There comes a time when you realize you're a pussy. That there are things you tell yourself you want but you don't take the risks to actually have them. Like stand up comedy - I'm a guy who gets some laughs at a party, but as any professional will tell you, its one thing to crack wise over wobbly pops and another to stand in front of an audience and entertain. It's a different dialogue is how HF put it - and it's an experiment that doesn't actually cost all that much - the cost, that stops me, is the work of writing some jokes and the risk of being embarrassed. As if I don't manage quite enough of that already by being a funny smart guy who doesn't risk much of anything.
Negative introspection, they say, isn't all that useful - but its a trope I've grown good at. THAT I've practiced…THAT I've written about - though having been told its unproductive I try and at least do the exercise of telling myself 'red flag' when I'm doing it and forcing myself on to something else. And so I've been here before and made deals with myself.
I've stopped worrying as much about posting shit on the internet - increasingly this navel gaving stuff because, guess what? - I'm introspective. I write this kind of stuff endlessly and exposing it to the world - or the 5 or 6 automated bots that crawl through my blog posts - is an act of self-exposure that I tell myself will thicken my skin to actually attempt 'real' writing on stuff other than the fluff in my navel.
But then I think of Woody Allen - who made a career out of his neuroses, and all the geniuses out there that tell you to write what you know. What I know is how easy it is to get wrapped up in yourself, in the endless questions, the empty dharmas that you know cognitively have no real 'answer' - there's nothing in your head that can actually simulate what will happen if you take action in the world.
Many, like 12 or more years ago, I told myself - alright, write 200 pages of stream of consciousness and then edit it. Well to avoid doing that I became a picture editor and honed my skills making sense of other people's bullshit (erm - awesome, concise, supremely beautiful material) - because a picture editor like an AD or any of the creative yet 'below the line' positions has the luxury of not really being responsible for the problem they are trying to solve. Generally a producer or a director hires an editor to either completely take on the writing and organizing of a movie (in the case of documentary) - and those are the projects I like, because I like writing and structuring and story editing, or to execute as best as possible the producer's and director's ideas. But you're doing it for a cheque, and if it's 'bad' - well, you didn't shoot it now did you? So the upside is a constructive detachment - which is why I recommend to all you producers and directors to hire an editor - objectivity AND craft is worth shelling out the candy - but the downside is lack of ownership. At the end of the day it's rare that the editor's role is ever mentioned, it's possible you don't get invited to the award shows, and with the passage of time, perhaps naturally, the final film begins to seem inevitable as if the chasm between what the producer and director dreamt and shot, and the final product never actually existed. Of course the movie needed a Lord of the Rings style opening, of course the title, tag line etc sprang fully formed onto the press materials.
So for me the 'cost' of editing is bitterness. Too pussy to really lead, I lead as much as I can in the editing, and then beat myself up that the pats on the head stop and people have moved onto other things.
Which gets me back to this mass of wallowing and self-absorption - oh wait, that's being negative - this mass of self-exploration and discovery which only slowly is seeing the light of day.
What's good about journal writing, stream of consciousness, etc, is that on any day, hopefully, you start repeating yourself - and that moment of recognition allows you a little detachment, to either look at what is bothering you in a different way, or to try and find the universal in what feels at the moment of writing, to be so deeply personal. So I know by the sheer weight of statistics that my bullshit is actually common. Not universal certainly, because we all vary along the gradients of introspective and extroverted, novelty seeking or conservative -- but sufficiently banal and common that 20% or even 2% of you know exactly what I mean. You might not express it in the same way, because, well, we're all somewhat odd ducks and I was actually dropped on my head in an age before kiddie knapsacks had five point safety harnesses.
And so that is my take away. To avoid just calling myself a pussy for not taking more chances like trying stand up, or pitching, or actually polishing anything I've written - I'm just airing my laundry on a blog. These silly questions - which amount I'm aware to long boring rationalizations for my actions or lack of actions - by exposure hopefully force me towards proactivity. I'm hoping it's a bit like AA. My name is John, and I like to gaze at my navel and then blame myself for not taking enough chances.
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