Closing loops is overrated. I’m a fan of leaving creations open ended or as a question.
Live a bit of life, have a sleep or go make something else.
Then come back to it. Your brain will provide the next piece.
So yeah, I’m approximately 204 videos in to my daily film making habit. The last twenty of which were a series that required hours of green screening each day (yes, you read that right, hours)
Not the dream.
But I’m glad I saw out the series and was pleased with the final episode I put out yesterday. I’m glad I could exhale completely the initial impulse that spurred it, I mean how great to make something with a beginning middle and an end!
I was reminded by the great Chase Jarvis about the purpose of practice. That’s what I’m doing with this daily habit after all- I’m practicing. Chase reminded me that the purpose of practice is to practice the most fundamental, elemental basics of the thing you’re trying to get better at.
For me it’s acting, it’s telling stories that connect people to their heart and the hearts of others real or imaginary. Things that make people laugh, but most of all move people in a way. This can be a 1 second clip or a 3 hour movie- the length doesn’t matter, but that’s the element I’m seeking to improve.
Looking back on my 20 days of working on this series, I realised the majority of the time was spent keying out backgrounds and creating complex soundscapes to sound like another dimension. And I’m definitely not trying to practice keying out backgrounds OR creating complex soundscapes to sound like another dimension.
I suppose in a vague pursuit of story telling, acting and moving people I found myself doing that. And I’m glad I did because it spurred this realisation.
ANYWAY.
All this to say- I won’t be spending those hours on the thing I’m not here to practice. S0 my new rule is this:
Each day’s video can take no more than 30 minutes to shoot and no more than 30 minutes to edit. That’s it.
I think this will be tricky to do- BUT I can’t let my life be slowly taken over alien green screening. I hope the constraint will force a ultra clarity on the purpose of my practice each day and help me build the skill I want rather than a side quest that accidentally wastes my time.
Let’s see.
I wonder where the phrase ‘jump the gun’ came from? This is kind of about that.
When I was editing my film today, I caught myself wanting to create the background for this particular part I had in my head. The reason I caught the impulse was I was already low energy and knew that working out of order might be harder.
Instead, I simply started from the beginning; Choose the take I’ll use. Pick the length. Choose the next take. Trim it. Repeat.
There’s magic in simply doing the thing in order (or indeed the best order you can make) and then the next thing. And then the next thing.
You can’t build a pyramid by starting with the middle brick.
(Though the jury’s still out for me on how they did… maybe this is the way they did it).
But I’m not an ancient Egyptian so I’ll start from the bottom.
When editing my daily films, I notice that on the first take, it’s usually the one I use. The performance seems to be most connected to the initial impulse and truth of the moment I’m playing.
I’m not sure if this is an across the board rule- I actually think because I’m the one writing it, the first take is the closest to my initial idea so ends up being the one I use…
It’s interesting to watch my performance get busier and less nuanced as the takes go on.
How can we trust our first instincts more?
How can we allow the succeeding takes to give us depth and nuance, not reduce it?
Before I started making daily videos to share online I ummed and aah’d about what I should make and what the ‘final thing’ would be. I didn’t want to start without a big master plan of exactly what the videos would be, and how they would culminate to create this idea of a perfect body of work.
It’s quite funny to me, nearly 200 videos in, and I still don’t know what I’m making.
This is the inevitable journey of creativity; we follow hunches but its not our business what is ends up as. And it’s certainly not our business to try and mould some sort of premeditated trajectory.
Bodies of work and careers come together in retrospect- it’s not for us to curate. Make something now that you’re interested in and use influences that inspire you. Do your best, ship it and then move on.
I’m a little closer to knowing what I’m making, but only a little closer. And that’s only after 193 videos made and shared. So my advice is to start as soon as possible.
Then enjoy the not knowing.
The other day I made a video and I decided to put the words ‘episode 1’ in the title.
This suggests there’ll be an episode 2… and maybe even an episode 3.
Do I have either planned?
No…
But I’ve posted it now so I guess I have to follow up.
In what ways can you use the ‘episode 1’ theory to your creative advantage?
And I’m not talking about food! Being selective about our social media use isn’t a new idea, but I’m having some success with some of my little rules so I thought they’d be worth sharing.
No apps: I don’t have any social media apps on my phone- (only exception is Tik Tok and YouTube- see below for their rules.)
Do not disturb default: The normal mode for my phone is do not disturb. That means that nothing interrupts me unless I want it to. When I have time to check my phone, I physically have to check for any messages or phone calls. It’s incredibly freeing being on my own clock like this. It does seem unusual to me that we should be interrupted all day at any time simply because technology now allows it. I don’t think it’s natural to be at everyone’s beck and call.
Email: This is definitely my weakness so I have to be strict sometimes. All of my work is attached to emails so there are seasons when I’m in and out of email all day BUT I take a leaf from Tim Ferriss’ book here. He teaches to batch email, that is check it and deal with it only twice a day- 12pm and 4 pm. You’ll be amazed at how quick it actually is. The alternative for me was checking it sporadically throughout the day and that wasted so much time and energy. Batching is where it’s at.
