Hello!

Gotta ask:

Can you tell that I sit with stuff before making decisions?

Yup.

I do this in most areas of my life cuz I like to exhaust all possibilites. And if things don’t hold my attention for that next round or even next several rounds? I let it self-select out of my life. This proves to so incredibly helpful.

No. Not everything gets this level of scrutiny.

But big things?

Absolutely.

This is even more the case for my stories since I live with them for a while.

And?

I started an exercise in April:

Write a contained thriller around two characters with limited dialogue.

Cuz I thought it would incredibly cool to boil the entire story down to single word choices carrying the movie’s weight. I love writing my stories where I treat my characters like they are the set pieces. This is the movie term to explain visual feasts in movies like wild chases, battle scenes, montages, etc.

How do I do this? Write layered and complex characters with simple stories. Some people call these kinds of stories: Oscar bait.

Yup. They let actors show off their acting chops.

I also like writing those kinds of stories cuz I’m curious about people. It’s always interesting to see how they self-sabotage. Like I still love that moment in Breaking Bad when Walter White told Hank the DEA agent that Hank hadn’t caught Heisenberg yet at their family picnic. This moment of arrogance set up the entire series finale in such a beautiful and very human way.

Dudes!?!

I would love to be able to write like that.

So?

My exercise was born.

EXCEPT…

I immediately thought of a prequel for each character and a swan song to finish it off.

After digging in until I hit the midpoint for the first script? I set it aside to marinate.

Why?

Taking breaks from stories can be as important as the writing process since it gives you what’s called “fresh eyes.”

You know that moment when you come back to what you thought was an amazing idea only find: distance is an awesome reality check???

Turns out that I still want to write this series. If anything? I’m more excited for I have since finished my 105 days of conscious connected breathing, today marks the halfway mark for my 105 day sex magic ritual, and I’m much further along in Layla Martin‘s VITA coaching class.

What the hell does embodiment work have to do with writing?

The best writing comes from letting your body and brain work together instead of one overriding the other.

My early work on this series? Very much in my head. Today’s session of returning to the work: so much richer cuz I got the plot down. This means the real has now begun.

Why write stories like these? Contained thrillers sell all the time. I’ve also been reading the Ink Tip newsletter for over a year. They ALWAYS have a least one call for these kinds of scripts. No. This isn’t glamorous like say a call for scripts from places Universal Studios or Netflix.

Totally cool.

Kathryn Bigelow started her feature film directing career doing a movie about lawless bikers and eventually won that Oscar for HURT LOCKER. She was the first woman to have that directing honor. Bigger point? Where you start doesn’t always determine where you end up.

So in the meantime…

I’m digging in deep to rethink how I write my pages. Perfect foundation for when I put together my microbudget films like 3 WISHES.

How about you? Can you relate to this journey with other areas in your life?

As always: Have a glamorous day for fun!!

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