Creativity Exercise: Bradbury's List of Nouns

After listening to Scriptnotes episode 321: Getting Stuff Written with John August and special guest Grant Faulkner, the executive director of National Novel Writer Month (NaNiWriMo) and author of the new book Pep Talks for Writers: 52 Insights and Actions to Boost Your Creative Mojo.

One exercise he describes on the podcast and in the book is Ray Bradbury's List of Nouns. Bradbury would write a list of 20 nouns and then write short essays, 100 to 200 words, about each word he called 'pensays'. This would warm him up and get him writing stories that he would later become famous for in his career. 

My adaptation of this exercise is to write the 20 nouns, then pick one and write a short paragraph story that involves that noun in some way. For example, in my list I wrote the word FLOOR. Within seconds a story popped into my head that I wrote down. 

    Gina was standing in the center of atrium watching the other students gather into their groups, carry their lunches into the cafeteria or linger before the bell rang. Under her foot a crack appeared in the floor out of no where with no warning of a rumbling or shaking. The crack split into more cracks and those cracks split into more cracks until there were enough cracks that the whole floor started to fall away and all that was left was a deep black hole. The other students began to scream, the ones at the edges ran for cover, but it happened so fast those in the middle didn't have time to run, so as the floor fell away so did they. Girls reached out for the strong arms of boys, but they couldn't hang on and slipped away, the boys too falling in after them as the more and more of the floor broke away or struggling to pull them up led to them being pulled in themselves. Gina stood on the edge watching the horror take place. Feeling helpless, feeling scared a voice broke through the panicked room. Kurt from homeroom reached out his hand begging for Gina to grab on while wrapping his other arm around a pillar holding the ceiling from the floor. The breaking glass from the library windows shattered as the dissolving floor continued to consume the school. Gina turned and threw out her arm making contact palm to palm with Kurt just as the floor caved in the total weight of her body shot straight down and her hand slipped out from Kurt's grip. Gina watched as everything faded away, the bright vibrant colors of reflected from the sun's yellow rays stretched farther and farther away until the high-pitched voices of terror were silent and all around her the landscape was darker than that of the deepest sleep.

Of course you can adapt this exercise to fit whatever creative endeavor you enjoy, whether it be writing, photography, painting, drawing, music, film, programming, sculpting, etc. A list of nouns can help you find inspiration in the most common or weirdest of places. Whatever it is you do create please feel free to share with me your stories, photos and art of all kinds. 

Thank you and happy creating!

Living Dolls - Part 3

        Lin and Calvin fled to the living room away from the growing fire burning in their kitchen. 

"Mommy! Mommy!" Meredith screeched at the top of her lungs. 

The sound of footsteps came running towards them and the door flew open. 

"What did you do?" 

"It wasn't me, it was the people."

"People!"

The fire started to spread through the house, going up the wall and igniting the ceiling.  

"Are they going to do anything?" Calvin said. 

"We should get out of here." 

Lin grabbed Calvin's hand and pulled him with her to the bedroom. The fire started burning through the wall. 

"Where are we going?"

"Out the window." 

Meredith's mother ran out of the room pulling her daughter behind her. Lin opened the window and flung her leg over the window's stool. 

"What's the plan Lin?"

"I'm going to climb up onto that desk."

"You are?"

"We have no choice. All I need is for you to push me up, then I'll lean down and pull you up."

"Alright."

Lin set her foot in the window pushing herself up. Calvin stood behind her with his hands around her ankles. The smoke got thicker as the flames began burning through the wall separating the kitchen and bathroom. Calvin held onto Lin while she reached for the desk's ledge.   

"Push me up a little higher!"

Calvin put his hand on Lin's rear end and pushed her up. She grabbed the ledge and tried to pull herself up. 

"Keep pushing!"

He put his hands under her feet and pushed again. The flames started to burn across the ceiling. 

"Hurry up Lin!"

Lin pulled her upper body over the edge then pulled her feet over. 

"Ok! Climb up!"

Calvin stood in the window as a piece of burning ceiling dropped onto the bed. He reached his hand up, but Lin couldn't reach. 

"Hold on! I have an idea!"

The fire consumed the bed in seconds filling the room full of black smoke and dangerous temperatures. 

"There's not much time Lin!"

Lin scrambled around the desk looking for an object to hold out to him. She came across a pencil, but it was too heavy for her to lift. Next to it was a stack of papers held together by a paper clip. She ran over and with two hands pulled it off of the papers. 

"I'm coming!"

