Is my creativity the result of a bad habit?

I've been exhausted for days. It keeps getting to 3am and I'm still awake. And the days keep getting busier.

Today was meant to be an early night. But I lay down and the tiredness of the day forgets itself and instead I think about ideas and projects and the world and whatever else comes along. It surprises me every time, but it really shouldn't, because it's so common for me.

I was never a sleeper. It's just a whole lot of lying down in the dark waiting for the day to start. But why am I like this? Is it linked to my creativity? Definitely. But why dont I sleep? Is it just a bad habit from childhood?

Is my creativity the result of a bad habit? Writers and artists of all disciplines like the ego boost of thinking they have a higher purpose or a gift from God, but maybe it is the result of a bad habit, or a knock to the head, or something equally mundane. Why do some people have a bad day and want to write a poem, whereas others have a bad day and want to buy a chocolate bar? We always have meaningful answers but why should it be meaningful?

As a kid I hated the dark. Didn't trust it. Even now I pull myself out of falling to sleep. But what if I dealt with my sleep issues when I was seven and became an avid sleeper. Would all the scripts and articles and blogs I've written at 2am still exist? Sometimes I conceive of entire projects in a night.

Was it written in the stars that I'd create my work while everyone is busy sleeping, or is it just a fluke?

But I'm tired, I wish I was asleep now. So often I can be so certain I need sleep, and then I almost feel anger as an idea appears in my mind at 4.09am, because I know the chance for rest is slipping away.

---- I've re-read everything above, and an ending to this post isn't coming. It's my late night muse shutting up shop, It's done for the night. The part of my brain that knows when I've done a good job knows that the work isn't done, but the part of my brain that fed me the 'blog about sleep' idea has gone silent. And that's creativity, a semi-formed idea at 1.28am on a Thursday morning.

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Artistic Maturity

You start out knowing who you are and what you want. And then you realise it's more complicated than that so you start adapting yourself and changing your plans and figuring out how to 'market' yourself.

Artistic maturity is when you go back to how you started: you become yourself.

I had lunch with three friends today. We're all still young but we've been at this a long time. One of the group always had the crazy unrealistic dream of acting on the West End stage. Now she does. She never allowed herself another choice.

One of the other friends used to worry about what his 'type' was, and what genre suits him. But today at lunch, in a short break from a show he's touring, he told me about a one man play he wants to produce, about a politician who fascinates him. There were no worries about whether it was a good career move or whether it was a logical thing to do -- he just followed his instincts. And it was great. We sat and brainstormed ideas for an hour and we could well be co-writing something.

The third friend, she had those battles with her agent that all actors have. It's the one where an agent tries to shove you down a certain path because that's where the roles are. Or more truthfully, that's where the agent's comfort zones are. But my friend said no. The agent wanted her to do some play that paid well but wasn't interesting. My friend said no, stayed in London, and landed a role on prime time TV.

And as we had lunch today; it was great to have that feeling; that we're all doing what we want to be doing. And it's not that difficult, you just decide to do it.

Because when someone says 'you have to write horror, it's the only thing I can sell' -- if you don't love horror, then you're strangling yourself as a writer. And if you want to be acting on screen in London and your agent tries to make you do a play in Ireland for six months -- you have to weigh up what counts, figure out who you really are.

Because most people I've met are bending to try and fit into the industry. But they all fail and they're smashing their head against the walls and complaining about how nothing is happening.

People forget to be themselves. Sure, you can try reinvent yourself and be something you're not, but how real is it? Is it a part of your true personality or are you trying desperately to be noticed? You don't wanna be like Meg Ryan in that boxing movie.

So, my friends are doing good. They're focusing on what they want to do. It's better than thumping your head against a wall.

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"MY DREAMS" Review

For many nights, over much of my life, I have watched numerous dreams, of my own, mostly whilst sleeping. I am growing increasingly unhappy with the quality of my dreams, and much prefer the earlier, funnier ones. It is also troubling to me that my dreams are becoming increasingly unrealistic, with some terrible acting. The dream about the banjo playing dancer, starring my best friend Doug --- whilst interesting at first, lost all credibility when Doug's feet stopped moving and he ended up shouting "I have no elbows!" at Natalie Portman repeatedly. What was Natalie Portman even doing in this dream? After her recent movies, I'm surprised she would star in something so unprofessional.

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A Guide To Video Rendering

I have been hired to write an instruction manual for the industry's leading editing software company. Here it is, in full:

Regardless of the speed of the system and the length of your project, rendering will take precisely somewhere between two minutes and/or nineteen hours. This is true even if you render the same thing twice.

We cannot give you an exact time for rendering as then you may end up doing something productive like going for a run, doing a painting, or finding a moment to pee. But we can promise that your edit will take no longer than nineteen hours to render (except when up against a deadline, when rendering may take three days, even when it says "35 Minutes Remaining.")

Editing uncompressed video takes a long time to render because the files are so big, therefore this takes the longest. Unless of course you are rendering a very small, lo-res file, in which case it takes the longest because we need a very long time to make everything so small. The best thing to do is to make a medium size file; but bear in mind this takes the longest of all because we need to turn uncompressed files into medium files without accidentally turning them tiny.

