Working for a Living

My outgoing voicemail message on my cell phone says that I'm "busy, busy, busy." 

I recorded this - years before I was actually "busy, busy, busy." My friend tease me about it all of the time. My friends who mediate would say that I manifested my schedule. The rest of the people I know would say that I was full of shit and at a certain point it just happened. Neither group is particularly wrong. I was actually busy. I was writing a lot before I actually got paid to do it.

When I was in grief counseling, I complained to my counselor that I wasn't really a working writer because I hadn't get gotten a paycheck for writing. He looked me in the eye and said, "Yes you are a working writer. You write full time. You just don't get paid yet."

A common conversation among writers is either about the next job or the first job. We're obsessed with what is to come. And I suppose we should be - that's what gets us up in the morning to write. Right? 

For a long time, I didn't get up in the morning to write. I got up in the morning to go to my day job as an assistant to a successful TV literary manager. I worked 10-12 hours a day, answering phones, reading scripts and generally feeling pretty productive. But none of that productivity was geared towards anything I really wanted to be doing. I was helping out my boss or the other managers in the office. I was an amazing assistant - kind, thoughtful, helpful, attentive and smart. I say smart last because I felt like that was the thing that mattered the least. It was a given that I would be smart, but not essential. I just needed to do my job with a smile. It was a good job for about three years. Then it was a bad job for the other four years I stayed on. I don't think I wasted any time being there - I did for several years after I left the company. But now that I'm writing on a show and co-running a theatre company and juggling my own projects, I see that it was an extended course in multitasking and splitting my focus. It taught me a lot - of what I don't want. And I learned that lesson repeatedly for a long time.

Once I started working for bosses who appreciated me, I understood my value and worth. It was that job that showed me that I had a lot to offer as a producer. And thankfully, that wonderful job only lasted six months. Lots of life happened in between and I started teaching about three months after that job ended. And that only lasted three months. Then I was on my own again, collecting unemployment and writing a lot. I kept at it - despite needing to work other jobs. I stayed afloat somehow. The Universe didn't present a lot of opportunities to work day jobs. I had put my time in. It kept giving me free time and I kept using that free time. 

Eventually, I realized that I don't love free time either. So I started writing a lot more. And now I wake up in the morning to work out, then have breakfast, then write, then send business emails, then have lunch, then do some more work or run errands. On the days I'm in the writers room, I'm up at 5 AM then I drive to the gym closest to my office and I work out. Then I have breakfast and get to the office early to get work done. Then I spend 8 hours pitching ideas and feeling my brains ooze out the side of my face. I drive home in traffic - or I wait it out - and I tire out on the drive home and watch You Tube videos before going to bed. When I'm teaching, I either start my morning in LA and then drive down to San Diego around 11 AM or I drive down at 5:30 AM (which I'm doing tomorrow) and I go work from my office. I grab lunch on campus and I have office hours before teaching back to back classes.

So now I actually am "busy, busy, busy." I keep a strict schedule - strict-ish. I like routine. I didn't always. I used to HATE routine. I used to think it inhibited my creativity. I used to also think outlines hindered my creativity. Now I love them - for TV and screenplays. I love order as much as I love the disorder. I think I spent a lot of my formative years in disorder as a desperate cry for help in trying to find order. I was incredibly unfocused as a kid in a lot of ways. Where I was focused was on TV and on my comic books. I was also a good student. But I didn't care about it much. I knew I was smart. I didn't feel like I needed to be the smartest guy in class. I settled for #2 or #3. I'm probably being very generous with myself.

I felt myself propelled towards things I LOVED. I loved words and images. I loved to be entertained. I knew from a very young age that I would be working in Hollywood somewhere. Even as a kid, I knew that I wanted to choose the stories that would show up on TV. I didn't know how that would manifest itself.  But I was a young kid and I'd record TV show theme songs. I was fascinated. Eventually, I would go into theatre because I also loved the expression of pure creativity. I loved dance and theatre. I loved things that existed in real time. 

Somehow all of that got me to this moment. I'm at a Peet's Coffee in Larchmont Villlage on my new MacBook Pro waiting to drive downtown to go to see FUN HOME with my friends at the Ahmanson.  For so long, I wanted to be surrounded by the same smart people I was around in college and graduate school. I moved to LA and got involved in the business. I networked. I schmoozed. I did all the things I thought I had to do to be successful. What I didn't do was write enough. I still thought that my charm was enough. Eventually I realized that hard work was everything. 

