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The 2017 Screenwriting Challenge!

By Jacob Krueger

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We’re going to do something special this podcast, because the holidays are a particularly challenging time for writers. And the New Year can come with its own added pressures.

We all do our best as writers when we get into a rhythm, but during the holiday season that rhythm can be really hard to maintain. Your schedule gets jammed up, you’ve got parties, you’ve got gifts to buy, you’ve got family visits, you’ve got stress, and you’ve got a little too much vacation time. The next thing you know you haven’t written.

Of course that's not even the real problem. The real problem is getting started up again. Ideally you want writing to be part of your daily routine. You want it to be as natural for you as brushing your teeth, getting dressed for work, drinking your morning coffee. But for most writers, this is rarely the case. Many of us write in fits and starts, waiting for those moments of inspiration and spending most of our time beating ourselves up when the inspiration doesn't come. Then just when we get started on a new rhythm, something happens to interrupt it.

I’m always amused when I participate in writing panels, because invariably there’s a young writer who asks that all-important question: “How do you know when you’re really a writer?”

What you get to do then is you get to watch famous writers lie their butts off. You get to watch one panelist after another insist, “What real writers do is write. You know you’re a writer when you write...”

Having worked as a writer for most of my professional life, I can tell you that that's not the truth. It doesn't really matter if you're an Academy Award winner or a first-time writer.

Most of what writers do is not writing. What writers really do is procrastinate.

Writers are brilliant at finding really important tasks to interfere with their writing. You set aside a couple minutes to write, and suddenly those dirty dishes really start to call to you. The next thing you know, you've cleaned your whole kitchen, scrubbed your shower tiles to a sparkling sheen, reorganized your closet, updated your Facebook photos, and you’ve still not written a single word.

You're upset with yourself. And, at the same time, a part of you feels like you didn’t have a choice, that time just got away from you.

Then you start to punish yourself. You tell yourself, “I’ll write for twice as long tomorrow.” Maybe you wrote for 2 hours today, then you’ll write for 4 hours tomorrow. Then tomorrow comes, and 4 hours seems like an impossible amount of time.

Even if you do manage to bang out a few pages, it's hard to find any joy when you're feeling like that. The next thing you know, you’ve gone a whole week, month, or maybe even a year without writing.

Under these circumstances, it’s really easy to doubt if you're a writer at all. You may even be tempted to give up on writing entirely. You may feel so blocked that you don't see any way out.

At the same time, you know that giving up on writing would be giving up on the best part of yourself.

So what are you supposed to do?

I'm going to tell you that the difference between successful and unsuccessful writers is not that one group never procrastinates, or that one group never gets blocked. The difference is that successful writers are better at managing their procrastination.

Successful writers are better at maintaining their creative rhythm, even when the inspiration is not flowing.           

Today's podcast is actually going to take place in 2 parts. First,