Creative Mondays #049 – No time for critics.
We’ve talked on here before about Challenging the Naysayers and how Some People Are Not Going To Like What You Create. Today I wanted to talk about another aspect of people who are critical of your work and that is completely ignoring them and how to ignore them. There’s a simple way to do that. Create more.
If you have enough time to be worrying over what people are saying about your art, you have too much free time. You should be creating, not worrying about what other people thing.
Many years ago, another comedy musician wrote a long diatribe about me and my comedy music on a closed mailing list that I was not a part of. I was not supposed to see it, but it made its way to me and I was generally shocked to see such vitriol pointed at me. It berated my talent (or lack thereof), my motives for even creating comedy music and putting out CDs and it was just generally mean. For weeks, I obsessed over it. I obsessed over it and plotted my revenge. At one point I even considered reprinting it, without the name at the bottom as the liner notes in the CD I was working on. Or, tongue in cheek, using select quotes in promo for the new CD.
One day, I had been going on and on about how mad I was about this letter and a friend told me I had to stop. He told me to think of actor Tom Hanks. He said there are people out there who, for whatever reason, hate Tom Hanks. They don’t like him and they say mean things about him. He then asked me if I thought Tom Hanks spent one moment thinking about those people and plotting ways to get them back or if Tom Hanks just went on with his life, acting and creating?
When put into that perspective it really made things clear. I was spending way too much time thinking about this person and what he had said. I needed to let it go and just get back to creating and that is what I did. I never even confronted this person about the things he said, I just went on creating my songs.
I will say, that I bet, occasionally, Tom Hanks probably reads a negative thing about himself and DOES feel bad about it. How can we not feel bad when someone says something negative about us? The key is to feel bad for a moment and then keep on doing what we are doing. We can’t let it drag us down where it feeds the negative brain or we spend all our time plotting the perfect revenge. That is all just time wasted from creating our art.
So, if you have enough time to worry about what the critics are saying, you have too much free time.
Create more.
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Do you dwell on what critics or naysayers say? How do you deal with it? Let us know in the comments below. Have a great week!
2014 Holiday Gift Guide
Whether you like it or not, the holidays are here and, for the most part, no matter what winter holiday you celebrate, you probably have to buy a gift or two for friends or family. Instead of getting someone another iTunes gift card, I’d like to offer up some suggestions. Let me make two things clear about the following list. One, I get nothing from these links. This is not an affiliate deal or anything. Two, these are things created by my friends, yes, but I also really enjoy the heck of them and I think you would as well.
Welcome to Goon Holler by Parker & Christian Jacobs – www.goonhollergeneralstore.com – I met Parker Jacobs, the mastermind behind Goon Holler via the social media service Vine. His hilarious Tooba character and my Uncle Interloper character became fast friends. I have been absolutely inspired by the way Parker has turned his Goon Holler concept into a whole world, which now includes the brand new book: Welcome to Goon Holler. It’s a great book for kids and adults. It’s an easy read and the artwork is fantastic. Parker’s style reminds me a lot of Jay Ward, creator of Rocky & Bullwinkle, and that’s a very, very good thing. This is a great gift for the kids on your list or people who have kids. Plus, you can get an autographed copy by visiting Parker’s website www.GoonHollerGeneralStore.
Ghost Train To New Orleans by Mur Lafferty – www.murverse.com – This one is actually two gifts in one because the book, Ghost Train To New Orleans is a followup to the novel Shambling Guide to New York. Now, you don’t really need to have read the first one, Mur does a great job of catching readers up on what has come before, but you SHOULD read the first one. It’s great. If you like stories about vampires, zombies and other monsters living their day to day life with humans, this one is a great read. THere’s some language and situations in it, so it’s not for kids, but I’d say teenagers, 16 or 17 can read it. And if you’re unsure, why not give the book a listen? Mur is currently podcasting a chapter a week of the book HERE for free! No reason not to check it out and then go buy the book via Amazon or your other favorite book buying sight. Better yet, order from Chapel Hill Comics and you’ll get a signed copy! It’s also available in ebook and audio formats. And if you want to pick up The Shambling Guide to New York, you can do that as well. Mur is a great author and a good friend and I whole heartedly recommend any of her work. Check out all of Mur’s work at www.Murverse.com
Tappin’ & Yappin’ Cast Recording by John B. deHaas – www.cdbaby.com/cd/joyandersenandjohnbdehaa – If you’re the type that loves musicals and spoofs of musicals, you must check out the Tappin’ & Yappin’ soundtrack by my good friend John B. deHaas along with Joy Andersen. The musical debuted at the Orlando Fringe Festival and the 2014 Cast Recording is now available as a, super limited edition, CD and digital download. The songs are hilarious and you will find yourself singing and laughing along with them. The show is PG rated, so this one may not be for younger kids, though it’s not blue. Again, if you are a musical theatre fan, or have one you are shopping for, this is a great gift. It’s available via CDBaby.com but is also up on iTunes and other digital download sites. Pick up a copy for you or a friend!
