Q3 in Progress

A few years ago, I started dividing my life in terms of fiscal quarters. I set these short term measurements of time to evaluate where things are at in my life. Now we're in the second half of the year. The first half was about work - whether it was teaching or being on the show. My time on the show seems so far away now. I was hoping to be on another show this quarter - I met on something that would have taken me through October. But I'm learning to embrace where I'm at. The great thing is that I do have a gig I'm starting in about ten days. That will keep me busy. But I've got to find balance between teaching and writing.

The third quarter started July 1st. I wrote what ended up being the final draft of a pilot I had been working on for a long time. Then I ended up meeting on a show early this month. That gig didn't happen. So I've started really working on my syllabi for the three classes I'm teaching this Fall. This month has been about taking time to think about this new pilot. I am still knee deep in the thinking phase. I know what the show is generally. I went to Portland to research, which in this case was about going to Portland to live for two weeks. I walked around the neighborhoods. I lived. I ate. I drank. I really got the city in my bones for a couple of weeks.

Now I'm back and I've got a little bit of time before school starts. The plan is to continue to brainstorm and get more thoughts down in the journal I've created for the pilot. My two syllabi are done. I've got a grad level course I'm teaching that I'm still putting together. I think I know what I'm doing.

Then I'm in San Diego for most of September. I'm going to stay down there and work on this pilot while I'm in the first few weeks of the semester. I'm teaching things I've taught before and the first half of the semester is going to be a lot of planning and talking. So we'll ease into things a lot. I've never taught three classes before. This feels like a lot and they're all writing courses. So I've got a lot on my plate.

But the time in San Diego will be good to reset my head, much like Portland did for me. Being out of LA for a little bit I think will be a good thing. I don't really want to go back and forth too much, but it looks like some things will be bringing me back to LA on the weekends. At least I can drive up on Saturday mornings and go back on Sunday afternoons. Being down in San Diego, having a social life, seeing friends, will be a really good thing for me. I've got a bunch of people I want to catch up with. I want to get more involved with theatre down there. I want to see my friend Jen and my friends Stewart and Justin, who I haven't seen much of. I want to see my friend Bryan and go out to gay bars and have a social life. I think it will be good to have some time away.

I've got a guy I have my eye on and another friend I spend a lot of time with. But maybe I need to inch a little closer to dating. I can do that in San Diego safely without feeling like I need to jump into something. Having a medium-distance boyfriend might actually be a good thing. Someone who's close enough and who I can see during the week. But not someone who lives in LA and who I have to  jump into something serious with. Baby steps.

I know that Q3's a bit of a transition. Q4 will be really busy with some workshops we're doing with the theatre company and working on pre-production for my play that we're producing next year. I don't have a shortage of things to do, which is terrific.

My intention is to keep going.
My intention is stillness.
My intention is positivity.
My intention is growth.

I am grateful for the time away.
I am grateful for the three classes I'm teaching.
I'm grateful for the stuff I need to do.
I am grateful for the breaths I take.

The Journey

I don't know what's happening to me.

I probably didn't get a job I really wanted and I'm not that upset about it. Not in a "fuck them" sort of way. Or in a Pollyanna "that's life" way either. It's all of this damn gratitude work I'm doing. There's this well worn trope that says that we need to redefine our idea of success. It sounds so cheesy. Because...how the fuck do you do that? But that's exactly what I did. The success isn't getting the job. The success is doing all the work to get the job. It's knowing that I opened my heart and spoke from a real place of vulnerability. That I can do that in a Hollywood meeting is a great success. That I'm not afraid to express myself is a great success. I can appreciate that.

I know I gave good meeting. I know that I have the depth of character to write a show like that. But I didn't get it. And I have a job that starts at the end of the month that I have to prepare for. I'm a professor and I get to go back to that. I could be disappointed that I didn't get this job, but that means I get to spend another week in Portland with friends and family. I get to go to my nephew's dance performance tomorrow. And I get to go to the coffee shop with my niece and sit side by side doing work. I get to go hiking on Saturday and baby sit on Saturday night while my brother and sister-in-law go out of town. I get to have a three way on Monday (and hopefully Tuesday and Wednesday). I get to be in town a little while longer researching this new project. I get to act as though I live here and absorb everything I'm experiencing and use it as material. As Nora Ephron said, "Everything is copy."

