So This is the New Year

Hallelujah. We’re back in an odd numbered year. 2007. It even has two circles and a 7 in it (two of my favorite symbols).

“2007. The year of resolve and rewards,” Adam claimed last night.

I couldn’t agree more.

We had a great New Year’s Eve. Low key, nothing major. It was just the two of us as the few friends we have were all out of town. I found myself a tad disappointed that we were not celebrating with others, but I couldn’t deny that it made sense after the year we’d had.

I worked on a painting that has been bothering me for months. It bothers me less now. We toasted champagne as the clock struck midnight and we watched the space needle’s fireworks display from our porch. It was nice.

It had the feeling of sun on the horizon again. New Year’s Eve day itself had been another one of Seattle’s crisp blue, beautiful days.

Then came January 1st: dark, dark, dark. The sun never even attempted to make an appearance. We got a call from our partner on the show that resulted in some of the details shifting. The shifting of the details, although they came as a bit of a blow, resulted in the show’s sale becoming even more realistic.

I was disheartened to discover that I felt disappointment. Initially I tried to place the let down on the shifting of the details. As a writer, as a creative collaborator, you’ve got to be flexible.

You’ve got to be able to kill your babies.

But Higher Self wasn’t going to let me off that easily.

“The disappointment that you feel is mourning.”

The negating emotions of the past sniffed out an opening and ran like hell to the surface of my being.

“Fuck it. Drop it. It’s not going to work. I told you.”

They threw punches for a good portion of the day. They needed to, I guess. They’re not accustomed to being squandered for such extensive periods of time.

Layered beneath that surface was the overwhelming amount of work that’s left to be done: on the show, on our other projects, on our personal finances, on everything really.

Higher Self was right. I was mourning over the realization that these underlying negative emotions are always at arm’s length away, ever ready to leap into action.

And I realized I was tired, really tired. Ever since coming back off the fast, I’ve felt physically exhausted.

By the time evening rolled around, I was able to rework my perspective.

The show is still on track to pitch mid-January.

We just regained the rights back to a short film that had been optioned for a year. It had been picked up by an Australian producer and was integrated into a feature film that was composed of ten shorts.

This feature was to be shot by ten different filmmaking teams around the world: truly an international collaboration. Our script was the opening and ending of the feature and our characters were the main characters that weaved throughout the other shorts.

Coordinating talent and crews to texturize ten global locations proved to exceed the budget. And the feature script itself needed a lot of work. A plethora of kinks present themselves when ten short screenplays are smooshed together.

It was a great concept that proved timely and costly to execute.

I’d already decided that I was going to approach the producer about requesting the rights back in early January. But I didn’t have to: he voluntarily released all rights back for the New Year.

I’m thrilled. At the time we signed this option agreement, we had three separate offers on the table. This script is an easy sell.

On top of that, we’re sprucing up our other two features. And we have two Intellectual Properties that I’m going to do my best to unload. One is industry-related and one is not. The industry-related one is a ‘highly stealable’ concept that I’ve been advised against trying to sell because of this fact.

We’ve gone out to a couple buyers already with some near hits.

I’m tired of fear. I’m tired of not moving forward on something because it might get stolen. If something does get stolen, so what? Big fucking deal. At least I tried. And at least the project will see the light of day. That’s part of the game. If I had the resources to produce these things myself, I would. But until that day arises I have to gamble. I have to try and sell my products to persons that do have the resources.

I realized that January 1st served up a big dish of everything that I have to face, everything that I’ve vowed to overcome.

Higher Self corrects, “The mourning you feel is at the loss of yourself. You are growing and while doing so, old patterns of your former self are left behind.”

Again, identifying elements within my life, within myself that I’d like to change are one thing. Implementing them takes great strength and discipline.

I’ll close with one of my favorite quotes from Erich Fromm. It states:

“Man’s main task is to give birth to himself.”