Is it Writer's Block Or Lost Passion?

Writer's block is a killer on creativity. When writers lose focus on the writing process, they defer to daily distractions as an escape mechanism. Washing dishes, searching the web, posting on social media, watching Tv, doing laundry and sleeping are a few activities that replace writing. As a result of these actions, writers question whether they lost their passion to keep writing. Writer's block and lost passion hold the power to starve creativity. There is hope to get back on track...

Writers automatically assume writer's block is to blame for stalled production, lack of effort, poor performance and low efficiency. It is not always writer's block that is holding writers back from moving forward to the next page. It is not always writer's block that is responsible for keeping a cursor flashing on a blank white screen. It is not always writer's block that delays projects from coming to fruition. What is causing writers to get frustrated?

The problem: Inhibited environments represent the source of low interest. If we are surrounded with supportive people who want us to thrive, we will maintain excitement to get work done. We can rely on these people to give us feedback. They will ask about our projects. They will understand that we need our quiet space. They will genuinely care about what we are working on. Unfortunately, most writers are not always so lucky to meet these ideal people. We can take control of our surroundings, emotions and feelings to make positive progress.

Our environment is never going to reflect the way we imagine it. There is constant noise that can distract us. People rarely stop gossiping about irrelevant matters. They have conversations out loud. They don't give us space. They need us to help them with their errands and projects. They want us to listen to their concerns. Writers deal with people sabotaging their dreams because they lack the confidence to speak up; they are pushovers with no backbone to stand tall.

Unfinished projects make us believe we lost our passion to dream. We can't get excited about what we once loved with our entire heart. We start envying people who are actually living the life we believe we deserve. We become jealous to hear that our competition achieved their dream. Meanwhile, we focus on doing too much of everything. We desire quick results instead of investing time, energy and effort into our pet projects. Our patience and perseverance are out of alignment. We keep talking about our projects to get attention. We act fake to make believe we are someone living our dream. We may act condescending to put others below us. Behind the scenes, we drag our feet and hang our heads down low to pity ourselves. Self-destructive attitudes are what block positive results.

Writer's block and lost passion are common excuses that writers use to feel better. Nobody wants to be viewed as uninspired and lazy. Lost passion is essentially allowing little things to get in the way our of big dream. Self-doubts, overthinking, excuses and distractions are defensive mechanisms that protect us from facing failure. We may fear people rejecting our talents and skills because we attach our identity to our dream. We may think that if we fail our dream, we will fail our purpose in this life.

Rewiring our brain to accept criticism is the first step to empowering positive/negative feedback to grow our writing into something beautiful, something inspiring. Hearing the truth saves us a lot of time. We may need to know what people really think. Does our story have potential? Will the audience enjoy watching this movie? What does our film resemble? Do we have a good theme? Sadly, some creative people capable of greatness expect people to always give their amateur and professional work kind compliments. In order to continue on with their passion, they need people to praise their every move. These people only share a snippet of their progress to win temporary acceptance. They treat attention and acceptance as oxygen. However, these writers remain stuck on page 5 of a 100 page script. We should not expect our work to be viewed as great: Life does not work this way.

People struggling with low confidence and low self-esteem require validation and acceptance to stay inspired and motivated. These people need other people to agree with their beliefs. They wait for others to give them 100 percent positive approval to move forward. They want people to praise their effort after sharing their pity parties. They need people to feel sorry for them. They want others to tell them what they want is guaranteed to happen. They need others to know they didn't waste their life away on impossible dreams. They depend on people to always pick them off the ground. They need people to see them, to notice them every day. The truth gets lost in the hay; it is the needle that will take forever to locate.

Athletes playing to win their coach's attention and approval will suffer after striking out, missing shots and dropping balls. Always remember that we are human beings choosing to use our gifts and talents. Win or lose, we are the same human beings. Just imagine all the possibilities, especially if we activate our laser focus to stay committed and not conflicted with what people think.

We either love our passion, or we are doing it for the wrong reasons. Seeking attention to nurse our unresolved issues is the quickest route to depression. Living for the opinions of others will lead to lifelong unhappiness. If we lose our passion, what is the reason for this happening? Did we have passion from the beginning? Are we following our dream just to be recognized as someone who is valuable? Do we lack self-worth? Do we have low self-esteem? Trying our best to pinpoint our lost passion, if this is important to us, will improve our future outlook. Time will never stop for us, so waiting for a better time is an excuse.

Our commitment as screenwriters should focus on building powerful stories into compelling movies. Take personal responsibility for your dream. If you need constant validation to live your dream, you will only focus on what other people think about your actions. Dreams don't work unless you do something to make them come true. It is as simple as starting a script and writing 100 pages. Keep revising your script until you believe the story fits your vision.