Calvin waited desperate to get away from the burning inferno that had consumed the whole room. 

"If I jump, I might make it. The floor isn't too far."

The shiny metal of the paper clip dropped in front of him.

"Grab it!"

He flung both hands in the air and took hold of it. Lin pulled the paper clip gripping her feet on to the desk to push herself back using the full strength of her body. As Calvin inched his way closer to the desk's edge, he let his right hand go and reached his forearm onto the surface. Below him the house raged in an orange glow and intense heat. He pushed himself up as hard as he could until his chest made it over the edge. Lin let go of the paper clip and ran to him, pulling him up by his shirt until he was all the way over. 

"I love you." 

"I love you too."

The door flew open with a heavy bang. The white foam from the fire extinguisher filled the air. Calvin and Lin coughed as it blanketed over them like an avalanche. They stood and ran for cover behind a box of crayons laying on the desk. The harsh whoosh of the of the fire extinguisher's nozzle went off for close to a minute, then stopped. 

"What happened here Meredith? No lies!"

"The two people in the house-"

"You want me to believe there are little people in the house?"

"It's the truth mommy."

"Then where are they?"

"I don't know. Did they get hurt?

Lin and Calvin emerge from behind the crayon box. The chard remains of the house stinks of smoke and fire. Meredith stands pleading to her mother that she is telling the truth. In their loudest voices they scream out, "Over here! We're over here!" Meredith's mother walks toward the noise, sees the two of them and like in some Hollywood movie faints just before she collapses on the floor. 

"Didn't she look familiar to you?" Calvin asked. 

"For a second there."

"You're alright!" Meredith screeched. 

The door slammed open and a man stood in the door way. 

"What the hell is happening in here?"

"Daddy!" Meredith screeched again. 

The man entered the room and picked his wife from the floor. 

"Meredith, tell me what happened?"

"Look on the desk. It's the little people."

Meredith pointed in their direction, as the man turned his head the mother began to wake. 

"Honey are your alright?"

"Are they real? The little people? I saw them and what happened?"

"You fainted mommy."

"I did?"

Calvin and Lin wipe the white extinguisher fluid from their faces and clothes. The mother sat up on her knees and crawled closer to them. 

"Who are you?" She asked. 

The father followed close behind her. Calvin and Lin couldn't believe their eyes, as they inched closer to the desk they could see it was themselves, Calvin and Lin staring down at them. Then in perfect unison together they said, "It's us." 

The Most Important Word(s) in Japanese

From my experience living in Japan, just over seven years, I found the most important word you need to know is this:

Onegaishimasu -おねがいします

Broken down in English phonetics it's:

O as in O
Ne as in Name
Gai as in Guy
Shi as in She
Ma as in Mama
Su as in Sue

The word means to 'please do me a favor'. Just as you would in English with 'please' and 'thank you', after asking for help, for a request for someone to do something for you or just anything really saying this one word will go a long way.

So you have been studying Japanese for a very long time or you've been studying out of a phrase book or level one textbook to learn words and grammatical phrases. That's great! Good for you. Learning a new language is good for your brain, builds cultural understanding and will definitely make it easier to make friends and order dinner.

But...

In Japan many people don't understand a lot of English or any, they might not even be able to understand your Japanese in that thick American (or other) accent of your's. So memorizing and having one strong word in your arsenal will go a long way.

Many of those phrase and textbooks put a lot of importance on greetings, saying hello and how's the weather, and yes they can be nice to know if your serious about living or working in Japan, but for tourists you can go a long way with just a few words.

So the second most important word you should know is:

Sumimasen - すみません

Broken down goes like this:

Su as in Sue
Mi as in Me
Ma as in Mama
Sen as in Sin

This word means to 'excuse'. As to say 'excuse me'. Literally it can mean 'excuse me for living', but that's if you add the Kanji. In contemporary Japan, it means 'pardon me' or 'excuse me'.

So...

You're on the streets of Tokyo looking for a location on a map, it should be right there, but because you're unfamiliar with Japan's address system, you don't know where to go next. A nice looking man or women is walking your way, what do you do?

You: Sumimasen.
M/W: はい。手伝いませんか？
You: Ummmmm-
M/W: はい。大丈夫か？
You: (points to map and address). Onegaishimasu.
M/W: あ！そうですよ。ちょっと、ちょっと。(waves hand for you to follow)

You follow the man or woman to the address and TADA! you are there which was right in front of you the whole time. With two words you communicated in Japanese and found what you were looking for in Tokyo or where ever you might be in Japan. You can do this with taxi drivers, train personnel, everyday citizens, but I don't recommend doing this on the bus - actually stay off the bus entirely unless you have a guide to help you with the peculiar logistics of bus riding in Japan.