Here are my successes:

• I decided three years ago that if I wanted to be a TV writer, then I had to give myself the schedule of a TV writer. So I started writing all of the time. And I moved from project to project. 
• I kept an office for six months that year (2014). And I wrote.
• I wrote five scripts that year - proving that I could be self motivated.
• I said yes to being my friend's on call sub that year. I think she called me four times.
• The following year, I spent eight months working on one script.
• I stood up for myself and made a lot of demands of a lot of people. I was a pain in the ass.
• The play reading and workshop were both successful and cited as a model of what to do.
• Because I worked on one script all year, I wrote two more scripts in the last three months of the year.
• I wrote 2000 pages that year. Up from 1000 the year before.
• The next year, I decided to focus more on myself.
• I got my first TV job.
• I got to be on set and produce.
• I got noticed.
• I joined the WGA.
• I was asked to teach one course that spring and then I was put on the schedule on my own that following fall.
• I started co-running a theatre company. I made new community.
• When the show came back this year, I was made a Co-Producer.
• I taught two classes this past winter and spring.
• I rewrote a script I had been working on for a long time.
• And I got a meeting on a show.

All of those other things led to where I am now. And it started over three years ago! It wasn't the year after my Dad's death or eight years ago. It took awhile. But everything I've listed above has to do with where I am not.

My intention is to listen.

My intention is to pay attention.

My intention is effect change in what I do.

I am grateful for the ability to be grateful.

I am grateful for a quiet and dark house.

I am grateful that I can get work done.

I am grateful for the good people in my life.

Visions

My friend Susan always does visualizations. There was a time where I thought she was crazy. But there is something to visualizing something for yourself and then bringing it to fruition. With all of this unlimited thinking and letting the Universe dream a bigger dream than you can dream for yourself, how to visualize can be confusing. What if I'm doing it wrong?

I feel the same way about meditation. It took me a full year to decide to meditate before I started doing it. It felt intimidating and like everything was banking on me doing it right. That was enough for me to not do it. But once I just committed to it, it was fine. I feel the same way about visualization. But for me, visualization is about paying attention to how I'm living my life. There might be things I do in one area of my life that are applicable to other areas of my life. So in that case, the visualization is paying attention to what I'm doing in these other aspects of my life.

I did a recent meditation about being a visionary. And in it, I was advised to let it rip in terms of explaining the vision I have for myself. What I loved about the meditation was that community was a part of that vision. Five or six years ago, I had no community in LA. I had no circle of other playwright friends who inspired me. Now, I am at the center of a community.

I was talking to my friend Cory earlier today about a group that everyone wants to get into run by a big theatre in town. I've had conversations with countless friends over the years about why they're not in that group. I've asked myself that question as well. But then I started taking not being included as a badge of honor. I'm not a celebrity playwright - is there any such thing? I've got plenty of playwright friends who are celebrities and I love them. But that's luck as well as talent. I've created something with Chalk Rep, my theatre company, that I feel is really beautiful. We've got a group of writers and actors who come together to create some really cool work. It's a curated group, but it's a group that works because the people in it are open hearted and really care about each other.

I decided to stop being excluded and to start including people in my group. The other group is incredibly exclusionary and it works on its own terms. But it doesn't matter to me how it's run because I don't run it. I run MY group. And if someone told me how to run it, I'd probably kick them in the balls. So I respect the fact that the other group is uncompromising in its approach. But their style just isn't my style. The point is that I created me own thing that is now being shaped by my vision for it. The group existed before me and I didn't take it over right away. But now that I have the reigns, I have some ideas.

What started it all for me was the Playwrights Union, which is a collective of 30 LA-based playwrights who do writing challenges and have events. It's an incredible social group of other writers. I met some of my close friends in that group and it really helped me out at a time when I needed community. I am going from active status to alumni status with the group. I now feel like I have enough community that another playwright who needs community needs to take that spot. I've got my writers group, plus my gay Latino writers collective and I'm also a member of the WGA and that's a huge community. I have all of these networks of people and it's about creating larger networks of support.

So when I have this vision of the things I want to do or what I want to have in my life, I'm already there. I've got groups I'm a part of and groups I'm curating. My taste is being represented in the groups I participate in. I get together with my close pals and we share work with each other. So I can visualize just by living my life, knowing that what I have I want more of and on a larger scale. I'm living the life I want to be living. And now it's about living more of it.

My intention is to grow.
My intention is to relax.
My intention is to be present.

I am grateful for time away.
I am grateful for ice cream.
I am grateful for a quiet house.