The only thing I hate more than NOT writing is writing something I care nothing about...

What is Success?

First post on blogspot.com. Sorry Xanga, I've moved on. You should, too. For what it's worth, we had a lot of good moments together...

Well let's get this started, shall we?

I'm not a fan of the blogs that talk about all the deep, profound Confucianisms the author's picked up from deep introspection and life experiences. They usually come after months of non-blogging and spew forth on the posting screen like... well like something that spews nasty stuff.

Well I haven't posted a blog for (valley girl) like seriously a year. And so regrettably, I'm going to do what I just said I don't like to see -- I'm going to spew forth some nasty deep testimonial schtuff. You don't have to read it if you don't want to...

Still there?

What is success? Most people would point to quantifiable objects of worth. Houses. Cars. Dollars in the bank account. Number of bank accounts. Number of kids. Number of people in your congregation.

But is all that really success? If someone asked me that question, I would say "Heck no," but the truth is I use that criteria all the time to judge other people's "success" around me. And that really sucks, because I would hate to have people judge my own success by the standards that I unwittingly judge others by.

Now why l am I talking about all this?

It's because by those standards, I would be a failure as a screenwriter.

My writing partner and I have accomplished a hell of a lot since we made the ballsy decision to make our dreams come true and write movies for (eventually) a living. We've made some great short films and wrote some kick-butt feature length scripts. We got representation. We've gone out on meetings with countless production companies. We got a free-option with an academy award winning producer.

If you told me a year ago that I'd be doing all that, I would have been very happy...

But for a long time, I wasn't. 

Why? Because as a writer, I still have yet to make a penny on anything. I'm still working my day job. I still haven't seen my name in "The Hollywood Reporter."

After a lot of struggling and prayer, I realized if I continued holding my "success" to the world's standards, I would (valley girl again) seriously go crazy. The real success is in the journey itself, not in the superficial gains that may come as a byproduct of it.

Real success is day in/day out loving what you do. Knowing what you're meant to do and doing it passionately with all you got. Success is finishing a script and being proud of it, not selling it. It's about being brave enough to stare at that intimidating blank screen and filling it up with the ideas that spew (there's that word again) forth from my head.

And according to that criteria, I'm as successful as Aaron Sorkin. David Koepp. Kurtzman & Orci. Brandt & Haas.

There's only so much I can control in life. I can't control if a studio will pass on my screenplay, but I can control the quality of my work. I can't control if the people around me will love all the movie ideas I come up with, but I can control the amount of them I come up with so that, sooner or later, I'll find a good story to start telling.

The rest is out of my control. It's up to the good Lord above. In His time, everything will work out...