There is no right or wrong way to tell a story. Pay special attention to creativity, technique and theme to keep readers invested in your script. Write with conviction to stay on track: Follow your message and share your beliefs. An example of this approach is Jordan Peele's Get Out, a film that aims to convey racism as envying minorities for their physical strength and agility.    

Writer's block is a mental block that involves numerous components. When we sit at our computer constantly looking into space, we are dealing with a challenge much bigger than writer's block and lost passion. We may dislike our story. We may downplay our talents to get compliments. Our passion is what inspires us to take action on something that either happens now, happens later, or never happens at all. Trusting in our gifts and talents can reduce writer's block. Believing in ourselves will give us hope to continue on through the trenches.

If we complain about writer's block and losing our passion, we are accepting that we have problems that are blocking our production. Taking the easy way out to complain and whine about recurring setbacks will never get us anywhere. Sharing all the things that we do to live our dream is a bargaining chip to say people owe us. It is our job to wake up and be inspired. We must maintain our passion to keep moving forward. If we are struggling to start and/or finish projects, we must dig deeper to understand the source of this problem.

There are ways to improve our concentration. We can listen to good music during the writing process. We can enjoy our favorite drink. We can take vitamins. We can go on a walk. We can go hiking. We can purchase a nice pen. We can buy a cool notepad. We can use "focus-based" apps to switch between focus time and breaks. We can embrace distractions to make them a part of our characters. We can change our scenery. We can go to a beach and write. We can go to a motel off of the coast and write without distractions. We can schedule time to write daily. We can discipline our writing life.

Writer's block and lost passion are excuses to justify our lack of effort and low production. After years of making excuses to write scripts, I finally figured out that you must rescue yourself to overcome negative traits. We can get caught up in bad habits that restrict our personal growth. In contrast, we can transfer our bad habits, blocks and problems into our stories. Compelling characters can turn movies into emotional experiences because the audience may see a piece of their life experiences in the movie. They can embrace these personal connections, realizing the writer actually understands their life.

Writer's block and lost passion can mirror what is going on in our real lives. If we work with a co-writer who wants to control our entire story, we must re-evaluate whether to stay for the long haul or leave them behind to grow our dream elsewhere. We can outgrow mentors, teachers and coaches. These people can block us, making us think we are struggling with writer's block, low drive and lost passion.

Being on the same page requires two sides to compromise on one vision. Don't allow other people to walk all over you. They may tell you that they care about your dream and assure you that they will never do anything to harm you. However, their actions may show a darker side to their real motivation. What really matters to them is their dream What they really want is to succeed. What they need is your story. What they are doing is discarding your scenes, ideas and creativity to feed their egos. They may want to be viewed as smart, a genius and exceptionally talented. Somehow, we are letting someone push us back into the crowd.

Negative people find empowerment seeing other people experiencing pain and suffering. Step away from every person you believe is holding you back. If you miss them later on, they are important to your future. If you feel better without them, maybe they are a bad fit in your life. Sooner or later, you need to recognize that you can do what you want yourself. Never think you are not good enough. Hiding from your unresolved issues will delay your dreams. If you are not ready to embrace the spotlight, you have the freedom to step in the crowd and watch the show as an audience member.

Know the difference between writer's block, lost passion, or living a stressful life full of obstacles. Your dream will stop waiting for you to react. Nobody is to blame for your life. You control your dream. You can make or break your future. You can learn from your past to create profound movies with deeper meanings. You can stop listening to people who block your growth. You can change your scenery to restore your interest. If you care about your dream, you will make adjustments instead of resorting to excuses. May your dream come true.

Happy Screenwriting!

Lack of Effort To Build Dreams: Faking It And Never Making It

Some people are quick to share their dreams with perfect strangers. They are not afraid to reveal that they want to become a Hollywood actor, a director, a producer, a screenwriter, a singer, a YouTube star and an Instagram influencer. They can trick their audience into believing they are living the dream life. For some unknown reason, they enjoy getting high off of attention. They feed off of daily compliments to feel happy. They rely on daily engagement to boost their moods. Truth is, some creative artists rarely invest the right amount of effort to live their dreams.

Making excuses, constant complaining, excessive whining, self-doubting, overthinking, self-pitying, obsessing on insecurities, exposing vulnerabilities, lacking confidence, suffering with self-esteem, being self-destructive, self-sabotaging, fixating on problems and failing to confront unresolved issues get far more play time than investing time and energy into living dreams. Getting attention to feel valuable replaces hard work and discipline.