I'm living a life that I'm pretty psyched about. I have great colleagues. I have peers who inspire me and push me. I knew quite a few writers who are better than me. And that makes me better. I also get to write for a living. I'm in awe. By my colleagues who are smarter than me in the room. By my showrunner. By my friends in my theatre company who have a deeper, greater vision than I do. I'm constantly amazed by all of this greatness around me. I don't feel like I'm the best. I know I'm pretty damn good. But I don't look around and feel like I'm better than everyone around me. That would scare me. I need to be inspired and challenged. I don't need to be the best. I just need to be better than yesterday. And that could be spiritually, emotionally, physically as well as a better writer. I'm happy to be more thoughtful and enlightened than the day before. That's enough. And that's plenty.

My intention is growth.

My intention is to shine.

My intention is to smile.

My intention is to speak up.

My intention is to ask.

My intention is to wonder.

I am grateful for friendships.

I am grateful for this beautiful machine.

I am grateful for my body.

I am grateful for my schedule.

I am grateful for the work.

In My Own Voice

I had dinner last week with my fellow writers on our last day in the writers room.

My friend Gina and I sat next to each other in this darkly lit, romantic restaurant in Woodland Hills. We've been friends for over ten years and Gina has seen my work evolve. We worked on a ten minute play festival together that we produced with other NYU alumni writers. We've been good friends for a long time and Gina has always been supportive. She has come to various play readings of mine and came to one over the summer of the play I wrote that I basically feel has changed the way I write.

As we've sitting over dinner and everyone else is talking, Gina leans over and says, "You know, I have to tell you again how great that play is." I nodded politely and thanked her. "I don't think we've ever talked about it. Is [my manager] sending it out?"

I told her that he wasn't - we actually share the same manager. Then she proceeded to tell me something really beautiful and humbling. She said that the play was something special. That she knew my work and that my other work was good, but this was ME. I listened to her compliments, which were so kind, and I just nodded with the occasional thank you. I told her that I had been afraid to write in that voice because I felt like it was too much. She looked me right in the eye.

"You should always write in that voice. That's your voice."

I have been writing since I was in the seventh grade. Miss Russell would have us write short stories and all of my stories were about comic book heroes because all I did was watch TV and read comic books. Then in high school I stopped reading comic books and I started writing little short stories or novellas. I wrote something that was 120 pages once - at my little computer in the corner during one summer. I think it was about the boy across the street that I had a crush on. In college, I wrote more fiction and eventually started writing plays.

I couldn't stop writing. I had a lifetime's worth - at that point, 20 years - of things to say. I never thought it was bad, but I knew my writing wasn't as good as it could be. I thought that about my writing for years. I had emotion that I couldn't tap into. I didn't know if I ever would tap into it. I was writing characters who were supposed to be far more mature than I. But nothing stopped me. I wanted to be that person I saw myself becoming one day.

Eventually, I got to graduate school. And then I got out here to LA to try and write in TV. I had developed a personality, but my writing didn't have that distinction. Yet I was still obsessed to become a better writer. And through writing I became better. I became a skilled technician as a writer. And with some luck, I would have had a career as that writer. I am of mixed race - someone should have hired me back then. I should have had a career earlier purely because I checked a lot of boxes - I could have been a very rich quota filler.

Year after year, I would get angrier and more frustrated that something wasn't happening. I would hear bosses and people I respected say to me, "You're doing all of the right things." Yet, it never felt that way. The one thing that kept me going was that I could feel myself getting better. I knew that in script after script, I was getting better. And for the record, I had some excellent spec scripts for shows like The Office, 30 Rock and Modern Family. I stand by the proficiency of all of those specs. I also had about 10 others that were at various levels of good. Any of these scripts could or should have gotten me a job at that point, I thought. I just was tired of waiting.

But something gnawed at the back of my brain. I had no voice. I was funny in person. I was weird. I was attractive and liked to socialize. I had stopped being shy and awkward and became someone who could fake being cool - or at least, cool enough. At that point, I was even living a Hollywood life - by hitching my wagon to a guy to whom that was of paramount importance. So I made it important to me. But I did nothing to find this voice. I found a lot of noise to distract and to drown out any silence so it wouldn't be obvious that I had no voice in my writing. And at that time, I literally had no voice in my relationship. I was living someone else's dream of how to live.

We broke up. My Dad got sick. (I'm fast-tracking this because a lot of this stuff I've covered throughout the history of this blog.) I didn't know if I wanted to be a writer any more. It felt stupid. It felt indulgent and selfish. And I wasn't successful at it. But late at night I wrote anyway. Dad had bad days and I had to hold a lot of my own pain and suffering in. I had to be his caretaker. So at night, I would write - waiting for him to wake up and need something. I wrote things that had no real consequence. I wrote to keep from going crazy - it didn't matter to my what I was writing. I needed something to distract me. Then I found my way into another relationship - this time with someone much nicer, but also someone who needed me to be something I wasn't. I still hadn't gotten over that.

