How to be luckier

I’ve talked about luck on here before.  Mostly, I think I've expressed my own belief that luck can play a role in a person’s (or writer’s) success, but only to a certain extent.  I think it’s one thing to get a lucky break, but quite another to take that lucky break and make something substantial out of it (let’s just say, I’ve seen plenty of people get “lucky” and land amazing jobs…only to be fired shortly after because they couldn’t handle the responsibilities).

They shoulda had one of these babies!

However you might feel about luck, I don’t think anyone would say they DON'T want to be lucky.  But how can a person "be luckier" (an oxymoron)?  Lifehacker ran an article yesterday called "What Lucky People Do Differently Than Unlucky People" that describes a psychological experiment I recognized immediately because it also appeared in Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers a couple years ago (see, I told you to read it already!).  Go ahead and read it again, though.  The experiment involves two groups of people, one that considers themselves "lucky" and one that considers themselves "unlucky."  Each group is asked to count the number of photos in a newspaper.  The lucky group, on average, completes the task in seconds while the unlucky group takes minutes.  This isn't due to the lucky group's superior picture counting skills, but due to the fact that most saw a message on the second page of the paper that said to stop counting and gave them the total number of pictures.

In other words, the lesson appears to be that lucky people catch a break (in this case) because they are more relaxed about the task and not so focused on one narrow thing that they missed a better opportunity.  This is a little hard for me to swallow.  After all, successful people have specific goals and get things done and I worry sometimes that if I don’t stay focused on specific tasks (like finishing a script) that I won’t finish anything.

But, I think there’s a balance to all this.  Like I said before, getting a lucky break and having success after that break aren’t necessarily one in the same.  Maybe it’s best to think about this luck stuff not in terms of tasks you WANT to complete/will be beneficial to you as a writer to complete (like writing your dang script) but tedious tasks you DON’T WANT to complete/don’t make you a better writer (like searching for a job, networking, and counting pictures in a paper).  So maybe the best advice is, be more relaxed in networking situations and don't try so hard to just pass your script along, and you might have the good fortune to make a friend who will help you more than a casual connection.  Or, stay open minded in your job search instead of focusing on one specific job or bust.  Or, just win the lotto already if you’re so lucky, jeesh.

You must read..."What the Dog Saw"

Alright, confession, I’m recommending this book before finishing it, but I’m enjoying it quite a bit so I figured there wasn’t much harm in passing it along.  As mentioned before, I’m a total junkie for Malcolm Gladwell, especially his book, Outliers.  Also, I have jury duty this upcoming week, so I’m totally going to finish this book while I’m waiting to see if I get selected.

Tell me what the dog saw!  Tell me!

Speaking of jury duty, I know most people dread being summoned and want to get out of the whole ordeal, but I’m kind of hoping I get picked just for the experience.  As a baby writer living in LA, I don’t get many opportunities to go outside of the typical things I experience or to see how people doing non-Hollywood careers work (medical, legal, etc.) and considering so many TV shows are about people in these non-Hollywood careers, I welcome the chance to see some of that first hand.

And, that’s another reason I recommend What the Dog Saw.  Like all of Gladwell books, it’s non-fiction, in this case a diverse collection of articles he has written.  While it’s awesome to read novels and scripts to learn how great writers write and tell stories, I think it’s also important to try new things (like jury duty) and read non-fiction and news articles to get inspired/get ideas for all those awesome scripts you're going to write.

Malcolm Gladwell - advice for aspiring writers

In a previous post I expressed my enthusiasm for Malcolm Gladwell's book, Outliers, and cited that book's 10,000 hour rule as a good reason why you should write daily or put more hours into your writing.  

Last week, Big Think released a short video where Gladwell gives advice to aspiring writers (click the link to see the video or read the transcript).  The basic gist of what Gladwell says (or all of what he says since the video is only about 2 minutes long) is that writers and creative types in general need to learn to embrace chaos and not edit themselves.  In contrast, a surgeon probably shouldn't let his/her mind wander too much while in the middle of a procedure.  Simple enough, makes sense, and I can totally understand how over-editing yourself might keep you from writing something great/new/totally original.  

