Ockham Media

OK, so it’s not cocaine, alcohol, or gambling. But people can get addicted to pretty much anything, even things that are seemingly good. ie, exercise, working, and can I put CHOCOLATE is this category? So now I confess…I am an addict to self-help. Over that last 15 years I’ve read every book, listened to every cd, enrolled in many programs. At first it really did help. These materials gave me new ideas and new ways of looking at life. Great! But here’s the thing. I am an avid reader and over the years 97% of what I read is some form of self-help and still I need more. Can you say A-D-D-I-C-T?

I only recently realized my “addiction” to these books and the problem behind it. These books/cds always promote ways to make your life BETTER. Translation: you aren’t good enough right now and you must strive to be more, because frankly, you suck right now. This was my true motive in reading this stuff. I kept reading in hopes of finding that ONE GEM that would make me awesome. And when that one didn’t work I’d find another and another, all the while believing my life and my self wasn’t “good enough”.

This is the problem behind Self-Help. This is how they suck you in. You should be earning more money, or loosing more weight, or having a better relationship. And some GURU is gonna give you the 7 step program to “fix” you. Well, I’VE HAD IT with this crap. I am here to proclaim that I am good enough right now. I now focus on living in the present, not some idealized future that will never occur. This may sound like defeat. But really, this is one of the biggest victories of my life. I am accepting what is. I am accepting with gratitude the money I have now, the state of my health and relationships right now. Wow, what an amazing few weeks it’s been since figuring this out. I am alive! I am not striving, I’m enjoying and loving. What a difference.

So, that’s it. I’m giving up self-help cold turkey. I invite you to do the same. Because the truth is if you were really meant to have more money, less weight, or better relationships right now…YOU WOULD. So, let’s stop beating ourselves up and realize that we are the bomb…right now!!

(There is the other problem of being addicted to the internet. Maybe I’ll tackle that one next year.)

Twelve months ago I could not tell you that I was an artist. I was still in denial. I was still hoping to discover I was actually a high-power business person. I even made a couple attempts at becoming that person. Each time I was miserable and left wondering why I sucked at it so badly. Meanwhile, every time I was following an artistic whisper, I was full of joy and love, and people who saw my creations responded with such beautiful words and reactions.

Only recently have I fully realized the extent to which I was hurting myself and those around me by trying so dang hard to be something I don’t really want to be. I decided to take a new path and accept was IS. I began to embrace my inner artist, to loosen my stranglehold on her as she spent the last two decades choking for life. She awoke with a roar and a novel spilled out. She proclaimed loudly that she is tired of editing family movies and is ready to express herself in a whole new way.

The truth is that, were it up to me, I would not choose to be an artist. It can be a tough and lonely road. Honestly, I’d rather love being a stock broker or a real estate investor and make big bucks easily. But when I see who I really am I must admit I hate doing those activities and always end up self-sabotaging when I’m in those situations.  If I’m not creating I feel sick inside, or full of anger, or both! So why would an artist be in denial for so long? I didn’t like the idea of admitting, “I’m an artist”, because it conjures up cultural stereotypes that are horrific! The biggest ones being the “starving artist” and the “flaky artist”.  That’s enough to scare someone into being a stock broker, isn’t it? I mean, who wants to be a starving flake?? It has taken me a long long time to break through these stereotypes and come to truly believe that if I follow my heart, I won’t end up a penniless psycho. (We’ll see!)

So in 2009 my theme was RECLAIMATION. This included reclaiming my true self which is writer, filmmaker, composer, cheoreographer, fashion designer, and who knows what else. But now at the end of 2009 I loudly proclaim that I AM AN ARTIST. No I am not penniless (close). No I am not a weirdo (usually). I will not hide behind a self-imposed veil anymore and I am done chasing after “easy” money. I have gifts to share with the world and going forward that is what I will do.

I continue the lonely journey of crafting a novel. I mean lonely in a good way. Sitting down with my laptop and a hot drink while my daughter slumbers peacefully is the highlight of my day. The words aren’t flowing right now. I am at a tricky part of the re-writes, but I am so enamored by the process that I love the agony anyway. I forgot how much I love this magical process.

Also, I have been writing a lot of “philosophical” essays lately. Maybe I’ll post a couple on here, not sure yet.