Youth With A Mission Modesto – http://ywam-modesto.blogspot.com – If you are looking for a gift that’s a little more on the ‘do good’ side of things, I recently came across a charity that is doing some amazing work for people in need. Sure, Red Cross, Salavation Army and others get national attention, but we rarely hear about local acts of good. My friend Aaron is involved with Youth With A Mission Modesto and I recently talked with him about all the group was doing in Modesto and it really hit home. YWAMM take the charity directly to the streets to help people in need and they ae doing a darn fine job. I invite you to check out their website and if it jives with your charitable giving, consider a donation.
Herp Derp Ya Don’t Sterp – Devo Spice – https://devospice.bandcamp.com/album/herp-derp-ya-dont-sterp – Comedy/nerdcore rapper Devo Spice has a brand new album that will ‘drop’ on December 2nd. Devo Spice is a regular on The Dr. Demento Show and has had several songs chart on, not only the monthly Dr. Demento Top 10, but also the big end of the year Funny 25 countdowns. If you like funny rap parodies and originals, much in the same vein as “Weird Al”, you’ll love Devo Spice. If you order his album on December 2nd, you’ll even get a bonus album!
Squid Friends by Kristin Hogan – https://www.etsy.com/shop/SquidFriends – I’ve mentioned Kristin and her fantastic squid friends on the blog before but I wanted to bring them up again because how much more unique of a gift could you give than the gift of a plush squid?! You just can’t! But Kristin isn’t just selling squids, she is also selling nautilus’, art, baby blankets and more! If you want a one of a kind gift, Squid Friends is where you need to go! Now.
These are a just a few great gift ideas for those hard to shop for people on your list. The fun thing, to me, is that they are all my creative friends, working hard and creating and putting their creations out into the world. I have purchased (or given to) each of these projects and they all have my personal seal of approval. Again, I get nothing out of this, there’s no affiliate links or anything here. These are just people and projects I believe in and am lucky enough to call friends. I hope you’ll check one or two of them out.
If you’d like to consider purchasing some of my creative projects, you can check out the STORE PAGE at my website. Theres a few ideas there and anything you purchase will go towards producing more. You can also check out Saturday Morning Media’s PATREON PAGE if you want to consider giving a reoccurring donation.
Whatever you decide, I hope you have a very happy holiday season!
Creative Mondays #048 – Edit.
Today, we tackle a topic I have HUGE problems with. Editing. Mainly, editing your creative work. Now this might have more of an importance for those artists who are writers, but there might be a thing or two that can be taken away from this by those who work in other fields as well.
I hate editing. I really do. And, if you’ve been a reader of this blog for any amount of time longer than a week, you know I’m telling the truth. My immediate reaction to writing something is, “Done.” I feel I’ve come up with all the ideas for the writing part of it, I’ve put them on paper (or typed them in digitally) and now I’m done. There’s a part of my brain that looks at editing as ‘going back’ and, as you know, I have a strong philosophy of ‘keep moving forward.’ Right now I have two 90,000+ word novellas written that have been that way for years, simply because I can’t bring myself to sit down and edit them.
I understand this is a problem. I understand that the only way to solve this problem is to sit down and edit. Yet, I can’t bring myself to do it. Why? I don’t know.
My good friend Mur Lafferty has a great podcast called I Should Be Writing. A super valuable podcast for writers and wannabe writers. She frequently does feedback shows and I wrote in asking the questions about editing. Specifically, how do I motivate myself to do it when it feels like going back to work on something I’ve already finished?
