A Popular Misconception

I just finished listening to a YouTube video about how important it is to set and pursue goals. The author maintains that without making plans, you will end up (along with perhaps a 95% majority of people) essentially a failure, having never achieved real success. This I cannot disagree with; the adage goes, "If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail."

The title of this blog refers to a statement he made toward the end of his post, though. It is a popular train of thought, but one that I disagree with. He says, "People are basically good." I am NOT going to say that people are inherently evil scientists, bent on the destruction of the universe; but my contention is that the statement is flawed, and should read, "People are basically capable of being good." Being good, like being evil, is a choice each of us has to make. I think that if we don't plan on being at least a little good, we will tend toward being a little evil; selfishness is a minor evil, after all. Unless you've been trained very well by your parents to share, to reach out, etc., you will probably tend to look to your own interests first.

I think the purpose of life is to have a positive impact on the world, at least the world around you. (We can't ALL be raging megalomaniacs, after all!) But even this takes planning and action on each person's part. We have to want to. I think having no impact on the world is to be a failure. Of course, having a negative impact is worse; you require more people to work harder at being positive influences.

At the same time, I don't think we should just blindly pat people on the back and say nothing but positive things all the time. Sugar coating everything around you is not realistic; in fact, it's essentially lying, which turns your efforts into evil. But slamming people with their failures is counter productive. I think that's where the term "constructive criticism" comes in. It's a positive, encouraging way of telling people how their performance was sub-par. It builds them up, and helps them set better goals, helps them strive to make better impacts.

So, use your powers for good, and not for evil! But please, use your powers SOMEHOW. Make a choice, make a plan, and act. (And physician, heal thyself....)

I Want Work!

So, it was wonderful while it was actually happening. The three short films are done and have shown in their initial screenings. The class feature has a cool trailer, and looks to be finished and released sooner or later. The other feature is slogging through pick up days, hopefully to be finished next month. BUT NOTHING ELSE.

What's a guy to do in order to support the fam? I need work that pays. Job, films, this studio we are trying to start, whatever. INCOME.

Whining. I hate that too.

Thanksgiving is a week away. I am thankful for many things, including generally good health, especially for an old man. (I still look mid-30's, and Brain Age confirms that, too.) I have good people around me. I have skills I love to use. I have some cool new toys to play with! (Friend bought me a train set! Wife wants me to install a shelf train in the DINING ROOM! Traded the silly PSP for a DSi XL!) I have children I'm proud of. I love my wife (and not just because of the train deal...)

Nevertheless, at least for me, whenever I think about my blessings, I often tend to think about how I have neglected some of those blessings. I have writing skills that I just am not using, except very sporadically. I love to write; I have little self-motivation. I feel I switch directions too easily (go easy on that point, peanut gallery!).

I am confident something is going to happen soon, mostly because it SIMPLY HAS TO. Let's see what it is!

So, on Sunday I will start shooting the fifth film/third short in my Production Management portfolio. (For the record, the first two were features, and then a string of three shorts.) Each one is, in fact, paying a bit more than the previous, so it seems to be heading in the right direction.

And number one is on IMDb! It is called "Bad to the Bone", and there I am, listed as Production Manager! If you aren't quite sure what that entails, you can click on my job title, and IMDb has definitions. Very handy. I finally found out, for instance, that Production Managers are in the Producer camp. That's okay! I'll head that way.

Feature number two has some pickup shooting days tentatively scheduled, and also some additional scenes that were written after the end of principle shooting; they haven't even been scheduled yet. So it is unlikely that it will hit IMDb for a while. I think you have to be further along, but I don't know for sure, yet.

The three shorts are all student projects for people from the Motion Picture Institute of Michigan. MPI teaches their students the big picture of making films; often, it seems, that means they miss some of the small but important details of how to do the jobs required to make a film. MPI has been around for a while, so the students have managed fine over the years, but the current batch are finding it FAR easier to get things done by hiring students from Lifton Institute for Media Skills. Like me!

Enough of this silly blogging (for now)! I've got WORK to do!

March 12th!!! Here it is, almost the end of July! No wonder no one reads these things. They'd die from the entropy!

Now I AM a Production Manager. I have just wrapped my third film. None of them are completely through post-production, so I have nothing to show you, dear reader. I have been told they will be listed in IMDb as soon as possible, but none of them are, yet.

But that doesn't change the fact that I AM a Production Manager. It rocks! Now, I just have to start finding better and better paying gigs.

The Quotable Thumper

"If you haven't got anything nice to say, don't say nothin' at all." I guess, since my career life is all doom and gloom, and it seriously affects the rest of my life, I have been living on that premise. At least subconsciously. I think laziness fits in there, too, as far as writing here on the blog goes. I've said a number of times lately that the old saying is true, "If you need something done, give it to the busiest person." I see now that the truth is that busy people have a momentum going, so they can achieve even more if pressed. Nonbusy people, on the other hand, don't have that momentum. Whether momentum is caused by their activities, or they pick up activities because of their momentum is a chicken-and-egg argument. My main point is that I experience this to be true in my case; I can't seem to get much done, and I blame being unemployed.

Now, fortunately, I am changing gears a bit. I am enrolled in the Lifton Institute for Media Studies, a new film institute based in Allen Park. I intend to study Production Management. It seems to be a logical path for me, having studied operations management and project management recently. Basically, I see it as the completion of my education in a few months' time, and connections to get into a real career. Given the past many months, this is a wonderful bright spot. Forward!