Anonymous asked:

oweeeeendennis:

Here are your options:



Option 1: Hold onto your ideas

You hold onto your ideas until you can pitch them to executives, even though that may be years and years from now. So if you’re a student right now, that means you’re probably between 18-22. I didn’t get to pitch Infinity Train until I was 27, I didn’t get to make the pilot until I was 29. Now I’m 30 and I’m still waiting around for a possible greenlight. That is 3 years of my life waiting for other people to get moving so I can get moving. If your life goes like mine, that’s 7 years until you’ve made something. One thing. 7 years. How old were you 7 years ago and how many ideas have you had in those 7 years that could also be turned into things? YOU WILL NEVER RUN OUT OF IDEAS.

Something else to keep in mind, I was able to get moving on those ideas because I was working in the industry already, had contacts, and had started building a reputation. If you walk up the front of Nickelodeon or Disney or something and just knock on the door, they’re not going to listen to your pitch. So when will you have those contacts and reputation? How will you build those connections?

Well the first thing you do is start making and producing work. That means, ironically, you gotta start using those ideas you’re holding onto. Why would you expect anyone to want to help make your things if you’re not already making things? That brings me to…

Option 2: Make your ideas

If you don’t have work, then how are people finding out about you? They’re not. You’re not an artist if you’re not making work, you’re just a person with a bunch of thoughts. Lots of things have thoughts. Cows have thoughts. The thing with thoughts is that they’re NOT REAL. It’s all just up in your head. How are you different from any other person? Everybody has ideas, it’s making the idea into a reality that’s the accomplishment.

It’s tempting to not make things. If you make something, then that means it can be a failure and that other people can criticize it. If it remains a thought in your head, then no one can say anything bad about it and it’s just a perfect thing forever that only you know is perfect. You become the person that’s like “Then there’s this guy, he’s got like a sword, and he’s like SWUH! and it’s SO awesome!” and people go: “Wow that sounds fun!” and then you go: “Yeah, I’m gonna make it someday” and they go: “cool!” and then you sit around and waste your life and never make it because why would you? It’s perfect in your head! You already got the compliment from someone, you KNOW there would be fans and people would love it because the version you have in your head is so great! You don’t have to actually prove that it’s a viable idea or that you can even make it because you’ve already done it in your imagination.

Deep down though, you’ll know it’s not true, and it will just make you feel guilty, regretful, and jealous of people who DID actually make and follow through on their ideas. It poisons your soul, then you die, then your guts fertilize some plants which get eaten by a cow, which gets turned into a burger, which gets eaten by an actual artist and used as caloric energy to power their actual artist hands.

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I think the real question you should ask yourself is “would I rather see this thing exist than not exist?” Because the fact is, if you want the thing to exist, you have to make it, no one is going to suddenly knock on your door and beg you for your ideas. Don’t sit around and wait for a future that may never come, become an active participant in what you want your future to be.

As my friend Toby once angrily yelled into an empty street one day: “IDEAS ARE FUCKING INFINITE, JUST MAKE THE THING!”