Music Video #2 is on hold. It got stuck in casting and it still needs funding. That’s ok. There’s not a big rush on it. In fact, the purpose of music video #2 is to promote my novel, hee hee. Pretty sneaky, huh? I’ll elaborate more soon, but this whole novel project keeps expanding into other media forms, which is a perfect fit for this particular novel.

I don’t want to jinx anything, but I may be getting on as a camera person for a documentary project! I should know more next week. Happy Thanksgiving!

*Oh, one more thing that has nothing to do with anything. But, I want to announce it here as my way of putting it out to the universe. Our travel destination for 2011 has been chosen. We will be going with both kiddos…

The writing process is so bizarre. After weeks of creative gridlock, I decided to sit down with my laptop today to work on the novel. I hadn’t touched it in weeks. After meeting with my editor on Friday, I was even more worried about getting back to it.

According to my editor the basic structure of the story is good. These next rewrites will be dedicated to expanding the story. One character needs to establish a deeper role in the story. I never quite developed her into anything interesting or helpful to the story. Also, we decided that one character who is eluded to, but never takes an active role in the story is far too important to have an offstage role in the story. So I now must add another story line to an already complicated story that covers multiple time lines. So all this was heavy on my mind when I sat down at my laptop this afternoon (with my hot chocolate).

My mind wrestled with itself. For a good 45 minutes I hemmed and hawed and squirmed in my chair trying to find the missing pieces of the story. Then suddenly….I got an idea. I began typing like a mad-woman to capture it before it disappeared. It wasn’t a brilliant idea. In fact, it was kinda dumb. But that dumb idea lead me to another idea that definitely had substance. It was then I felt the faucet begin to trickle. Creativity, slowing dripping into my brain. By the time my daughter woke up I only had 500 words, but I was totally absorbed in the idea and the trickle evolved to a steady flow. Darn, too bad I had to stop then. But after my hiatus to this novel, as I come back to it, I am still in love with the story. I am still enraptured by the characters. It’s amazing I’m not sick of them yet, but there is more of their story to tell and I am their messenger. I hope I am finally exiting the creative desert.

I wish I had something exciting to share, but I do not. It seems my wellspring of creativity has dried up as suddenly as it began. All of a sudden nothing. zilch. nada. I’ve spent the last few weeks banging my head against the wall trying to force the creative juices to flow again, but no luck. I do have a meeting with my editor this week and I do plan to crank out more re-writes on the novel over the holidays. But otherwise, my cup has run dry. I am exhausted from exerting effort and going nowhere, so I am taking a break. No use fighting the forces that be. I will write again when I have some good news to share. Maybe next year. Just kidding.

Just want to give a quick update on Music Vid#2 becasue I sound like such a whiny baby in my last post. Much progress has been made on it this week. I can’t complain. The Master Shot List is now about 90% done. I have talked to Ceavco Rentals about the equipment I’ll be using. One thing I’m so excited about is that we’ll be using a special camera that shoots in super-slow-motion. I know we’ll get some stunning shots with this baby and I can’t wait to get my hands on that camera!!! I’m also starting to scout locations which is really fun. I”ll post some pictures up sometime, once I decide on the final locations. We are trying to get permission to shoot in a hospital for part of it, so that will be interesting. Preliminary casting is just barely underway. It will be a while before I can talk more about that. Lastly, the budget. Actually I have total confidence that this will not be an issue. My passion for this project is so strong that I know it will come together. Over the next weeks I will start gathering props and continue with casting. Stay Tuned.

I might as well admit it’s another one of those phases where things are moving as quickly as a snail. I exert a ton of effort and not much happens. It is time to step back and give everything some breathing room. Life ebbs and flows and it certainly ain’t flowing lately! I don’t like this phase. I don’t handle it well. This is coming from someone who gets annoyed with weekends because they interrupt my work flow. So I am trying really hard to stay positive and believe that the seeds I have planted are growing, they just aren’t sprouting yet.

The Book: I got great feed back from my editor. I need to come up with my list of questions and schedule a meeting with her to go over everything and get a sense of what my next steps are. I have not even thought about doing this this week.

Music Video #2- Crawling along. The Shotlist is getting there. I have a very crude version of it right now. It still needs a lot of attention. I am beginning to wonder where the funding for this project is going to come from and trusting that something will come through. I hope to shoot in March so, need some funding before then.