And finally...

You should learn this last word:

Arigatou - ありがとう

That's:

Ari as in Ali
Ga as in GaGa
Tou as in Toe

This word means 'thank you'. Use this word to thank all the people who have been generous enough to help you on your trip. And, if you are feeling extra confident tac on Domo - ども on the front (you probably know this from the Styx song Mr. Roboto in which they sing 'domo arigatou Mr. Roboto') and Gozaimasu - ございます on the end.

Add:

Do as in Dough
Mo as in Moe

And:

Go as in Go
Zai as in Zine
Ma as in Mama
Su as in Sue

For added practice put it in a song like this:

With these three words and any number that you remember without looking in a English to Japanese dictionary, by the way just invest in a dictionary or translation app so you can easily type or speak the word you're looking for in English and have translated to Japanese quickly so you're not wasting people's time flipping through endless pages in a book, then you will be on your way to SEEING JAPAN!

For more information visit my site www.deathbykanji.com to learn Japanese from the many variety of signs you may encounter on your journey. And if you so happen to speak Japanese and you find a mistake, please let me know.

Write to Feel Better

I was listening to the podcast, The Close-Up with guests Judd Apatow and Lena Dunham. One of the questions from the audience was: Could you explain your writing process and habits?

Judd Apatow explained that Lena, and she agreed, loves to write. If she has a bad day or is upset about something then writing puts here in a good mood. Judd on the other hand might be more like the rest of us, total procrastination.

To get things done he has to rent a hotel room and chug red bull to get his writing done so that there are no distractions. Distractions kill productivity, so you have to run as far away from them as possible; distraction is everywhere, but your desire to get the work done needs to be hotter than your desire to fuck around. But fucking around is easier than working as Judd explains, the reason behind his procrastination is because the act of writing is looking into a mirror, telling him of his unworthiness so he avoids it with other things.

I can relate to his sentiment, a lot. But my dream is to be more like Lena, probably everyone's also. Instead of feeling bad and wasting time, I want to feel bad and write to feel better. Lena does explain that she isn't perfect, she does indeed procrastinate by writing by writing other things. I relate to that too. Instead of rewriting my screenplay, I am sitting here writing this. I'm using my limited brain power to write about procrastination rather than to not procrastinate.

How do we kill what Tim Urban calls the procrastination monster?

By forming good habits. Conditioning yourself to work everyday especially on "days you don't feel like writing but have to get it done, and days you do feel like it but can't" due to unexpected emergencies or unimportant phone calls.

Judd offered some advice from David (last name who I can't quite make out) that is: "Write at the same time everyday to train your brain to turn on", which leads you to wire your brain into a habit.

Something they don't talk about on The Close-Up podcast, but I have heard Judd talk about on other podcasts is the importance of a deadline. Having a deadline creates a sense of urgency and forces to you to work to get it done by a specific time. The project that your working on now, set a deadline to be finished in two weeks. If you don't finish it by the deadline, then think of a way to punish yourself for not finishing it. I could recommend some punishments, but I'm sure you could find your own, just don't make them too harsh because remember:

Writing is fun, write to feel better. This is your new mantra.

How to Think About Haiku

There are in great respects a lot of books about writing Haiku. Books that teach you the rules and requirements for writing such a short and sweet poem.

Rules such as:

Syllable construction - 5, 7, 5
Needed references - usually towards a time of year

And some other things I can't remember.

The Japanese have lots of rules for constructing a Haiku that need to be taken seriously if you intend to be taken seriously as a Haiku poet. Such as syllables, references and specific phrases. The good thing about the Japanese language it is easy to construct a Haiku in such a way, but what about the English language.

The best rule I ever read about the subject (in a book I can't remember at the moment and some terminology that I can't find on Google) was this:

Of the three lines - The first two lines should make a complete thought and the last two lines should make a complete thought.

The TV is on
In the afternoon
Always doing nothing

Line 1 and 2: The Tv is on in the afternoon
Line 2 and 3: In the afternoon always doing nothing

The three lines form a complete thought about what is happening, expressing something that I believe is true. Two of the most important aspects of any art form.

Professional poets and classically trained English teachers might disagree with my thesis, but I believe that we shouldn't be putting too much restrictions on creativity. Although Haiku is only a Haiku because of its distinct parameters otherwise it would be something else.

So go and Haiku my little monsters.