Dad died. I took a year to do nothing but go to therapy once a week. I didn't work. I lived off of unemployment for much longer than I needed to. But it was there and I kept getting extensions and I thought, "Why the fuck not?" I decided to take time for me. And I did a lot of soul searching during that time. I still hadn't found my voice yet. Not even the direct aftermath of my Dad's death would do that. But I had started writing about death in my work - I never had a character die or dealt with death anywhere in my plays or spec TV pilots. The good thing was that I spent a lot of time writing and getting better at writing these pilots. I got involved with my writers group to run writing challenges and to encourage my fellow writers to write pilots. I had worked in a development job for seven years where I got to see first hand what it was like to create some of the most influential TV shows of the past decade. I knew things. And I needed a community. So I took advantage and made myself available. I had a lot of friends tell me I should become an executive or a manager. But I felt too old for that, even years ago. And I was stubborn. I was going to write. I realized that even though nothing was more important than taking care of my Dad when he was sick, that I had to write. And I wasn't going to let a fickle TV industry tell me who I was or should be as a writer. I stopped chasing the dragon. I wrote without getting paid. In the two year period when I decided that I was going to make time to write no matter what, I wrote eight scripts and 3000 pages. I didn't care whether or not I was going to be called a writer by other people. I was writing.

Two years ago - in the second year of that two year period - I proposed a play to a theatre company that was going to develop five new plays with writers. I had seen a news report the year earlier about active shooter drills and I wanted to write an epic eight character play about it. And I did. And it had all of the characteristics of plays I had written before. It had humor. It had a crafty structure. It was smart. But if I'm being honest, it didn't have that specific voice. I love that play. I owe my TV career to that play. People like that play. I am so grateful for that play.

People did really like the play. And I had a friend tell me this was my "silver bullet play." It's her theory that there's that piece of material that "hits it out of the ballpark (a phrase that I hate, but not hers)." It's this idea that you've got the play that cuts through it all. It was the best thing I had written up to that point. It's a great play for a number of reasons. And in the middle of writing that play, I had two friends ask me when I was going to write about my Dad and when I was going to write a play in the voice that's how I talk to them - full of vulgarities and no fucks. I flippantly said they were the same play.

And they were.

Because so many people told me that the shooter play was going to be my silver bullet, I started writing this other play. The shooter play had a great reading - so wonderful and fulfilling. But I couldn't listen to more complements. They were starting to raise my expectations and I knew that was dangerous for me. So I started on this other thing. I brought in the first 19 pages to my writers group and the head of the group flipped over it. "Keep writing. This is fucking amazing." My stomach had been turning at the thought of hearing it out loud because I had never written like this before. I finished the play three months later.

Long story only slightly shorter: He read it. He loved it. The company committed to a workshop. Then they asked me to join the company. Then we did a workshop five months later and that's the reading Gina saw.

That was my voice. 

It was me. I couldn't hide. I was vulgar and talking about my sex life and my dad's death. I was bare. And it was the play that made me see myself differently. I often say that my dad's death broke me open. Well, this play broke me open as a writer. I am different now.

And my friend Gina telling me that I was a good writer before, but that this was another level, really made me feel thankful for the entirely of my journey. This writer gets to experience the joy of writing this play. If I had the other things happen - purely out of luck, because I was no where near the writer I am now - then maybe I wouldn't be here for this. This is the guy I was trying to be. And now I don't know the person I'll be beyond this guy. But if life has taught me anything in the past five years, it's to  shout out to the Universe at the top of my lungs:

Surprise me.

I've learned to LOVE surprises.

My intention is to not know.
My intention is openness.
My intention is wonder.
My intention is expansion.
My intention is adventure.

I am grateful for the years nothing happened.
I am grateful for the more than 20 scripts I have written.
I am grateful for time.
I am grateful for patience.
I am grateful for my stubbornness.
I am grateful for my joy.
I am grateful that I am the person who wrote that play.

My New MacBook Pro

My old computer had it.

It was tired of having to be the recipient of all of my creative ideas. Some of the best stuff I've written was written on that guy. I had inherited this computer from my brother and sister-in-law a few years ago when my computer wasn't working and they had this old MacBook that they had spilled water on years before, but only revived when a free replacement keyboard was offered. Then the computer came back to life, but they didn't need it anymore, so they gave it to me.

And it was a godsend. I liked that it was a Mac. I liked that it didn't have a broken keyboard, like mine, which required that i bring a huge keyboard with me wherever I went to write. It got the job done for sure, but I needed something that could be more mobile. Then I got this beautiful white MacBook and brought it with me to coffee shops, libraries, the office I had for a short time. Last year, I had been thinking about getting a new computer. It was probably time. I wanted something of my own. But my brother convinced me to wait - this computer still worked and there would be more advances made with MacBooks in the years to come. Wait until it was worth it - like two or three years, he said.

