Rehab

I think I need to check into rehab. Writers rehab. If it exists. It's almost Thursday and for this week I don't have much work to show for it. I don't know what it is. I knew this process was going to be tough, but I'm battling my inner creative demons to get my ass to write.

It's starting to bother me. Everyday I wake up with no job to go to, no pressing errands to run and no real purpose to do anything, and yet I sit here and don't have any desire to write. I just stare at my computer, get bored, and then fire up Call of Duty: Black Ops in hopes it will jump-start my creativity. But it doesn't. I just sit here, play and think. Then if I get bored playing Call of Duty, I turn on a show I need to catch up on or a movie I've been waiting to watch. What is wrong with me? Why can't I just sit down in front of my keyboard and work on my shit all day? Who the fuck knows.

But like most rehab patients, I relapsed in the first week. I'm not proud of it, but at least it was this early on in my quest to become a screenwriter and not six months from now. The great thing is... I don't give up easily. I know this is what I want to do with my life and I will have to bunker down and get through these next few weeks.

This is a disease affecting many writers in the world. There's no denying it. It's an epidemic in the screenwriting community. Dr. Drew should document my struggles and get me into group meetings. This is a disease. A horrible, disgusting disease I have. I need to get rid of it. 

In the shadow of laziness, I did however finish my Premise Line, or Logline. A finished Premise Line can greatly affect your chances of churning out a good outline. I had most of my Premise Line done months ago, but knew it wasn't perfect. Now... it's as good as it's going to get. I can now start up on my 3-6-3 outline and then go back to the treatment I started last week. For those that don't know, I use a 3-6-3 that I learned as part of my Writer's Bootcamp training I received way back in the FOX Writer's Initiative. The basic idea behind the 3-6-3 is that you generally have 12 story beats in a major film. When you look at films, you can break down most of them into 10-12 major story beats that keep the story going. Three in the 1st Act. Six in the 2nd Act. Three more in the 3rd Act. Once you finish a completed 3-6-3 outline, your story has more clarity and reactionary plot points that provide solid structure to your screenplay.

So I do admit it... I relapsed. I relapsed bad. My disease took hold of me. My drive disappeared. But I won't give up. I can't. Writing is torture... and that's the way I like it.