Live To Write Another Day Dean Orion (ereader with android .TXT) 📖

radio in and brought that signal through as clearly and completely as you possibly can.

That’s not to say that achieving writing success is totally divorced from getting the positive feedback of others. Let’s be honest, it would be pretty naïve (not to mention, a little delusional) to claim that you’ve written a successful story if you haven’t received at least some modicum of external validation. But I think it’s also fair to say that the feedback you receive is ultimately only one factor among many that determines whether or not you feel you’ve fully realized any given piece of work. The real test is how well you stack up to that internal yardstick, whether or not you’ve reached the highest of bars you’ve set for yourself and satisfied the fairest, wisest, and most discerning of critics—you.

When you’ve done that, I believe you’ve achieved success as a writer. And when you can do it consistently, I believe financial success will follow.

SURVIVAL GUIDE SUMMARY

13. Art vs. Commerce

Things to Remember:

 

•Financial success and writing success are not joined at the hip.

•You can learn the business of being a writer. But you also have to be lucky to be financially successful.

•The best way to get lucky is to be ready when luck comes your way—which means having a great script in your pocket.

•Writing success = writer gene + process. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

•Only you know when you have achieved writing success.

Questions to Ask Yourself:

•What is the definition of financial success for you as a writer? Write it down.

•Have you looked at your overall writing process and identified places where you need to improve?

•What can you do differently on your next project, process-wise, that might help you overcome some of the deficiencies in your last one?

•Have you rewritten the story you’re currently working on as much as you possibly can? Do you know in your heart that it is as good as you can make it?

14. The Write Community

When I started writing this survival guide, I have to admit, I hadn’t really given much thought to how much my experience at The American Film Institute has shaped my thinking as a writer, and I certainly didn’t think I would be talking about it as much as I have. But as I reflect on it now, I realize it really did have a tremendous impact. The reason for that is simple. From the very first moment I stepped onto that campus, I felt I had finally found “my people.” I had finally become part of a community where everyone was passionate about telling stories, and where the words that made up those stories mattered. For the first time in my life, I had finally gotten into a room with a bunch of other writers.

Looking back on those days it seems as if my classmates and I were living in a timeless bubble. The long afternoons we spent sitting at that little sushi joint on the corner of Franklin and Vermont, arguing endlessly about theme and structure and characters. The hours and hours we spent watching films. The countless seminars we were so privileged to attend with the world’s greatest filmmakers. It was total and complete immersion into writer land, an unforgettable journey, free of all the other encumbrances of life.

While that experience could obviously never be duplicated, it did convince me of one very important thing:

To whatever extent it’s possible, you should make every effort to surround yourself with a community of writers, throughout every stage of your career.

 Bonding with Your Writer Brethren

Why is this such a big deal? Why do writers need other writers? Because when you spend the majority of your time living in the vast reaches of that infinite universe we call the human mind, every once in a while you just need someone to talk to. You know, an actual person who can actually sit down across from you and look you in the eye, as opposed to yet another figment of your imagination. But not just anybody will fit that bill. You need someone who truly knows what you’re going through day in and day out, someone who understands the solitude firsthand, who shares your passion, and who, like you, just may be crazy enough to spend their entire life pursuing it. These kinds of conversations between writers, whether they happen in passing or over a two-hour lunch, are so powerful and so vital to our collective psyche. It’s that unspoken solidarity, that exchange of energy and encouragement, that so often provides just the spark we need to press on.

On a more practical level, bonding with your writer brethren also allows you to share strategies and learn about the different techniques they may use. As your process continues to evolve, you will inevitably find yourself experimenting with these various approaches you hear about. They may not always work for you, but at the very least they will inform you creatively and contribute to your overall knowledge of the craft.

Here’s an interesting example. I have a friend who likes to experiment with the validity of his story concepts by writing test scenes. In other words, when he stumbles onto an idea he thinks is good, he immediately dives in and writes the one scene that is clearest in his mind, just to see if it pops on the page as much as it did in his head. Usually it’s a scene near the end of the story, a big climactic moment that he’s envisioning. His thinking is that if he can make the test scene work (even if he completely rewrites it later), then he’ll have an aiming point that will give him the drive and momentum needed to start writing the story from the beginning.

I found this fascinating, because while this approach is absolutely 180 degrees from my process, it’s also very similar to how I often write extensive notes about scenes that occur later in my story while I’m outlining. The difference is that I