Accomplishing a realistic dream is highly possible... Unfortunately, some people are more excited about receiving attention than making a real difference in this world. They want to be told they are pretty and or handsome. They need people to validate their self worth. They desire success to love who they are in this life. So many dreams are lost to wasting time on social media, day-in, day-out.

Recurring failures somehow disrupt the small steps that grow dreams. Some people rarely take personal responsibility to admit fault after making mistakes: People automatically think their value, identity and worth are put into question. They need reassurance to know they matter.

Confidence is everything. If we focus on the competition, we will get jealous and envy others. Negative emotions can prevent people from living a positive life.

What if we just focus on what resources we need to pursue our dream? We may actually live our dream...

Actors and actresses should consider exercising their acting muscles. Taking acting classes, rehearsing scenes, making acting reels, acting in short films and volunteering for script table readings are positive actions to increase exposure. Having supreme confidence as a movie performer is pulling from the past to collaborate with the future. Do the work behind the scenes to build your acting career.

Directors can watch famous Hollywood directors reveal their tricks of the trade on Master Class. They can practice making storyboards, interpret screenplays and study past films. They can perform assembly actions to rearrange scenes and retell stories. Furthermore, they can work with actors to prepare for future directing jobs.  

Writers can read screenplays, write action-based stories, master dialogue, inject their stories with real life experiences, listen to podcasts, read blogs, write short scripts, work as an uncredited paid writer and collaborate with other writers to receive real feedback and perform script coverage. Writing every day is not enough to become a great writer. There are many steps to evolve as a writer. Conflict and resolution are critical components to write profound screenplays.

Learning the truth is extremely important. However, people are too weak minded to accept the truth. They get offended, feel judged, claim their boundaries are being crossed and even accuse others of controlling them. These people attack the people who care about them. They embrace people who give them fake attention.

As we see on social media, there are toxic people lurking around to shame others. They criticize people who do not fall align with their thoughts and beliefs. The same people return to leave fake compliments and praises. Meanwhile, the page owners are dealing with internal pain that is left untreated. Wasting time on social media is the single biggest factor that will stall dreams. If we want to impress people, we will become obsessed with posting content, making stories, producing likes and receiving comments.

Honing your draft relies on giving effort. Staying disciplined can keep us on the right track to grow our dreams. Doing things that we love to do will make us happy. Infusing our projects with what we know best will retain our focus. We can control our effort to build our dreams...

Happy Screenwriting!

Suggestions Not Judging: Creating compelling characters

Screenwriting is a creative art that requires criticism to make progress. In order to become a professional screenwriter, we should accept constructive criticism as helpful feedback that can give us solid ideas.

Getting stuck in our comfortable ways to protect our ego can/will hold us back. There are vulnerable writers who view suggestions as judging their character.

Judging is unfairly criticizing someone without having all the facts present. A woman with tattoo sleeves is viewed as a stripper. "You are weak for allowing everyone to take advantage of you," is a negative statement. "You are terrible with your finances," is making a poor judgement of someone who does not earn as much at their current job. "Your finances will be the reason we will not get funding," is another inconsiderate judgemental statement if someone is not the sole reason for this potentially happening. 

What is not considered judging is telling someone that if they did not allow a certain person they complain about often to interfere in their life, they would not have to go back to a bad situation. We can tell them that if they gave more effort, they would have already accomplished their dream. The trigger word that sparked this person: Effort. They believe they have given a lot of effort. Truth is, they lost their passion to create. They allowed stress and pressure to rule their life. For this reason, they would constantly reach out for help. Unfortunately, they never applied valuable advice to better their life.  

Some people just need attention. They thrive off of sympathy. They need to be heard. They rely on another ear that will listen to their problems. They want us to blame other people. We're not supposed to solve other people's problems. Unresolved issues can block these people from taking actions. 

Whatever unresolved issues these people are dealing with come to the surface. They immediately get offended, switching the spotlight back to you—deflecting. They will attack your lack of effort. They will tell you to give up on your dream. Instead of appreciating your advice, they will consider your advice as judging. 

Unresolved issues can spark low confidence, insecurities, shame, lack of success, low self-worth, depression, unhappiness, vulnerabilities, self-consciousness and inferiority. It is a multi-headed monster that can unleash fury on us without notice. 

We must think of positive words to not offend them. We must compliment them to stroke their fragile ego. We must give them false praise to boost their moods. 

Just think about the value of life experiences. Our interactions with people who struggle with a wide range of challenges are useful to expand our screenwriting. No moment in life can ever go wasted. We can use everything in our past to create compelling characters. 

