An artist's life
Nasty, brutish, and long.
The Shadow
I can remember the day, but not the grade. Was it grade 1, 2 or 3? I was on the playground and wearing a dark blue Expos shirt. I had the bowl cut that so many asian boys had, although mine was more of a football like my head had astigmatism or something. The sun beat down during lunch recess and from the corner of my eye, I could see my shadow. It looked weird. My silhouette did not reflect how I saw myself. My head was back heavy, and my face completely flat. The profile of my face looked like a bullet, sideways.
This instilled a great insecurity in me. Yes, asian features are not as pronounced as caucasians from profile, but this never registered for me before. When I looked in the mirror, I rarely got a glimpse of my face from the side. While many white folks complain about how their roman nose protrudes, that’s how I thought a nose should be. Being Pinocchio was better than being a boy without a face.
Asians obsess over caucasian features because Western beauty ideals mean wealth and status. It’s residue from colonial history, of course. If China had taken over the world a few centuries ago, white folks would be getting slit eye surgeries and the bridges of their noses cracked down to size. As much as beauty matters in our culture, one must remember not to take these ideals personally. It’s all about perspective. But this takes time.
In my mid-thirties I realized that much of my creativity was driven by toxic energy, or, the shadow. I began to see how overcompensating for perceived inadequacies was pointless. Working hard would never give me a face.
Insecurity has always been a force in the artist, but there comes a point where this fuel becomes destructive and nihilistic. CEOs or athletes often say that they need an enemy to get up in the morning. This can be a potent motivator. But this also means that love for the craft or their job isn’t enough to keep striving. They need their insecurity to take shape in the real world. They need someone or something to tap into their self-hatred. While their fearlessness can be admirable, there are countless examples of successful people who are suicidal. The “why” behind their work is lost. On a deeper level, it may have never been. One can have good reasons to die for their cause. The end of emptiness isn’t a good one.
You say “what the fuck has this asshole done?” Touché. Chances are, I will never be great. I won’t be Kubrick or Steve Jobs. Most of us won’t be like them either. So why not learn to enjoy the journey as it is? And how many greats actually look at their work and feel whole? Many can’t help but fixate on what went wrong. It’s tragic to think of how many go to the grave feeling just as lacking as they did when they were young. Running from your shadow will never get rid of it. And believing that accomplishment is the only path to feeling worthy only strengthens your chains. All it takes is a generation for people to forget everything you were. When you’re dead, you’re dead.
Only you can embrace your shadow. This may be the fulfillment you’ve been looking for.
The Age of Immortality
My bro warned me.
When I was 33 or 34, he told me that I was still living in the “Age of Immortality.” The period in one’s life when you still feel fearless and untouched by age. Naturally, I wrote off what he had to say as the jealous raving of an older man who didn’t have the discipline to stay in shape or eat right.
Then I hit 35.
Was it just the COVID era? That’s what I told myself. “This crises will all bowl over. Everyone’s depressed and things are falling apart. They’ll feel more solid in a year or so.” There’s some truth to that self-talk. But changes are inevitable as you age, and sometimes defaulting to positivity is living in denial of harsh truths.
It’s like your life up until your mid-thirties is training for the big fight. Training. You’re in the gym, sparring and hitting the heavy bag. It’s not hard to impress onlookers. You look good doing the Ali shuffle while skipping. You may even trash talk younger opponents.
Then comes the first round of the real fight. It’s against a prime Mike Tyson.
Like he says, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” A hard right hand and vicious uppercut later. Your eyes roll back. This is real. Fight or flight kicks in. Three minutes seem like an eternity.
The bell rings. You’re back in your corner, stooping. Your body language says it all. You’re in shock and can’t hear what your coach is saying. It sets in: this is a fight no one has won. In fact, if you’re lucky, you will last the full twelve rounds and lose a majority decision. That’s a twelve round beating. Liver shots, concussions, a broken jaw, and you are guaranteed to lose.
Of course, this is a metaphor for our fight against mortality. Declining creative faculties, health, and the rest of it. The young are ignorant of all this, blissfully so. Into your late thirties, it’s a sinking feeling you can’t escape.
There is a silver lining to this, however. I’ve grown as a writer from this feeling of loss. The more I’ve felt defeated in-between rounds, the more I’m capable of spotting this resignation in others.
I’m more attuned to the suffering of others. I’m more attune to my own suffering. It is possible to write without life experience—we are professional daydreamers, after all. But writing, like all healthy relationships, involves deep connection. Every time you want to quit on your stool is an opportunity to sense the defeat in everyone. You’re not alone in this feeling, although most people tend to mask it.
The artist doesn’t shy from this existential crises. Nor does he seek it at all costs. He takes it as it comes, and deepens his relationship with himself, others and his art.
This feeling of resignation comes in many forms. Feeling inadequate, old, unproductive, aimless, friendless, fat, etc. It may not show up the way you’ve imagined it. Succumbing to eating pizza for breakfast and feeling like shit afterwards is not the heroic last stand anyone wants. Ditto for feeling guilty for binge watching dating shows instead of going out with friends.
But then again, it’s these pathetic outcomes that make you all the more relatable, and this makes good art. Take life as it comes. You’ll have those moments when you fight the resistance in you and power through that second draft or nail that audition. You will have life changing moments on vacation and ask out the person you really like.
The fight is a long one. Be thankful that you’re in it at all.
Only the Cursed
If you’ve found your way here, I pity you.
There are so many more interesting places to be on the internet. The distractions are where it’s at. There’s no reason to be bored. But for some reason you’re here. Consider this blog a warm fire for those lost artists unsatisfied with their lot. I will try to help you, but I have to warn you being a dedicated creator is not a job. It’s a lifestyle. One that’s filled with so much disappointment and heartache that to continue, one must have an inner masochist spurring them on.
I’ve been a filmmaker since I could figure out my family’s RCA camcorder back in the day. I’m not sure why I migrated to it, but the combination of technical know how and the feeling of power behind the lens excited me. To stay young, you have to know what you liked when you were a kid. I suppose this is why I keep coming back to movies.
As you can see from my front page, I’ve made a few indie features and some documentary work. This is my most recent stuff. I’ve also done a crapload of corporate work that isn’t really worth acknowledging. I am not a prodigy, just a homely journeyman who is trying to get better (which has happened with each film). No, I’m not killing it. But shit, I show up.
This brings me to the most important lesson of being an artist.
I’ve read a bunch of craft books and heard god knows how many successful people say the same thing. You need to treat this like a job. You need to show the fuck up. This is my first post, but already, I can tell that if there’s one takeaway I’d leave you with from this blog, it’s that gloriously unsexy reality of being a working creative person - making that anxiety inducing shuffle to your desk, where you will fail for the next few hours on a good day. There are productivity hacks I’ll go over at some point (like Neil Gaiman’s rules - you can write or you can do nothing, but you can’t do anything else), but for those to mean anything, you need to show up for Christ’s sake.
You’ll find one of these posts a month. I’ll try to keep them relevant to your - re: our - journey. They will be mainly film focused, but I think a lot of the things discussed here cross mediums. I’m in the middle of three projects at the moment, so bandwidth is thin. I’ll be back soon. Until then, please…. show up.