Is It Too Late For Your Dreams?
I remember thirty years ago talking to Leo and Diane Dillon, the wonderful husband-wife art team, friends of Harlan. I had lunch with them in Greenwich Village many years ago. I thought I wanted to talk to them about my first wife's artistic ambitions. I was wrong. In the presence of these wonderful artists, I realized I felt like a fraud. That I had made choices, based on survival, that were not true expressions of my being. They were about survival.
And as I spoke to them, I started weeping. And then sobbing. I felt that I'd wandered off the true path. "Hollywood is like a hill made of bullshit with a rose at the top. By the time you finish climbing…you've lost your sense of smell". I forget who said that. But EVERY external human endeavor is like this. Everyone must sacrifice options to focus, but if you aren't careful, you'll sacrifice the very things you need to enjoy the journey: love, integrity, health, connection, contribution.
I felt I'd lost myself. "Is it too late for me?" I said through tear-blurred eyes. And these wonderful people smiled gently at me, and Dianne reached across the table and took my hands. "If you can even ask that question, Steve…its not too late."
And with those words, I was made whole. Anyone who wonders why I spend an hour every day teaching people has only to consider how blessed I've been with mentors, and understand that all I can do to thank them is be the best person I can be, and pay it forward.
What I was asking was: is it too late for me to be the best writer I can be? Honest, successful, exploring new arenas, genuinely expressing my deepest self to the limits of my capacity?
Everything I"d done HAD been on that path. HAD been heading to the same destination. I simply had to take the detours appropriate for my journey. But I had to humble myself and admit I was scared at the compromises I'd made.
But I'd done the best I could, with the resources I had. The Hero's Journey understood this: Leon and Diane were allies on my journey, further down the path, and from their perspective, they knew EXACTLY what I needed to hear.
It wasn't too late. Its NEVER too late, not for what your soul desires, which is full expression, in THIS moment, which is the only moment that exists.
On Sept 23, Tananarive and I will be bringing everything we have to help students find their path. All there is is the path. The time you spend regretting, or negatively comparing yourself to others is SPECIFICALLY time you are NOT spending on the path. When you're there, you don't see yourself. There is only the journey itself.
If you see yourself, you aren't being "you". You are OBSERVING "you" and that is NOT doing the work, it is "checking" the work. And the real reward in life is to spend the majority of your time in happy flow, surrounded by people and things you love, joyfully giving yourself away to the world in the way you find most in alignment with your being.
This requires moving a large body of information and process from "Unconscious Incompetence" to "Unconscious Competence." We will move from art as a broad discipline and study to writing and its specific strictures. And from there to screenwriting, a very specific writing form with its own rules and laws. And then…to creating, building and sustaining a career, including the "Writer's Room" phenomenon, which brings all of this together in a life jazz ensemble, one of the most amazing and delightful and terrifying and educational and PROFITABLE experiences of my life. And we actually identified a path to get on that train! Learn more at www.hollywoodloophole.com
But that is simply a specific application of that core question: "How to I become the most authentic version of myself?" or "Who am I?" and "what is true?"
Whatever yoru answer to those questions is, while it might be too late for certain ego targets, it is NOT too late to be happy: to do the best you can, at this time of your life, to spend as much of your life in the "progressive realization of a worthy goal."
It is never too late for this, as long as you draw breath. Because the REAL goal is joy and service, and it is never too late if you can drop your illusions and see life, and yourself, and your goals and desires, as they really are. I am so grateful to have found a path like this. I pray that you will fine your own, that makes you as happy, healthy, and successful BY YOUR OWN VALUES as mine has made me. If mine sounds interesting…if what we describe here calls to you, then know that on Sept 23rd we will over-deliver, and hope you'll be there.
But first: what is your WHAT? What do you really want? Why do you want it?
Only after you have clarified those things does it make sense to ask "how" and build your to-do list. If your "how" is the Lifewriting approach…join us!
Namaste
Steve