A Little Bit Genghis Khan

One of my current favorite songs is Genghis Khan by Miike Snow.





Their previous song Animal is also one of my favorite songs. But this video is also very funny and cool. But for some reason I don't want to share it on social media. Mostly because it has a somewhat homosexual love story in the James Bond inspired storyline. You know how people on the internet are, even people you know. Because I like creativity, dancing, catchy melodies, interesting plot twists and cool costume design this video makes me smile. And it has a cool cliffhanger.

Hard Work Over Talent

A lot of people say, 'I wish I was just good at something.'

A person goes on stage and sings a beautiful song. People watch and when it's finished they say, 'That person has talent.' I don't say that. If a five year old does it, I do say that, and that person who is now an adult started off with talent, but talent alone did't put them on that stage, hard work put them on that stage.

The hours of practice that you didn't see, the hundreds even thousands of performances that you didn't see. The heartbreak, the pain, the rejection, the failures that all led up to that glorious moment on stage.

Some of us will never get there because they believe they don't have the talent. What you don't know is hard work can just be as good and better than talent. I don't believe you need talent at all to be honest. You just need to be brave, willing to put in the hard work everyday, be vulnerable and show it in a public space.

When you look at a piece of contemporary art that looks messy and effortless as if the artist put no thought into what-so-ever and your first thought is, 'my kid could draw that.' You should stop and remember that the person who did draw that was a kid once and they're bringing that experience with them. They also probably went to art school and drew thousands of pictures of hands, legs, arms, bodies, portraits, apples, rooms and whatever to the point where they made a decision, a choice to paint that particular work and paint another and another just like it.

Your kid drew a picture just like that because it is all they are capable of doing, right now. As they grow up they will improve and move forward. You should teach them the value of hard work over talent. Just because Tiger Woods picked up a golf club when he was three and won tournaments by the age of five that doesn't make his story the formula for being good at golf. Thousands of other kids picked up clubs and worked their fingers to the bone to be good and never amount to the level he has achieved.

It takes passion, it takes time. If you haven't become successful by the time your twenty-eight doesn't mean you should give up. Don't believe that you have to be young to be successful. All the 30 under 30 crap is just motivation for someone else. It's not for you or you should spin in a way that does motivate you and there's always something they did that you can learn from also.

Reading through some old notebooks from my days at the University of Akron, I came across a quote from one of my mentors at the time Michael Spiro. He said, "It's not magic, either you put in the time or you didn't." Meaning you either sat in the room by yourself for hours at a time putting in the hard work or you slacked off and didn't, no matter what art form of discipline you're working in.

Preparedness + Opportunity = Success

This is one of the principals of success I believe and it is true. You have to be prepared to earn success, that's not the hard part in my opinion, the hard part is the opportunity.

If you have a degree in history, but you have been designing your own video games and want to switch over to a career what do you do? Having knowledge of history would be great if the company was making a historical game, but without experience or a portfolio that shows off you skills then you are doomed to be overlooked again and again.

So maybe you should just make your own game and put on the App store for people to play for free.

If you share it with 100 people and they share it with 100 people and they share it with 100 people then eventually you will get to 10,000 and that is the magic number according to Seth Godin to have a substantial tribe. Then that tribe will want to have more and your next project you can sell to them and make a living, or get noticed and hired and make a living and do the things you love.

Learning to Write with Spec Scripts

If you're going to build a house, you should know what a house looks like, right?

If your going to write within a documented universe, then you should study the universe. I'm mostly talking about Spec script writing for a TV show, but should apply to anyone writing fan fiction.

'Why are you writing a Spec for on-air show?' You may ask, 'You should be working on original material.' You're right and I am, but the major network writing fellowship programs require a spec for a show currently on-air.

Luckily, I have some favorite shows that I am invested in and have some stories to tell within their universe. It used to be the standard in getting the job as a TV writer. Anyone who listens to Nerdist Writer's Panel have heard some of them from writers working today. One story I remember is from a lady, whose name I can't remember, getting a job with a spec script of Sex in the City.

Writing specs for current shows should be somewhat standard for learning to write a show. Why? Because it is a show that is on air, its on air for a reason. It's something you can watch and learn from, get the characters voices in your head and see how the story works in multiple episodes.

Then when writing something original, something personal, you would have a strong fundamental of writing characters, storylines, drama, action, jokes or whatever strange and surreal imagery that you may have swimming around that beautiful brain of yours.

Knowing what a script is will help you do all that, just like knowing what a house looks like will help you build one if that was something you needed to do.