Looking for answers
The world of filmmaking is so over-saturated right now and there are so many conversations about formula and “going viral” and taking your brand to the next level. I think there’s this big movement to really become a well-known brand. That is the exact thing that kills the spirit of an artist. I would say: Stop studying formulas; stop studying what has been done before you; stop studying the mechanisms and devices that have carried other people in other seasons to the next level. Go out and do life; fall on your face; fail; absorb everything; let it hurt you and bleed through you; and then talk about it. Also, figure out who you are before you start telling stories. All of that is not the five-point model to success.
- Eliot Rausch
I re-read this quote, over and over again while mulling the decision to leave my job at lululemon. I feel what Eliot is speaking about can be applied to many people’s career or vocational lives. Young people, myself included, are looking for the easy route. I want the formula. I want to know the path, the trajectory, the secrets. I want to get “there,” wherever “there” is. (Spoiler Alert: there is no “there.”)
I had to face some challenging realizations: Did I want to be the type of person who played it safe or risked a little failure? Did I want to experience life from my office desk, or be in full responsibility for how it all turned out? Did I want to spectate or get my hands dirty?
And in this contemplation, I again, found myself looking for answers from the outside. I sought out all the articles, podcasts, interviews I could about other Directors and filmmakers. At some point I said fuck it. Nobody had the answers for me. I recognized that at the end of the day, an interesting life lived with new experiences would outweigh the risk of living safe. The lives we live are the ultimate creative act and what we choose to fill our days with is the most creative thing we can do.
“I beg you, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.”
Now, two months into freelancing, I’ve grown to remember what is truly important to being in business and filmmaking. Building meaningful relationships. Truly doing the work and putting in the time. Being present in my life and living it. Being in service of others (Thanks for the reminder Matt).
This isn't to say that I'm nailing it everyday. I still feel like I'm searching for what's next a lot of the time. But what I'm growing to appreciate is the chance to create a life rich in expieriences, everyday.