I barely started preliminary casting for this video. I’ve had my “dream cast” selected for months. This week I pitched the project for the person I hope to have in the lead role. I wanted to go ahead and get going on this because if this person declines the role, I need to start combing the planet again to find someone else.  Later this week I’m going to go scout someone else who I want to offer a role to. I love the casting process. It is one my favorite parts. Who, oh who, will be breathing life into my characters??

Educational DVD- I have another meeting with my partner this week and after this I should have enough to start editing the 2nd rough cut. I really hope we can have this done by the end of the year. It is going to be really awesome and I think it will help a lot of people. We still need to solidify a marketing plan for this DVD. Maybe by November we can start working on that.

For now I will try to take a break from all of this. I want to enjoy Halloween with my kids. I know that things will start moving again when the time is right. You always know when it’s right because it feels very effortless, not labored and agonizing like it has been lately!

When I start a creative project I tend to distance myself from the outside world. I go into mental seclusion. My friends wonder where I disappeared to. I have no clue what is going on outside my little box of a brain. This is fine for a while. In fact it helps the creative project incubate as life is breathed into it. But if I stay in this place too long I begin to notice adverse side-effects: ego flares, doubt, and fear. (Notice the last 2 are versions of “ego flares”) I tend to forget that I am actually part of a greater universe that is alive and evolving while I’m stuck inside my mental cave.

I would guess that the universe has been showering me with blessings but I’ve been too self absorbed to notice. Now that all my projects are underway in some form, it is time to get out of this me-centered space. Yesterday I did an exercise to help me do this. I put a piece of paper in my pocket and purposely LOOKED for amazing blessings to occur. I expected them to arrive. When they did I wrote them down. Needless to say, yesterday was amazing! I am so blessed and am quickly getting back to a place of gratitude. I tallied up 7 blessings during the day- things that just happened without any effort on my part. All 7 of them are significant. I am ready to interact with the outside world once again.

As a side note I have been dealing with a ton of fear lately, because I am giving my comfort zone a huge shove. I picked up the book “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway”. So far I think it has some good ideas. I’m open to anything at this point. Cold Call Day is tomorrow and already I want to crawl back into my cave. But… I WON”T. I’ll pick up that phone and plow through it and hopefully get a few appointments.

I’m sitting outside and the sun feels almost foreign. I could blame the regularly scheduled cold weather. But really it hasn’t occurred to me to subject myself to sunshine. Days pass and I barely remember stepping outside. Very sad! Such is the life of an artist who is all consumed.

The Book: Got the notes and critique back from my editor! She was very positive and that helped bring my level of self-consciousness way down. Luckily, she said the structure of my book is pretty good. So future rewrites will focus more on filling out the story rather than redoing parts of it. I am taking some time to absorb all her notes and get clear on the next set of rewrites.

Music Video#2: Started pre-production this week. Basically I am putting in “fake shots” in my editing program so I can map out the pacing and define each shot that is needed. Tedious but fun. Doing this process I got one minute into the song this week- slow going.

In addition this week was chalked full of taking both kids to various medical specialists (they are fine!) Also I am editing a family movie this week and next week. It takes all my time which causes things like the book and the music video to barely get attention. But I am grateful for the money, and I do still love making these family documentaries. With this paycheck I’ll be able to float another couple months and really kick some butt on the book and music vid. Once these projects are done, I am certain Metallica or Dave Mathews will want to hire me to do their next video (gotta dream big, right?)

It’s always weird how everything gets stuck for a while. Then, suddenly everything starts moving again. It’s like a landslide. Things really picked up this week. I’m left bewildered, excited, and trying to allow things to continue to unfold without being a control freak.

Music Video #1- done and sent off. I don’t expect to mention this one again until November when I will hear if this project is accepted to premiere at the band’s album release party or not.

Music Video #2- Pre Production starts this week. Basically all the planning, organizing and budgeting happens in this phase. I already have my dream cast in mind. But other things must be put in place before I can start approaching actors. I expect this one to be in phase I pre-production for 2 or 3 months.

The Book- Got word from my editor. She’s working on my manuscript! So far she said she is “really enjoying it”. I should get her feedback in a week or two. Can’t wait!

Fear is a strange thing. It is all in our minds, yet it controls everything we do. I am trying to make fear my friend. This is one of the hardest things I have ever had to face in myself and I know that as I continue in this business, I’ll have to keep doing it over and over again. The very thought of that makes me want to vomit even more. Oh well. DREAM BIG, EVERYONE!