Delayed gratification: As mentioned above, I do have YouTube and Tik Tok on my phone. They’re there because I upload my daily video to both platforms. I found this was a bit of a flaw in my plan, because I’d go on to upload ad get trapped. Worse still, I’d go on before I’d made my video and check to see how many likes or views my previous video had. This wasn’t helping me. New rule! I can only go on these apps ONCE per day and that’s to upload that days video. This means I’m using it to produce rather than consume AND I get the added treat of seeing how my previous video is going. It’s win win.
There’s my best version of a zen mantra I suppose- but it’s true I find.
This morning I watched an episode of Grand Designs, my favourite TV show. During the commercial break there was an ad for some furniture company and I remember loving the stylish full-wall shelf they showed in the ad. I happily watched the rest of the show and forgot about the shelf.
Later, I was working next to the giant shelf in the den of the house I’m staying in at the moment. I glanced up from my laptop and saw the big hunk of wood and books and an idea landed on my forehead.
Chuckling to myself (it’s always a good sign) I got up and acted out a scene of a guy who is showing someone around his newly built home and suggests there is a secret passage behind the case but can’t seem to find the secret lever book.
The idea tickled me enough to make this:
It didn’t occur to me until much later that the idea for this sketch could have come from the book shelf I admired on the ad as well as the general subject of home design and build from Grand Designs.
I realised I have to love and respect all aspects of my experience. You simply never know what will feed what and in what capacity or indeed when.
Everything is ( or has the potential to be) something.
This feels like the most important question of my life right now. It seems to allude me in lots of ways and there are many factors.
Let me give some context for those just tuning in: at the beginning of this year I challenged myself to create a short clip, film or acting snippet every day.
So everyday I make, wether inspiration strikes or (as is more often the case) perspiration strikes in the form of “oh no, I haven’t made anything yet”.
The results, as you can imagine are varied, heck go and see for yourself: https://www.tiktok.com/@justinrogersnz
So each day, I’m actively asking the question (out of emergency need) “how the heck can I be more creative?!”
Enter Dave Burgess.
I mentioned in another post that I’m reading Dave’s book, Teach Like A Pirate. It’s great, you should read it too.
He talks about using questions in order to prompt our creativity. Dave says its pretty hopeless to wait for inspiration to strike- I’m certainly guilty of this and I think that’s because I have indeed randomly got ideas to turn into my little daily morsels.
Dave encourages us to engage instead in the process. A key part of which is the asking of effective questions.
It’s “What are three ways I could walk in this door that I find fun” (specific)
Over “What the heck should I make?!” (too broad and scary)
I’m excited and inspired by Dave’s example here- that just because it can look like magic, creativity is not magic. It’s a craft and one that can (and should) be practiced.
There is a fantastic life planning system that I learned from Tony Robbins called RPM.
It’s designed to change the focus from ‘to do’s’ to outcomes. What’s the difference? Well I find that to dos can become a never ending list you work through for the rest of your life (or indeed that you never get through). I also find that if I’m a bit underenergised and I look at a list of things I ‘have to’ do, then I’m very prone to procrastination.
Tony’s system helps you re-align with the purpose- or the “why the heck am I even doing this?”
I know I can easily forget the WHY behind anything when I’m in the flow of my work day. I had a mini breakthrough today while using the RPM system that I think is worth sharing.
It may seem tedious at first, but a crucial step in the RPM system is to look not only at outcomes but the reason you want it. I sat down to plan my day today and thought twice about whether I would use RPM for my film a day habit. This is something I decided to do this year to make a little movie each day to share online.
The reason I didn’t want to do it went something like this “Well look, I know I need to make a movie anyway, so I can just put in on the calendar or carve an hour or so out of my day to do it, what’s the big deal? I don’t need some fancy system for that”
WRONG.
I decided to do it anyway and I’m glad I did.
As unnecessarily time consuming as it seemed, I followed the process:
What’s my outcome? To have a film that I’m proud of that I want to share with the world and shows me at my best. Hmm pretty good start, certainly glad I wrote that down, it hadn’t been that clear in my head…
Why do I want that? Well… I want to act! I love acting and creating, I want to use my hard earned skill and entertain some stranger. I want to cast a vote for the type of creator I am- one that works every day. I want to make something I’m proud of that will exist forever- this one time investment will keep working for me and entertain people for years to come! Woah, where did all that come from! I couldn’t believe how much I had to say about why I wanted this outcome. The best part was, the more I wrote the more associated I became with these reasons. I felt them more in some symbiotic loop.
It was only later that some old thoughts came back: Well I want to make a film every day… what am I supposed to do write that out every day? Come on what a waste of time, I can just get on a make the thing rather than spend time doing all that…
And there was my breakthrough. I do have to do it every day. That’s the difference that makes the difference I think. If I take the time remain connected to my purpose each day, I will have more access to the resources of someone who is inspired.
Yes it’s work, but that’s the point. I don’t think it comes naturally to do hard things. And if we just schedule it and expect the ‘why’ to be searingly clear for us, we may run out of steam. This is especially true when it comes to the important non urgent stuff, it’s easy to cast it aside in your day to make way for the inevitable day to day things that need our attention now. We have to make them urgent otherwise we’ll never get around to the things that make the real difference.
Take the extra couple of minutes before you engage with these tasks that really matter. Engage with your why each time; make it a habit. Go on, do the hard thing. Every day.