Her answer? “You haven’t finished.” Editing is part of writing. A big part of it. Her point: it’s not going back because I’m not done with it.
I completely see this point.
So what do I have to do? I have to edit.
The problem is getting my brain to conform to the point! The only way to get my brain to work that way is by actually doing the work no matter how much I don’t want to. This Creative Mondays blog has actually helped me with that. I usually write the blog posts months in advance. Then on Sunday night, I’ll read through the one I want to post and do some editing on it. (As you can tell by the countless spelling errors and autocorrect fails, I don’t edit too carefully, but I do get some editing in.)
Another aspect of editing that is difficult and, I don’t get, is the whole being able to ‘kill your darlings’ mentality. Where even if you like something so much, you have to be willing to edit it out of your story if it is not working. I’ve been lucky to have had success writing in a field, podcasting, where you don’t have to edit out things because there’s no network execs telling you to do so. That said, I would still edit out funny jokes or lines while doing Dr. Floyd.
I did learn a little trick though to make that easier. Something I started doing with Dr. Floyd and I have continued to do with podcasts I’ve written for ever since. If there is a really funny bit that I like from an episode that just isn’t working and I realize I have to cut it out, I’ll copy the part that’s being removed and paste it in a file called SHOWNAME_UNUSED. Like FLOYD_UNUSED. To me, that makes it seem like I’m not getting rid of it, I’m just saving it for later. And there have been times where, while writing a new episode, I will look through that file and, if it fits, pick out something to use in the current episode I’m writing. But even if I wind up never using it, putting in that file makes me feel like I’m not throwing it away. I’m keeping it for later.
If we create we have to be able to edit. We can’t be so precious with our stuff we can’t let some of it go and make it even better. I think it’s an important lesson for artists to learn and some, I’m meaning myself here, need to keep trying to learn it.
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How do you handle editing in your creative work? I’m writing form a writer’s point of view but how does editing fork in other fields? I’d love for you to comment and let us know! Have a great week!
Advent Calendar 2014
The promo for the 2014 edition of Grant’s Advent Calendar went live this morning. Like a lot of Advent Calendar video ideas, it took me forever to come up with the idea for it, but then once I did, it came fully realized and was pretty easy to shoot.
If you haven’t seen the trailer yet, It’s at the bottom of this post and it’s just a hair over 30 seconds long. I tell you, editing the current project I’m doing for Stan Lee’s World of Heroes, has really drilled into me the importance of tight, quick editing. A lesson I applied to this promo which would have been much longer if I kept it in its original form. (Now if I could only apply the same thought on editing to my writing.)
I am excited to start the Advent Podcast, of course, but I’m also a little nervous this year, for a few reasons. One is that I have, practically, no ideas. Last year, I thought about it all year and came up with a huge list of ideas. This year, I have about three ideas. Not that good when you need, at least, 24.
Another reason I’m a little nervous this will be the first year without direct promotion on Facebook. I completely deleted myself from Facebook earlier this year and that included the fan page for the Advent Calendar. I feel like I may have shot myself in the foot, promotion wise, because it seems that if you want to promote something, you have to do it on Facebook. But I just can’t be on Facebook anymore. So, I’m going to put all my focus in promoting the show in other outlets and also hope that word of mouth kicks into high gear this year. So, if you’re reading this, and you’re a fan of Grant’s Advent Calendar, please tell a friend. Or five.
I started the podcast in 2005 and one frustration I have is that the podcast has never been featured in the iTunes Podcast Directory. I don’t know why, but it’s always been a dream/wish to make that accomplishment happen. I know there’s a million other podcasts out there, but you’d think the longest running Holiday Video Podcast on the web would get some sort of mention. I do understand that getting that mention wouldn’t mean THAT much in the grand scheme of things, but it’s something I’d love to see happen.
Anyway, here we stand on the edge of another Advent Calendar season. Despite my nervousness, I’m super excited to get going. Check out the promo below and, if you’d like to help produce the show, check out the Saturday Morning Media Patreon campaign I have running and consider making a pledge. And, as always, thank you for the support.