Then the computer just took longer and longer to work. I kept getting the "pinwheel." Then the magnet on the charger started being fickle and it was hard to charge the computer. I knew old whitey was on her way out. Then the new MacBook Pro came out with the touch pad. I had thought about the MacBook that came out last year, but it looked slight and it was basically a new version of the Air.

Finally, last weekend I went to the Apple Store and thought, "It's time. I have the money. I need it and I'm going to do it." So I did. And I set the computer up this past week. I did the data migration myself and waited five hours while my files transferred to the new computer. Then I opened it and now it's sitting on my lap. It's three pounds. It's Space Grey. It looks great. And now I look like the cool dude when I'm somewhere on the computer.

But that's not why this computer's terrific. It's terrific because it's the first computer I bought for myself as a professional writer. Writing bought this computer. And I'm ready to do more writing on it. I have said that 2016 broke me open as a writer, though the work I've done in the writer's room and on my play. I feel different as a writer now. And I'll be writing my next projects on this new computer. It's appropriate that this different writer is working on a different laptop. I've got this cool new case for it that looks like an envelope. I've stepped up my game professionally and this computer is evidence of that.

Why does all of that matter? Is this just me being in love with looking cool with the new MacBook Pro?

The truth is that I can find a way to get work done. In college, I didn't even have a computer and did all of my work in the computer lab. I wrote plays in the computer lab because I had to. I will find a way to get work done, no matter what. But this new guy makes my life a hell of a lot easier. It's faster. I can do some simple editing on it. And I can finally have my Netflix and HBO Go on here, which I didn't have before. I had everything on my phone.

I feel like I can move faster with this new machine. I'm pretty excited about it. It's the computer I deserve for the work I have been doing. I'm starting to get that.

My intention is to work.
My intention is to expand.
My intention is to keep going.

I am grateful for this new computer.
I am grateful for my friends for their patience and feedback. 
I'm grateful for some time to rest and catch up.

Another Room Closed

I'm done with my second writer's room. I've been in two writer's rooms in the past year. And now the second one is done. I now face the thing I always face when I'm done with something.

What now?

Well, yesterday I set up my new computer, which I'm typing on now. It feels pretty great to be writing on, too. I finished the writer's room on my old computer and the next day I got this one. I waited a few days to put it together. I had a birthday - this was my present to myself. A pretty good present. This is the computer bought with my writing money.

I have a hunger I didn't have before. I think for so long I wanted to be a good writer. I started writing in seventh grade and just wanted to be good at something. And I wrote and wrote and wrote. Eventually, that got me places in my life. I wrote in college and I got to grad school, where I was very bad. For a long time, I was the eternal student. Trying to learn how to do it. Then I got good at it. Then it wasn't all that interesting because I was writing in order to get hired. I was in the constant state of proving myself.

Then life stopped and I had a period of several years where I wrote because I had to. My Dad got sick. I wrote when he was sleeping. Writing was survival. Then that period of time was over. I probably took about six weeks off writing after my Dad died. But then it became survival again. I had stopped writing to get on some TV show or something. I wrote because I had to. I wrote because I would die if I didn't.

Then three years ago, I started writing a lot more. I wrote 1000 pages that year, which I thought was a lot. Then the next year I wrote 2000 pages. Around that time, I was so in love with writing that I decided that even if I didn't work professionally, it would be okay. I wrote a play that I knew was good - even if no one thought it was. I knew I had done something. I had accomplished something. And it took a lot out of me. I ignored my relationship in order to write this play. I'm an obsessive person and I learned that year that I was okay with that. I lost a boyfriend, but got something better - a new play. I can say that I made the right choice because we're becoming friends again. But focusing on trying to be the perfect boyfriend took too much energy.

Then last year, I got my first professional writing gig. I started my writers room as I was finishing the play that would become my favorite play I've ever written. Finally, my ability and my heart met up.

So what does this all mean?

I leave this writer's room with renewed confidence I didn't have before. My friend Jen and I had drinks a couple of weeks ago. I walked in to the bar and she looked at me, "What have you been doing to look so sexy and confident?" I told her that I had to wake up at 5 AM every morning so that I could avoid traffic. I got to the gym by 6:15 and started working out. So because I've been working out five days a week for the past six weeks,  I think I look better - and therefore, I'm more confident. But what I didn't mention or realize was that I was better in the room this year. I had gotten over my shyness. I was now a Co-Producer, so a leader in some way.  I had gotten better at pitching ideas in the room. Also, I had spent the three months before the room started teaching - and that boosted my confidence. I'm about to go back to teaching on Thursday - I wonder how I will have changed as a teacher?