When the rendering is complete, you will find that your video is unplayable because the format you chose does not exist. This is your fault. You will need to render again for somewhere in the region of nineteen hours, and at the end of it your film will be complete but unfortunately there will be no audio and possibly no video. This is because you tried to format an mpeg into a mov whilst the mp4's were arguing with the avi's. Luckily, in order to help you meet your deadline, we have arranged for the producer to visit for a stern chat. You only need 47 hours to render your video.

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Marriage

Joe Fox

Tweaking? A project that needs "tweaking"?

Kathleen Kelly

Yes.

Joe Fox

T-w-e-a-k-i-n-g.

Kathleen Kelly

-i-n-g. That's what he said.

Joe Fox 

I think he's married. Married, three kids.

It's tell me what to write week. TB asked "Have you ever been married or been close to marriage?"

And the answer is no and no. 

I never planned it to be that way. But there it is. I always thought, by now, I'd have all that stuff figured out -- but I really don't. It's weird because, when you write a blog post, everyone 'gets' you. In relationships, it's never that easy. 

And I'm no good at all the nonsense, the drama. I like forward motion. I need to fly to New York on a whim so I can write a screenplay, I need to disappear on my own for five days when I'm a grumpy idiot. I'm an awkward-writer-fool who always reads too much into the women that don't like me and too little into those that do.

And I never get it right.

And starting things is hard. Too much drama and confusion. I just want a woman who'll happily watch 'The Apartment' and then we both go off and get on with our dreams. But there aren't too many women like that.

And everything I'm writing is about my needs. You can see how I'm selfish.

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Two Comments Today That Made My Week Already

From Krista: "I'm not sure if I've commented on your blog before, but now I just have to! You are such an inspiring person! Thanks to your writings I am beginning to find who I am and, more importantly, who I want to be, and not live life the way others think I should! I am gonna be me :)

Thanks for being awesome!"

From Happy Frog and I: "Since I read your interview with MLS and the great advice you gave there I have felt different. I have felt like a writer who happens to have an office job at the moment. All the procrastination has vanished. When I have free time I write or read blogs or think about how to move forward with creating.

I am glad I am feeling this way now but not when I was a teenager. I am glad I am following my dream now rather then when I wouldn't have been able to handle the pressure and the rejection. "

Thank you! It is wonderful to recieve encouragement!

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Thirteen

I was in the bakery near where I live today, buying some lunch - and got talking to the lady about film. I was asking if they'd consider catering for my next movie, because even when you're buying bread, you never stop thinking with your film hat on. So of course, I explained who I am and what I do - and she told me about her thirteen year old boy, and how he's been auditioning for acting jobs, and creating music; and doing all sorts of wonderful things.

And within two minutes and the buttering of a baguette -- she told me about how one minute she was young and wanted to see the world and the next minute she was working in a bakery for twenty years. And the boy is only thirteen but you can see she's hoping he's her ticket to see the world. She told me, quite touchingly, how more than anything she wants to make some money so she can take him to America. Because for her, that's where people like him will succeed.

But right now he's thirteen and he's got to figure out what he wants to do, without a heap of pressure on his shoulders. She said his music and acting could be terrible, what does she know, she's just his Mother. I said that his stuff probably is terrible but it's not what matters. Right now, he's thirteen. At sixteen he'll be better. I told her the thing I always tell Mother's of young talented people; I tell them how long it takes. I explain that "The X Factor" and "American Idol" are bullshit. They make it look like fame and success come after two minutes of talent and an audition. But that's not talent, that's a TV show and a bit of marketing. Real talent is spending your last penny on some bread and crying your eyes out because the nineteenth person in a row rejected you.

"The girl doesn't, it seems to me, have a special perception or feeling which would lift that book above the 'curiosity' level." -Rejection Slip for 'The Diary Of Anne Frank'

Talent takes a long time. Nobody cared about John Wayne's early films. Nobody turned up to Steve Martin's stand-up gigs for eight years.

But you're not thirteen anymore. You're twenty two or twenty nine or fifty six and nobody is watching or reading or buying your stuff. Or six people are when you need fifty thousand to break even. It's stressful, right? And one side of your brain is telling you to give up and the other side is telling you to get an office job for two months even though you know you will probably kill all the staff there. Everyone is trying to work it out. And right now your best friend has a role on Broadway, and you're struggling. But next year you sell a screenplay and get interviewed on TV, and that friend who was on Broadway is back on Broadway but he's selling tickets at the discount booth.

Your talent, your ideas, your voice; they're in constant development. Take my blog for example --- sometimes I nail it, sometimes I send you to sleep. Sometimes you're inspired, sometimes you wish I'd shut up. But hopefully, I get better at it. And it keeps growing. One minute you have one follower, the next you have two hundred, and it keeps going. You start out with no followers partly because you've not written anything yet, and partly because you're not the best you'll be yet. It's a lifetime commitment. We're not getting rich, but that was never the dream. The dream was to be artists. And that shitty feeling you get when you fuck up an audition or when a producer laughs you out of the room or you post your new film on Youtube and only get 9 views--------- that's the journey. You get stronger each time you fail.

But the thirteen year old just plays and experiments; and we need to hold on to that essence. We need to be kids in the front row.

Won't you let me walk you home from school?
Won't you let me meet you at the pool?
Maybe Friday I can
Get tickets for the dance
And I'll take you.

-Big Star - Thirteen

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