Failure!

Great post on Seth's blog today about "How to Fail". As a "Creative" or an entrepreneur, we should be prepared to fail. In fact, we should seek it out. I remember seeing an exhibit on Tim Burton's work a couple of years ago.
I was shocked by the amount of failure. I assumed that once someone became Tim Burton, life was just one success after another. Not so.
Tim fails. A lot. Every year. Still today.
What's different? He keeps launching, keeps going and keeps delivering products. He learns from failure and moves on and eventually he succeeds. Big time.
If you haven't failed lately, then you probably aren't moving towards your big success.

Note: I take this lesson to heart as well. I need to launch a couple of things in the next year so I can fail...or maybe not, but there's only one way to find out.

Awesome story

This story is just amazing. I love stuff like this. A guy makes a 4 minutes video for $300.00. Uploads it on Thursday to youtube.com and by Monday, Hollywood is emailing. He ends up with a $30 million deal with Sam Raimi's company.

It's not often that you hear about true overnight success like that. Most of us hone our craft and delve in obscurity, all but begging for attention and when the attention comes, it is rarely to the delight and accolades of all.

Still, it's an inspiring story and a good reminder to keep plugging away and keep producing...then get it in front of people and let them do the rest. If it's truly remarkable and can go "viral" then Hollywood may come calling!




('’)

Robin Williams

I caught Robin Williams' show from the "Weapons of Self Destruction" tour last night at the Durham Performing Arts Center in Durham, NC.

First, let me say, if you don't have tickets for this show - got to Robin's website, see if there is a show near you and go there. It is well worth the ticket price. There were times during the show that I thought I was going to literally injure myself laughing that hard for that long.

I thought a lot about Robin Williams. Here is someone who was a classicly trained actor at Juliard where he was in an advanced class with Christopher Reeve, so he has the acting skills.

He shows up in Hollywood and struggles, like everyone else, got a break as Mork on Happy Days and then Mork and Mindy where he improved a lot of his lines.

He realized improv was a skill, and did some stand up and the next thing you know (after several stand up tours, and a out a million movies), he's basically a household name. Of course, he has had to be careful and keep himself fresh and relevant and make the right choices about money and roles and all of that, but the odds of going from a childhood in Illinois and Michigan to where he is now are just astronomical, but also a great lesson for those of us striving to get somewhere.

So maybe we haven't made the right steps to get there in our 20's and enjoy a lifetime of success, but then again, maybe we weren't meant to. Success at a young age comes with its own price. The point is, it's all out there...keep chasing it.

Another great thing about Robin Williams...he is a big fan of pen and paper roleplaying games as well as online video games and that makes him not totally unlike you and me.