Idea Share

Yesterday, I had a transformative experience.  I sat in a conference room with 11 other writers who had all committed to a goal of writing a television pilot script in the month of October.  We committed four hours on a Saturday to listen to each other explain our creative ideas.  Instead of making excuses...

• I have work to do.
• I'm busy.
• I have better ways to spend my time.
• I've got my own script to be working on.
• If I share, that means I'm taking away something from myself.

We decided to get together and share.  And that's transformative because it's the Pro who knows that they aren't giving away opportunity by reaching out and helping others.  I heard great ideas.  I heard fully fleshed out great ideas.  And I heard glimmers of great ideas.  I heard ideas that are making people think and expanding their own idea of what they can do.  I heard commercial ideas and non-commercial ideas.  And we all had our own ways of getting to the same goal of writing a new script.  Some people had notes.  Other people spoke off the top of their heads.  Some folks had fully fleshed out treatments that they read from.  It was an excellent lesson in process.  And it was a validation that we all have separate processes.  

I needed that.  

I am confident in my ability to generate ideas.  I have been at it for a long time.  So I was getting ready last week for this session and I felt like I had a solid idea.  I had gone out to get a book on this idea.  I had been researching for awhile.  I was getting ready to set up some interviews.  I was knee deep in this idea.  Then I had a meeting with a business associate and this person gave me a new idea.  Well, she didn't give it to me so much as dig something out in me that I hadn't put the spotlight on (more on that in a later blog post).  

But what did I do initially?  I pushed that idea to the side.  Then I went back to my office and started working on the original idea.  Then I was driving home and this new idea started to take shape.  I had the structure of the series, the main character, the world, the concept, the next several seasons all begin to take shape on that drive home.  Then I went to the office on Saturday before our session and started to work out those ideas.  It became clear what I needed to work on.  The ideas were flowing out of me.

With my other idea, I had the characters, the world and some conflicts.  But it didn't just come together.  

It was great for us to come together and share what we're working on with each other.  I know all of these writers and I'm confident that they're pretty talented.  And sitting down for four hours to hear all of these ideas seemed overwhelming at first, but it was great.  I'm just happy to have a group of people I trust and a safe, pleasant space to work in.  I felt like I was welcoming them into my creative home and it was terrific.  The ideas were in various stages of readiness, and I felt like I learned a lot just by listening to the ideas and getting to comment on what I responded to.  

I'm finding that it's rare to have a group of people I respect and who have the same interests, work ethic and ability.  When all of those things come together, I feel like it's important to support that in whatever way possible.

I am grateful for friendships.

I am grateful for creative space.

I am grateful for kindness.

I am grateful to have a place to go to every day to write.