I walked into that bar with a swagger because I'm more in my own skin than I have ever been. Yeah, I'm more muscley. But I'm owning who I am. And that feels transcendent. That hasn't really happened to such a degree before.

I'm looking forward to what THAT writer writes next - to what that writer produces. I want to be that writer. That's the goal. To be the writer I'm meant to be. Sounds like an ad for Diane von Furstenberg. As I leave this writers room, I know that I have become a better writer/producer/professor/ professional. I'm better because of these gigs. And each job helps me be better at the next one.

I find that I'm not in such a hurry anymore. I don't know if that's a result of age or experience. But I'm not so worried that I'm not going to get it. I now know that time is a factor. I have to settle into this person in order to see what this person does. Better writing will come as a result of letting this person show himself. Of course, I need to keep the machine moving. I still have to spend every morning at the metaphorical ballet barre, practicing my form and technique. I still have to do my rudiments. I still have to read and research and watch things. But the growth will come just as much out of a result of life progressing while I'm doing all of these things. I guess they work in tandem.

My intention is wonder.
My intention is delight.
My intention is growth.
My intention is progression.

I am grateful for this new MacBook Pro.
I am grateful for the work that went into its purchase.
I am grateful for the money that paid for it.
I am grateful for the future work that will be created on it.
I am grateful for the professionalism I feel because of it.

Procrastination in Real Time

I'm at the West Hollywood Library surrounded by people trying to get work done. Computers are out, notes are out, people are looking at their phones…researching, I'm assuming.

I have two things I should be working on. I really should be working on my episode rewrite. I have all of my notes. I have a lot to do. And yet, it's the last thing I want to do right now. 

I also have a pilot I rewrote and could be doing some work on as well. I took some notes on it this weekend. I'm heading to a WGA event tonight where I will be letting people know I have a new sample. And yet, I'm staring down the script with all of my notes on it.

I have student papers to grade, too. 

It's a gloomy, foggy, overcast shitty day in LA. It's the PERFECT day to get work done. Any work done. I'm out of my office today to work on the episode rewrite. I have five hours until this event at the WGA. I should be doing more. 

I worked out today. Really hard. My body feels sore. 

I need to work out my brain really hard. My mind should feel sore.

And yet, here I am, as I often am wondering where my motivation has gone. I can blame my muscles - I can really feel them right now. I can blame the fact that I lost my headphones and haven't gotten new ones yet, so I can drown out the sound around me. But none of that is the source of my procrastination. 

Resistance is standing over my shoulder right now. I can feel it breathing down my neck. And it's winning. I'm hungry. I should go downstairs and eat. I should do more than I'm doing now, that's for sure. 

I even took five minutes to look at my phone, resisting writing this blog. That's how crazy it is right now. 

I sent an email to my writer's group about submissions being due tomorrow.

I am still hungry. I probably will go eat.

I have carne asada and a cabbage slaw.

Trying not to have to buy dinner - there's a small meal provided at the WGA event later. I'm being frugal. I'm done with work in a week and only have two weeks worth of checks and two script payments left. I'm not in the poor house. But I'm trying to be conservative in my spending.

I realized that I'm going to a WGA event every night this week, except for Friday. That means I've got dinner covered every night this week. And on Friday, the writers in my room are being taken out to dinner. How much am I loving that? A lot.

I just checked Facebook and found out that my friend Tracee is in Rome and I sent a gelateria recommendation. I want to go back to Italy. I also want to go to Spain, my friend Tony is going there this summer and I'm tempted to meet him there. But I also want to be working on a TV show by this summer. Oh, Jesus. So much to do and want.

I've been here at the library for almost an hour and haven't done any work yet. Okay.  I'm going to go have lunch.

And THEN -

My intention is to work.

My intention is to stay awake.

My intention is to keep focused - and not on the cute guy across from me.

My intention is to grow.

I am grateful for overcast days that feel perfect for writing.

I am grateful for a quiet library.

I am grateful for love and friendship.

I am grateful for work to do, even if it's so much work that it feels overwhelming.

I am grateful for typing skills that allow me to look at the hot guy (still distracted) across the room while typing. 

I am grateful for my Adidas hi tops, which might become a conversation starter.

I am grateful for every opportunity I've had this year.

I am grateful for many words to say.

I am grateful that my imagination is open and fruitful.

Body, Mind and Soul United

I love quiet mornings.

For the past five weeks, I have gotten up at 5 AM, left the house by 5:30 and gotten to the gym by 6:15-6:30. I have worked out at the gym, showered and headed to Whole Foods to have soup for breakfast. I would read at a table there or answer emails and then wait until 8 AM to head into my office and get more work done until we got started in the room at 10 AM.