The only problem I have with Gladwell's advice is that it's pretty general (understandable, it's just a short video) and I'm left with more questions than answers.  For example, how does letting your mind wander connect with the reality of having to produce a product?  I mean, it's great to brainstorm, have a vivid imagination, not throw out any idea as it comes to you, but at some point it IS necessary for a writer to focus and complete a project.  

Maybe I'm over analyzing this, but it's a problem I struggle with personally.  I think I have a sort of writer's ADD where I endlessly start (but don't finish) projects and I think it's partly because I always have tons of half baked ideas floating around.  Since I don't focus and embrace chaos TOO much, it's easy for me to put projects aside and say: "When I know how to end that, or when the inspiration strikes for how to write that scene, I'll do it."  But it doesn't always happen, or I'm not thinking about it because I'm on to something new.  Maybe continuing to embrace chaos while making more time for writing will allow me to both keep all the ideas I get (or save them for later) while giving me more time/space to complete projects.  Like how a room full of monkeys typing into infinity might eventually produce Hamlet, me typing into infinity might eventually produce a finished script...or something like that.

Should writers write every day?

As we get further into January, it becomes sink or swim time for any 2011 resolutions.  I'm not a big resolution person (I think they're usually too general or nebulous like "lose weight" or "be a better person") but I do like to have a few concrete goals for myself at the start of each year.  For 2011, one was to start a blog (check!) while another was one that most baby writers make and break yearly: to finish several projects I'd started...which really translates to the more general/nebulous resolution to "write more often."  This brings me to the somewhat divisive question I recently discussed with another baby writer and one that I think baby writers discuss all the time: Should writers write every day?  Luckily, I think I have the answer, and that answer is YES...SORT OF.  Let me explain...

I think the whole “writers should write daily” axiom can come across as a little bogus when pros say it to baby writers.  It sounds better to tell an eager baby, "Yes, write every day" than to say, "Well, yeah, I try to write all the time, but sometimes I just play Mass Effect and Madden all day."  Furthermore, I know for a fact some pros don’t write daily (on the flip side I know many who do).  And, how much are you supposed to write every day if you do write daily?  And, what about days you write a lot?  Do those balance out days you don’t write at all?  And does writing a blog count even if it has nothing to do with your screenwriting? (please say it does). So now that I’ve raised a bunch of questions and haven't explained anything, what was my point?

Well, I’m a big fan of the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell (my friends tell me I’m kinda obsessed).  Anyway, the book throws a lot of ideas out there, but the one that really stuck with me was that practicing your craft can be equally if not more important than natural talent or ability.  Gladwell gives examples of “outliers” in certain fields like the Beatles, Michael Jordan, and Bill Gates, and talks about how all of these "outliers" had tons of meaningful practice in their respective careers before they made it.  This introduces the 10,000 Hour Rule...you've probably heard of it, even if you haven't read the book.  The rule basically says you need to practice your craft for 10,000 hours before you can reach the level of expert.

Now, there are plenty of people who want to dispute and nitpick this rule, but considering all the success stories Gladwell mentioned, let’s assume for a minute that he's right (or that we at least want to emulate the success of those people).  So then, let’s say you decided (or only made time) to write for an hour a day, 3 days a week (basically every other day...pretty common among some baby writers I know).  At that rate, it would take you 64 years to get your 10,000 hours and become an “expert.”  Ouch.  If you change that number so you’re writing 1 hour every day, that number goes down to about 27 years, and if you can manage nearly 3 hours a day or 20 hours a week, that number goes down to around 10 years.  

So, what does this mean?  Well, even after dedicating as many (unpaid) hours to your writing as you would to a (paid) part time job, it still takes years to reach that expert level.  Now, the good news for writers is you probably didn’t write your first word today.  You’ve likely had hundreds of hours of practice through school and your own enjoyment, already…but if you never make time to write (despite life or a busy work schedule), it’s gonna take a long long long time to get to that 10,000 mark (if you EVER reach it). 

So, let’s all resolve to "write more often" (every day or several hours once a week if that’s what works best for you) oh, and to read Outliers if you haven't, because it's awesome.