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Have you ever been afraid to do something because you thought it would be dangerous or painful or mean certain failure?
Some people won't fly. Some won't try new foods. Others are afraid to get out of a bad relationship or confront the idiot at work or school who's relentless hassling drives you crazy.
These are examples of being fearful of something before you ever do it.
There are lots of new screenwriters who suffer from this ailment. They're afraid to either finish something or send it out into the world. They're afraid of rejection. Or being told it's not good enough or not funny enough or not "whatever" enough. And they're afraid to find out if they're resilient enough to be a screenwriter. So what they do is play it safe. They keep working on the same script endlessly, then put it away and start another one, then go back to the first, do more work on it, then go back to the second and maybe finish it that, then start a third.
This is a problem. Finishing a script (and in my book that means doing a number of drafts until it's officiall finished and ready to be sent to agents and producers) is hard enough. But not getting an answer--one way or another--is even harder.
I'd rather finish a script. Get it out there. Have 20 agents say "No thanks" or 20 producers say "No thanks" and put it away, then to never know. If it gets turned down the script has had it's time at bat. That's all you want. Let the script get seen. If everyone turns it down, so be it. THEN you go on to the next one.
And just because your script gets turned down, doesn't mean it's a bad script. There are other reasons, out of your control.
So you will always have that script. And when the day comes that you sell another one and you're suddenly hot, that's when you pull that first one out of the proverbial drawer and let it have another shot.
Don't be afraid. Remember: the greatest risk is not taking one. |