What that means is I go to bed around 11 PM or earlier and wake up in a state of quiet and darkness. Then I drive silently or with a podcast to the gym. Even with music on at the gym, I don't talk to anyone and I go through my gym routine. The whole morning is like a meditation usually until I get to the sauna at around 7:15 when I end up talking to people. But even with that, I'm pretty quiet until I step into the office around 8:15-8:30. But by that time, I have had three hours to myself.

When I get to the gym, I plan on working my body out pretty hard. I took it pretty easy in the first few weeks because I didn't really know what my body was capable of. So I didn't leave the gym particularly sore. But as I've been going and finding out that my body is capable of so much more, I have been pushing it. And I enjoy pushing myself past my limits to the point where I have to vocalize:

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

I used to think the guys who did that in the gym were pretty silly until I started doing it. It doesn't seem all that silly to me any more. It means I can't help myself and I need to grunt in order to push harder. I'm also talking to myself a lot at the gym. Sometimes, that's working through ideas in my head for whatever episode I'm working on or for the script I'm working out on the side. And sometimes I'm trying to get that 8th or 9th or 10th rep in - and that's all I'm thinking about.

The working out and the stillness of the early part of my day help my mind open up. Yes, the working out five days a week for five weeks has had a physical effect. My friend Jen told me at drinks the other night that something was new about me. I had a new confidence and charisma. I have swag, apparently. But I also think that swag comes from being more confident in the room this year. I think it comes from juggling two jobs. I think it comes from mentoring two of our younger writers. I think it comes from maybe feeling like I'm fitting in my clothes better - and that has been going on for at least six months.

I bought a jumpsuit on Saturday. A man's jumpsuit in black. A man's jumpsuit - even in black - is a bold choice. I was out shopping on Saturday and walked into Zara. I looked around - I had never really explored the store much before but a lot of my friends swear by it. It's fashionable clothes at a lower price point. I don't always trust that means that things are well made. It's a few steps above H&M in quality. But way more fashionable than most brands. I saw this jumpsuit and I've always wanted one. So I decided to try it on.

To my surprise and amazement, it fit. Really well. I'm nipped in at the waist - and even though I feel personally I could lose weight there, it looked great. And even with that, I had to take a walk around the mall to contemplate. I'm not a person who ever pays retail for anything. I'll pick up things at H&M because it's so cheap, but I'd rather pay the sale price even at a good price. So I went back to the store and I tried some other things on and I bought a pair of skinny black jeans at $36 and a shirt ON SALE at $15. Plus, the jumpsuit at $120. Was that extravagant? I've seen jumpsuits at other places for $500 bucks - and those are even on sale at $300 right now. (Yes, I look on line constantly to see if the fashionable clothes I want have gone on sale. It's a side hobby.)

I bought it to stand out. I bought it because I don't want to blend in any more. And that represents a change in mentality from even a year ago. So maybe my friend Jen was right and I have more swag. I'm not hiding behind other people any more. I'm not wearing clothes I've worn for five years because I can't afford to buy new clothes. I have an attitude I didn't have before. I'm stepping forward in my life. My muscles pop out of that jumpsuit, by the way. My face has thinned out a bit. My skin looks great. My eyes are clear. I'm more awake than I've ever been. And that's not just what I eat, although I have been doing Whole 30 since last year. And the friends who may have been skeptical about it are now doing it.

My mindset has changed. Slowly. I started meditating seriously about three years ago after being totally afraid of it. I don't meditate every day, but I spend a good chunk of time alone every day. And I spend time in stillness every day. That has helped me a lot.

I have also been wearing different things to the gym. I bought running tights in July at the Nike Employee Store - for a steep 50% discount, plus no sales taxes. I bought a lot of running gear that I didn't really pull out until October. I'm even trying to be a stand out at the gym in running tights and tight t-shirts. And I went shopping last weekend to buy a bunch more workout gear. I'm changing my game up. I'm making sure I have lots of things to wear to the gym. I have quiet gym clothes - which I'm phasing out - and LOUD gym clothes.

My mind is more focused because I start out the day having accomplished something before I step foot in the office. I want to keep this routine going even as I leave the room at the end of this week. I want to get up and head to the gym first thing so that when I get home, I can have breakfast and get my day started by 10 AM. But the workout has to be the first thing I do. It has made me remarkably disciplined. Some mornings it will be a run. Others it will be a workout. Or both. But I'm getting a lot from working out every day.

