I find myself involved in an ongoing conversation about accountability and creativity, about inspiration vs discipline, about unfinished projects and abandoned ideas.
My friends, my students, my peers. I’m surrounded by creative and funny and smart and insightful and driven people, and a lot of them can’t seem to start the thing or finish the thing but talk a lot about wanting to, and next week, and when things settle down at work.
They ask: Do I need to find inspiration? Do I need to show up at my computer from 2-3pm everyday? Pay someone to keep me accountable? Outline more? Outline less? Wait until the new year, the paycheck, the class is over?
Maybe? Yes? But I think there’s something else to consider when it comes to why some people finish their creative projects while some never start.
Stakes.
In my storytelling classes, the stakes are something we talk about over and over again. To put it simply, the stakes of a story are defined by what the character has to gain and lose. What’s the best thing that can happen if they achieve their want, and what’s the worst thing that might happen if they don’t?
***Quick writing note: there really are only a few core wants (IMO- like everything else!). Most of us want love, admiration, validation, to be seen, to be included. We’re scared of failure, ostracism, embarrassment. In our writing, we must use specific language to make our stories one of a kind.
So instead of writing “I want to be seen,” we might say our want is “to hear the audience's applause.” This will inform the way we write the story, the metaphors we might use, etc. This is what we call “universal theme” and it’s what makes stories (movies, TV shows, books) so relatable; someone might not want to get on stage and hear applause, but they want to be seen (as do most people). This is what makes your story relatable (a la strumming my pain with her fingers, singing my life with her words).
Along that line, there are often few best things and worst things. Again, to elevate our writing and make our stories individual, it’s best to use specific examples of gains and losses that represent universal themes. (for ex: instead of saying “If I don’t get an A on the test I’ll be a failure.” Say “If I don’t get an A on the test, I won’t get the scholarship, I’ll never leave this small town, and I’ll be forced to repeat my father’s mediocre, unhappy life.” You feel?)
A few examples:
WANT: to slow dance with their crush at the homecoming dance
Best thing: love! (a common stake), to feel like you are “one of those girls,” to feel beautiful
Worst thing:
-feeling like missing out (stay at home with your Dad watching the news instead of being a part of it all…again)
-heartbreak (sobbing at the local track while you sob to Whitney Houston ballads)
-poor self-image (“I’ll be what everyone else thinks I am, an ugly duckling.”)
WANT: to make the baseball team
Best thing: friendship, to wear the uniform, to make your dad proud, to win your sister’s respect, to hit a home run like your hero
Worst thing:
-rejection (dad washes the car instead of talks to you about shared interest)
-not being loved (your sister ignores you at her birthday)
-loneliness (if you’re not at baseball practices, you have spend your time listening to your mom bitch about bills)
WANT: a dog
Best thing: having a best friend, feeling needed, having responsibility, feeling like an adult, building a family.
Worst thing:
-loneliness (If you don’t have a dog you’re coming home to an empty apartment.)
-feeling like you’re missing out on a major life event (“Everyone around me are having babies, I want the feeling of motherhood in my own way.”)
Wow, I didn't mean to go on such a writing lesson there!
Anyway, if you look at your life as a story, and you’re the main character, then what are your stakes? What happens if you never finish that screenplay, produce that show, write that song? What happens if you do?
I am lucky in a way. I have alway known I wanted to do this. I knew I wanted to create and perform. Sure, it’s taken me a minute (decade) to realize what this is, is writing and performing my own words, teaching storytelling and producing my shows.
Because of that, my creative projects are also my jobs. My stakes?
Best thing:
-I am the person who I tell everyone I am
-I can pay my rent
-I am achieving my dream
-I am fulfilling my purpose
Worst thing:
-Complete fucking identity crisis
-Uncomfortableness/dread/depression around wanting to perform but having nothing to perform
-Never *moving* people by my work or making an impact
-NO INCOME
-Have to hunt for an entry level job I would fucking hate
-Forced to move back in with my mom in Ohio (some very high stakes!)
If week after month after year you keep saying you want to do that thing and you don’t, it might not be so much about inspiration, fear, motivation, resources or scheduling (though I’m not saying those things don’t play a part). It might be that your personal stakes aren’t high enough.
Stop shrugging this off! Make your stakes higher! Most things in life are self-imposed (and most things don’t matter at all), so you might have to create stakes around your goal.
I’m not saying you have to quit your job and rely on this thing to pay your rent… but maybe you do? Or maybe you need outside accountability you pay for, a deadline where you share 3 chapters of your book with friends, or you post about it on social media and the shame and humiliation you’d feel if you didn't follow through would just be too much to bear.
So what’s that thing you’ve been toying with, picking up and putting down? What’s the best thing that could happen if you completed it? And more importantly, what’s the worst thing that would happen if you never finished it?
If not finishing your project makes you the type of person who doesn't commit to yourself, the type of person who doesn’t bet on yourself, the type of person who talks the talk but never walks the walk, for my money, that is the worst thing of all.