you want to be a writer, you have to write.  You have to write every day. 

One of the best ways to get to the place of daily writing is to set tiny goals and build on them.  I started the year wanting to write a page a day.  I had established the habit at the end of last year.  Obviously, I hadn’t established it strongly enough, because I let it lapse.  And I mistakenly thought I could jump right back where I stopped.

Two weeks ago, with a goal of writing a page a day, I wrote half a page.  Half a page for the entire week!  Last week, with a goal of writing a half page a day, I wrote 15 pages.  This week, I’ve increased my goal to ¾ of a page.  I will let you know next week how it turned out. 

The key is that even if I only write three quarters of a page a day, that’s five and a quarter pages at the end of the week.   It’s way more than the output was when I set my goal higher than I was ready to accomplish.  More importantly, the daily amount isn’t so big that it’s discouraging.  And because it is attainable, I’m completing the work every day; often surpassing the daily quota.

If you are finding that you aren’t meeting your writing goals, instead of getting pissed off with yourself and beating yourself up, set a smaller goal.  Consistency is the real goal here.   Consistency of output.  Regular writing.  Putting the seat of the pants into the seat of the chair and writing.  

Once you can meet your smaller goal consistently, then you can consider increasing it.   Maybe you need to keep it small and attainable for a long time.   Even if you only write half a page every day for a year, that’s a draft and half of a play. 

Be persistent.  Have a “turtle mind” and set some attainable goals that you can do consistently.  Slow and steady wins the race.

P.S.  I lost two pounds last week.

Falling Down redux

Okay, so this is the first blog after “publicizing” my goals and what do I have to report?  Uh, I guess it’s a kind of good news/bad news thing.  I like to get the bad news first, so here it is:  I only wrote half a page of script last week.  Half a page?!?

I thought I would be able to jump right back to the level I was at (i.e. a page a day), but I think I need to step more slowly into this goal.  So instead of going right to a page a day, I will start with half a page a day.  So, for this week’s total, I should have three and a half pages.  It’s better to start small and consistently, so I can build momentum rather than just start with the main goal.  (And not get there at all.)

Next week, I will write three quarters of a page a day (five and a quarter pages for the week).  And the following week, I will be at my target of one page a day or seven pages a week.

I am a little disappointed, but I really should have started easily in the first place.  Although, I know that I can do the page a day, I wasn’t there, so I should have built to it.  The bright spot is that I wrote a half page.  Yay for me.  It was the most writing I had done in a month, so it was definitely an improvement.

Another important aspect of this is trying to get it done as soon as possible.  So, today, I’ve already done my quota.  Yay!

Did you see that?  I just used two of the components of setting goals.  Looking for bright spots and relying on planning not willpower.  So, here’s the plan: I will do my writing either before I leave the house or on the train into work.  That way, I will have met my most important writing goal for the day and focus on other things.

So, what was the good news?

I lost a pound.  I now weigh 216lbs.  I also lost 2cm off my waist and was able to fit into a pair of jeans that my wife bought me for Christmas.  I could barely get them on at Christmas and I couldn’t button them up!  It’s a great feeling to be able to wear them now.

I’m also at more than 25% of my goal weight.  On that front, I am way ahead of schedule.  The key to my success (so far) is that there has been more planning involved than my writing goals.  I have been following the “Slow Carb Diet” as outlined in Timothy Ferris’ book The Four Hour Body.   I plan to follow it for a month and then assess how it’s going.

It certainly seems more sustainable than some other diets I’ve tried.  I really liked The Zone diet, but I found it tricky to follow.  The Slow Carb is much less complicated.  And you get a “cheat day” every week!  Ah, glorious cheat day...

Anyway, I’m starting this week very happy with my weight goals and optimistic about my writing goals.  I also think the success of one goal helps feed the commitment to the other goal. 

How are you doing in your goals?

Resolutions 2011

Now that we are three weeks into the New Year and the giddy effects of eggnog and champagne are wearing off, I thought I would look soberly at my resolutions for 2011.  I know, resolutions get a bad rap, because we tend to make grandiose resolutions thinking of what we could accomplish in a year, but after a few weeks the realization that it requires effort to keep those goals eats away at our will power.