How does all of this affected my writing? I feel like my rewrites have become more focused. I pick a problem or a goal and I focus on that. It's the same focus I feel when I'm doing biceps and I have to squeeze as I'm bringing the weight up to my face. I do that extra squeeze to get that muscle to pop. It's that extra push at the end when I do my chest exercises or my triceps or pull ups. It's also the focus that takes me to the gym to accomplish that day's goal. If it's arms day, I know what I need to do. If I know I have to sit and do the rewrite to do a tone pass or a pass where I make sure that we're focused on our protagonist - that's the focus of that day's work. I'm at it. Every friggin' day. The same thing with my stillness practice. Sometimes I'll read to get focused. Sometimes I'll listen to something. Sometimes I sit in stillness and don't listen to anything.

The daily practice of doing something makes me feel like it's not impossible to accomplish the goals I want to accomplish. I've been waking up every morning at 5 AM to go to the gym. Five weeks later, people have noticed a difference.  Four years ago, I started the routine of going with friends to the library to write. Now I can see where that has taken me. And I've only gotten more disciplined because I know how much further I want to go. When you start doing the work, you realize how much work it actually takes to do what you want to do. It's a lot harder than I thought it would be. But I'm a lot stronger than I thought I was as well.

My intention is growth.
My intention is strength.
My intention is focused.
My intention is to see.
My intention is to sit in stillness.
My intention is to know.

I am grateful for friendship.
I am grateful for work.
I am grateful for breaks.
I am grateful for routine.
I am grateful for the gym.
I am grateful for the library.
I am grateful for the coffee shop. 
I am grateful for the sofa.
I am grateful for the daily act of doing something.

Power Up on the Visualization

It's my birthday month. Astrologically, this is my moon.
I have my copy of Brene Brown's Daring Greatly on my table.
I'm going to re-read Into the Magic Shop.
I have my copy of The War of Art and Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield at the ready.
I have my arsenal of manifestation manuals ready to go.
Let's do this!

I'm leaning in (which I'm not reading) to the power of the new moon. I know what I want for myself this year. I want a new place to live. I want to have a steady network or cable writing job at my level. I want to travel more this year.

Last year, a psychic told me I would be busier than I'd ever thought I'd be and that I'd be moving back in to LA. It feels like this is the set up for that. Two years ago, when I shook things up and interviewed for a job I wasn't sure I wanted in Portland, it took about six months for that shake up to take effect. It has been about the same amount of time since I talked to the psychic. Signs are there that a shake up is about to happen.

My horoscope.
The amount of work I have - I'm teaching and I'm working on our show.
My work is getting noticed.

I have a lot of smoke and there's about to be fire. I can smell it.

More importantly, I can SEE it. And I need to see it in order to visualize all of this happening. I'm working on my first episode of our third season. And I'll start my second episode soon. I finished a draft of a pilot yesterday that I've been trying to finish and I will have that ready. Then I need to write my next pilot. I have a play I'm wanting to start, but that will be on hold until the summer possibly. Or late Spring. It depends if I get a job. It depends on what I have going on. But I don't feel like I have enough of a drive to start a new play as much as I have a drive to get my next network or cable job. Or the next five jobs - in a row. I feel good about where I am with the last two plays I wrote. I want to let that breathe a bit and see where I'm at. The next two plays I have ready to write are both smaller plays with casts of three or four.

The horoscope says that the 10 days after the new moon are important. So whatever you're doing in those ten days, you're manifesting what your year will look like. Here's what I've been doing:

• January 27: Finished breaking my second episode. Ready to go to script on first episode.
• January 28: Curated a play reading for my theatre company. Dinner with two close writer friends. Writing episode.
• January 29: Breakfast with sweet actor friend moving to NYC. Writing episode.
• January 30: Writing episode.
• January 31: Writing episode. Writing pilot. Finishing first draft of episode.
• Feb 1: Writing pilot.
• Feb 2: Writing episode and making edits.

On the 3rd, I'll be turning in my episode and back in the writers room. Then I'll spend the weekend working on the pilot, hoping to finish a draft to send to friends to ready on the 5th. So if the ten days after the new moon are an indication, I'll be working on staff this year and writing a lot of episodic TV and my own material. I'll also be juggling projects. 

Sounds like I'll be busier than I imagined. All right. That sounds like I'm right on track.

I also worked out every day. I found time to relax at the Korean Spa and work. And I've found a lot of quiet time. And I've MAINLY eaten well. So I have those things to look forward to as well. Time for myself and time to work.

My intention is to work.

My intention is to keep going.

My intention is perseverance.

My intention is growth and expansion.

My intention is understanding and knowledge.

My intention is to see what exists.

I am grateful for all of the books I read to keep me focused.

I am grateful for my friends who keep me grounded.

I am grateful for the talent I am surrounded by.

I am grateful for the work I am able to do.

I am grateful for the life I am able to lead.

I am grateful for the power I hold.

