Live To Write Another Day

teachers, grandparents, siblings, friends, and all sorts of other people who will start to exert a sway over it. As I said before, your job now is to be a sure-handed guide, to receive the advice and insight of others, to make level-headed decisions about your story’s future, and to continue to shape it into the story it wants to become.
Does this mean that you’re no longer in control of the process? Absolutely not. On the contrary, your process is more important than ever. What it means is that you have to find a way to be comfortable with the fact that no matter who you give your script to, from this day forward it will always be seen in an imperfect light. No matter what you do with the notes you receive, no matter how hard you try, no matter how many painstaking times you rewrite it, there will always be another person with another opinion, and there will always be more notes.
Seriously. Always.
Are you starting to understand now why I was so emphatic about loving and cherishing the time you spent writing that first draft—when the idea belonged to no one else but you?
Again, I’m not saying you should just throw up your hands and jump off a bridge. What I’m saying is you have to be super cognizant of the fact that you’ve now entered an entirely new phase in the life of your story, one in which you’ve got to make a substantial attitude adjustment as you approach the work ahead. So don’t worry, it’s not all doom and gloom. In fact, there’s definitely another way of looking at this next step with the glass half full.
 The Story Will Never Stop Being Told
When you started this grand adventure, you had nothing more than a passing notion, a faint, undefined radio signal, right? Then you started to tune that radio signal in and it got clearer. Then its cells started to multiply and miraculously it grew into this fleshed out, three-dimensional being. But that doesn’t mean it’s not still growing and changing. As a matter of fact it will never stop growing and changing. In other words:
The story will never stop being told.
If you can genuinely buy into this concept, then you will always be able to remain open to new ideas, and no note will ever freak you out. Okay, I take that back. Of course there will be notes that freak you out, but there will never be a note that takes you by surprise, or makes you want to jump off that bridge because you feel it threatens the precious sanctity of your creation. You’ll be egoless about it (if that’s possible), and at peace with the fact that not only does this story exist outside of you, it also exists in a state of constant change. So actually, you’re still tuning in that radio, and you always will be—because the story will never really be done. There will never be a final draft, and there’s absolutely nothing precious about it but your core message.
Another very memorable moment from my film school days illustrates what I’m talking about here in perhaps the simplest of ways. The wonderful writer/director and prolific producer James L. Brooks came to speak to us one afternoon, and part of the discussion involved screening selected scenes from his films and television shows. After they showed a scene from the Academy Award winning Terms of Endearment someone asked a question, but the pensive Brooks didn’t answer for several long moments. He just kept staring at the screen, until finally he explained that he couldn’t help thinking that he should have cut away from Jack Nicholson’s character earlier in the scene to capture a little more of Shirley MacLaine’s reaction.
I found this absolutely fascinating. Here it was 1989, a full six years after the film had been released, probably at least ten or more since he first began working on the idea, and who knows how long since he last looked at that particular scene. Now he’s in this auditorium full of adoring film students showering him with praise about his work. You’d think he’d just sit back and enjoy the ride, right? Wrong. His writer gene wouldn’t let him. Instead, he gets right back in there and keeps editing, keeps tuning in the story, keeps rewriting the script in his mind.
Clearly this is a guy who is well aware that the story never stops being told.
 Mining for Gold
Another healthy way to look at the note-receiving process is to see it as a gold-mining expedition, an opportunity to discover nuggets of wisdom that will help make your story better, as opposed to an encounter with a nuclear submarine that’s about to blow it to smithereens.
In order to be a successful gold miner though, you have to dig—and you have to dig persistently. You can’t be passive. You have to be proactive.
But how can you be proactive when you’re the one receiving the notes, when you’re the one who’s supposed to be doing the listening?
Here’s the deal: When someone gives you notes you need to be open and respectful and consider each one carefully, but at the same time you can’t let the note giver get away with being an omnipotent authority on your story, or let them poke holes in it without offering anything constructive (as we discussed in the previous chapter). It’s your work. You know it better than anyone, and you know what you’re trying to say with it. If you think a note has some validity, use the conversation to drill deeper into it. Shape the note into something that can help you realize your vision by getting more specifics out of your note giver. By asking them follow-up questions, you guide the direction of the discussion and engage them in the process, which will show them you value their opinion—and if they know you value their opinion, you will definitely get more out of them. Through this exchange,