People fear getting judged because they secretly know they are doing these negative things. If they already shared their indiscretions before, it is not judging to bring these topics up again during their "complaining and whining' storms. Being honest to help pinpoint the source of problems can empower people. Overly sensitive people who feel guilty inside feel judged.    

Confident people don't worry about judgmental people. They don't focus on what people think and say. They concentrate on urgent priorities that can/will improve their current situation. Schedules and deadlines replace overthinking to maximize time. 

Good screenwriting is recycling real life events to build characters. We meet certain people for a reason;  there are no accidents. Taking notes to save the past can work magic in our future scripts. 

Many people feel judged. Many people never seek counseling. Many people get triggered over internal pain. We can't control what happens outside of our lives. People have a right to act any way they want. It is not up to us how they live their lives. If they waste our time and energy returning back with the same problems they refuse to confront, re-evaluate your relationship with them. 

When people accuse you of judging them, they hold your opinion on a pedestal. If you mention being disappointed, they will take this to heart. Be careful what you say to vulnerable people. Recycle all past experiences to infuse your script with valuable content to teach people. 

What are we about? What is our message? How can we save people from making costly mistakes? Make your screenwriting a learning experience to spread true wisdom. 

Happy Screenwriting! 

    

The End. Closure in Your Script

The end of anything good is never fun. Reaching the end of something bad can give us great relief. Sometimes we are not ready to leave our past just yet. We need extra time to heal our hearts and minds: Closure. If you are a screenwriter, “The End” represents a powerful moment to celebrate.

“The End” of many ends... Draft after draft... Sleepless nights.... Many creative thoughts... Lack of support... Criticism... Eventually, there is an end to your screenplay. Screenwriters ponder on that last moment to finish their screenplays. The ending is so important because it can leave an everlasting impression on viewers.

How will you end your masterpiece? What is a good movie ending? Cliffhanger? Happy ending? Sad ending? Bittersweet ending? Redemption ending? The ending is the resolution that ties your story together.

The Third Act should be impactful. Reward the audience. Make “The End” count. The Green Mile has a tearjerking ending. We remember emotional movies that touch our souls.

Spend extra time on the ending. Think of clever ways to close your script. However you choose to end your screenplay, just know “The End” can make or break your story.

The End.

Happy Screenwriting! 

Humility is A Dying Breed: Social Media Is Ruining Screenwriting

Only a Film Degree--We must work to be screenwriters

We all know humble. We all know braggers. We all know action. We all know inaction...

Social media has casted a negative light on the writing world. On social media platforms, more people talk about the act of writing instead of waking every day to be proactive go-getters. In hindsight, writers once got work done; they completed scripts to option. Unfortunately, social media has turned screenwriting into a dream that is viewed as unreachable.

Screenwriting is an art form. It is also a discipline that requires time, energy and effort. Truth is, finished scripts are appealing to producers. There is little demand for unfinished scripts because they can't be produced. What separates professional screenwriters from aspiring screenwriters: Discipline.

Think about these comparisons: I am working on my degree versus I earned my degree. Any person can be working on a degree; however, only a select few will actually satisfy all the requirements to complete their degree programs.

Screenwriting is made out to be difficult. The real truth is that anything in life can be difficult if we fear the next step. We can make waking up on time to reach work a major challenge. We can make exercising daily an insurmountable task. We can postpone talking to someone we like over the lack of confidence. Placing constraints on our screenwriting will create fear. A large number of people worry about criticism. They automatically assume that receiving criticism is a precursor to failure. Their dream is better shared in forums, on discussion boards, on social media and in real life conversations.

Braggers need to draw attention to themselves. They need this attention to feel worth. The problem with sharing our dreams without doing the work is that we can block access to production. We spend way too much time trying to impress people with our creative ideas. We may post images about what we are supposedly doing, even if we are not actually working hard perfecting our craft. We will ask other writers/people what they think about our ideas so they can praise us. Condescending, bitter and petty attitudes can rule our emotions. We need to prove people wrong all the time. We fake being successful to create that adrenaline rush, that pure excitement of what it's like to accomplish a dream. Nevertheless, we can get carried away with all the attention that our dreams bring us.

Humble writers make movie magic happen. They wake up motivated and inspired to write. They write at their most vulnerable moments. They revise their previous projects. They don't crave attention. They already know their value as human beings choosing to be writers. There is no internal motivation to trick people, unless these themes are injected into characters.

Know the difference between being humble and bragging. If you are working hard, you earned the right to talk about your success. On the flip side, talking about the dream and not taking action to make it happen will delay the inevitable. Don't waste time. Your screenwriting dream will only come true if you do.

Happy screenwriting!