I enjoyed the book Switch by Chip Heath and Dan Heath; which is about the process of making changes.  (Their book Made to Stick is very good as well.)  Anyway, I signed up for their infrequent newsletter and received the following suggestions for resolutions:

FIVE TIPS FOR (FINALLY) GETTING YOUR NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION RIGHT

1. Don't be ambitious. When change is hard, aim low. A friend of ours, the editor of a wellness magazine, has a "1-Song Workout" that she does on days when she doesn't feel like working out. She tells herself, "All I have to do is work out for one song," but of course she often gets in a groove and finishes a full workout. So don't set an ambitious New Year's resolution like "I'll work out four times a week." Instead, plan to do "1-Song Workouts" on Monday and Thursday. Leave yourself room to overachieve -- that feeling of "nailing it" is what will keep you hooked.

2. Watch for bright spots. If you're trying to eat healthier, for instance, don't obsess about all the times that you slip and eat an Oreo. Instead, keep a constant watch on what does work. If you ate healthy food all day yesterday, how did you get away with it? Was it because you had healthy "heat & eat" food that was easy to fix? Was it because you never let yourself get so hungry that you'd crave fatty foods? Did you avoid the office lunch at the Mexican place? If you can understand what allowed you to succeed, you can do more of it. That's bright-spots thinking. (Need a refresher on "bright spots"?)

3. Make simple tweaks in your environment. If you're trying to increase your savings, pay with cash and leave your cards at home. If you're trying to diet, carry around a Ziploc of apple slices. If you're trying to jog, lay out your clothes the night before. If you're trying to stop oversleeping, set up a double (or triple?) alarm system. (Or buy a Clocky with your Xmas gift cards!) This stuff sounds insignificant, but it will make a big difference.

4. Rely on planning, not willpower. Your Resolution calls for a new way of behaving. And that's a challenge because you've been practicing the old way of behaving for a long time. The old way is well-paved and familiar and comfortable. So you can't just bet on willpower or good intentions to ensure your success. Use your planning skills. Get yourself on the hook for something! Don't plan to "learn Spanish." Register for a Spanish course at your local community college. Do it right now -- you're already online. Or don't "try hard" to go to the gym in the morning. Email your friend, right now, and tell 'em to come get you at 7am on January 3.

5. Publicize your resolution. We all know peer pressure works. So use it on yourself.  Tell everybody you know what your resolution is. They'll bug you about it, and you won't want to disappoint them. Just knowing that they know will make you more likely to succeed. Hell, if you want, tell us. We won't bug you about it, but we'll silently root for you.

I think the last tip is very good.  When you publicly let people know your goals, there’s pressure to put up or shut up.  Never under estimate the power of peer pressure.  So, what are my resolutions for 2011? 

I will lose 22lbs.  Now, some people may think that’s crazy or too large and I haven’t really comprehended the Heath Brother’s advice.  My goal last year was to lose 50lbs!  Needless to say, I gave up hope half way through the year.  But 22lbs works out to about 2lbs a month, which works out to about half a pound a week.  Through simple diet and a bit of exercise, I don’t think that’s outrageous.  Consistent and simple effort is the key here – for me, at least.  It’s also so drawn out that I can see if I’m on track or not.  My goal is to weigh 200lbs or less on the morning of Dec. 31.

To be honest, I actually started this last week and have already lost 5lbs!  Now, I don’t expect that amount of weight loss to be the norm.  It’s always easier to lose the first few pounds.  Sometimes just being aware of your weight or measuring it contributes to weight loss.

I weigh myself Monday mornings.  On Jan. 10, I was 222lbs.  On Jan. 17, I was 217lbs.  Yay for me.    I will update my weight on Mondays until I reach my goal.  After that, I will update it monthly to ensure I’m staying the course.  If my weight goes above 205, I’ll start updating weekly, again.

I will write a page of script a day or 7 pages a week.  This gives me some leeway if I “stumble” during the week.  I started this habit at the end of last year, but had fallen off the wagon by December.  A page a day of script writing isn’t very difficult, but it’s about re-establishing the habit and being consistent.  I think one of the challenges for many writers is that they put on a lot of pressure for that page.  Not me.  I am almost a 100% certain it will stink, but I will write it.

I will complete the first draft of one play.  This should be a happy outcome of the  previous goal.  Again, the first draft should be “crappy”, so no pressure on the quality.  But I do expect to have at least one new piece underway.  A stretch goal could be to have a second draft completed, but I will definitely be happy to have a first draft completed.

Obviously, this is my attempt to “publicize” my resolutions.  I guess I could provide weekly updates on the writing ones, as well as the weight goal.  That way, I can keep a tally and you can see how I’m doing.   

What about you?  Do you have any goals for 2011 that you’d care to publicize?