I am grateful for the stable ground I stand on.

Scene of the Crime

Yesterday, I went back to my grade school alma mater and spoke to fifth through eighth graders at Career Day. It was weird walking along those halls that haven't changed a bit since I was at school there 30 years ago. I talked to students about my life and career. It seems weird to be able to talk about a career when a year ago, I hadn't yet staffed on a TV show. I was about to nine days later, but a year ago it still hadn't happened. I think I had interviewed by this point. And I was hopeful.

We did a sort of speed dating thing where groups of kids went around from table to table to chat with each alumnus. I probably talked to about 12 groups and my voice was hoarse when I was done. But I found a format that worked in 7 minute increments. I started out with a question.

What do you do for fun?

Read (the proper answer)
Play Video Games (the real answer)
Sleep (when you have no answer)
Watch TV
Draw
Cook
Eat

Then I went around and asked them another question.

If you could get paid to do the things you do for fun, would you take that job?

YES. Always yes.

Then I explained that my answer would have been "read comic books, watch TV and draw." I was a creative, imaginative, in my own head kind of kid. I had an optimism that allowed me to be delusional and ignore the name calling I faced every day. I reflect on it now, but at the time, I just kept going. Then I tell the kids that I turned what I love to do into a career. I write because I learned story telling from the comic books I read and the TV I watched. I made up stories with the characters I drew. I always was telling stories of some sort on paper.

As the groups would come through, I would tell my story and engage them. They seemed interested. What I do for a living seems like fun to people. I get it. I couldn't have engaged a group like that when I was a kid. I was painfully shy. I saw some of those shy, creative kids come to my table yesterday. I saw their eyes light up and stay laser focused on me as I told my stories. I recognized the inability to ask questions, but to have a laundry list of questions in their head. I know what it must feel like to go home and say, "Why didn't I ask my questions?" I was that person.

But for me to say to them, "This is how I made a career" is remarkable. I have a career! That's the big revelation. I'm actually doing this. I had a career before I got paid - I have to remember that too. I was listening to Marc Meron's podcast yesterday and he was talking to a music manager about success. That when you're at something for awhile, having some success helps you along and keeps you from being bitter. When you get some success, you realize how fragile it all is and how it can go either way. I am grateful for my level of success.

It has made me want more, however. And I have bigger dreams to dream now. I have more impossible things to conquer. When I was 14, it would have seemed impossible to write on a TV show. Actually, it would have been impossible to leave my hometown. I couldn't imagine going to school in LA - where the rich people live. But I did that. Then college was another impossible thing that I conquered. Then moving out of California. And then moving to New York - the city I had always wanted to live. Then getting into NYU. Then getting a full scholarship. Then moving back to LA to pursue TV writing. And that seemed impossible for a long, long, long, long, long time. But I kept at it. Because - as many creative people have said in the countless podcasts I listen to - you have to be delusional. You have to be believe that you're going to do it. If it works out, it's vision and goal setting. If it doesn't work out, it's delusion. It's probably delusion either way because it's a relentless belief in one's self. I'm delusional. And that's what has pulled me through.

So what else can I be delusional about?

• I'm going to run my own show someday.
• I will sell several scripts.
• I will have lots of money and opportunity.
• I will have a loft downtown.
• I will drive a Mercedes.
• I will travel the world.
• I will produce my plays.
• I will write more.
• I will write better.
• The best thing I've ever written is ahead of me. 
• And when I've written the best thing I've ever written, the best thing I've ever written will still be out there for me.

It's like marathon training. When you start out, you say "That's the farthest I've ever run." Then the next week, it's the same thing. Then on and on and on and on until you go on a 20 mile training run. Then a 22 mile training run. Then you run the marathon. That's how this goes. It's the best thing I've ever written until the next time you write the best thing you've ever written. But you don't try to write the best thing you've ever written. You just do. Again, it's like running. All you have to do is put on your shoes and go. All I have to do as a writer is sit in front of the computer and go. 

I have bigger dreams now. And I'll accomplish those bigger dreams just like every time I set a new standard for myself. Those kids took me back to where I started dreaming. And as things feel more complicated with my life and the creative work I do, I needed a reminder - You got this. Because to them, I've already done the impossible. 

It's like those lyrics from "Merrily We Roll Along" - 

How did you get here from there, Mr. Shepard?

What was the moment and where, Mr. Shepard?

What did you have to go through?

My intention is reflection.

My intention is growth.

My intention is the next impossible thing.

My intention is expansion.

I am grateful for the moments to reflect.

I am grateful for the ability to share my journey and make it seem less impossible.

I am grateful for the work I've done that has gotten me here.

I am grateful for the life I am leading.

I am grateful to be able to ask the question, "And now what?"