 You're not, like, going off the grid or whatever, yeah. You know how it feels that way? I don't know how you do it in Chicago, so I'm just kind of... Oh, you don't meet them? We're... Oh, snap. Oh, that's kind of not generous. That's right. It's kind of not generous. It's kind of not nice. I'm from New Yorkshire, so... Okay, so you used to hear those. Oh, I'm from, like, Manchester. That area. Okay. It's so weird. You can help me time? You're going to tell people how to tweet? Twitter? Twitter? Yeah. How do you tweet? How do you tweet? How do you tweet? Is it five o'clock? It is indeed. It's five o'clock. It's time for watching the work. He asked me a minute ago. He was like, I'm like, okay, I got to go. I got to get ready to watch me work. He's like, well, what do you mean? And I said, I got to figure out what I'm going to work on. He's like, do you work? I'm like, it's called watch me work. So, yeah, I do actually work. Some people think I'm just pretending. But I'm not. Someone's screaming downstairs. Anyway, so this is watching work. I'm going to go to the public theater. Does everybody know how to do this? Hi. Does everybody know what we do here? Pretty much. You'll pretend that you know. Oh, look. This is my knowing should ever email me. This is like one of my dearest friends. This is the way out of this. She's a great writer and she's awesome. And I know her forever. She emailed me like, come to town, yo, yo. And I'm like, great. Yeah, but. You're looking great. You're looking really good. Okay, so now you know. This is great. So this is my friend. She's here. So does everybody know how to do watch work? You don't know. Do you know? Does someone want to explain what's your name? I'm Drew. Drew? Yes. So does someone want to explain it to Drew? Sure, I'll explain. Yeah, okay, go. So we write for 15 minutes. 20 of you write for 20 minutes. And then we have questions that we can ask Susan Laurie for 20 minutes. Or tell Matt tells us to leave. Yeah. Yeah, so yeah. So you can do, we can work on whatever you need to work on for 20 minutes and we all sit and do it at the same time. Yeah, so it's a play. It's a play. Yeah. But that's it. Perfectly accurate, except the most important thing about it is it's a play. So we're going to create the action together first. And the action is we're going to work together for 20 minutes. And people watching online will work with us. Hopefully you can work on anything you want. If you want to work on your choreography, if you're choreographing a show or something, feel free. Whatever you're into. And then we talk about, we spend 20 minutes after that doing the dialogue of the play, which is we're in conversation to do. And that's you guys asking me questions about your creative process. Right, so you ask me questions about your creative process. So just watch me work, but it's actually about you. So if you ask me a question about me, I'm going to do Ninjastix. Ninjastix, Ninjastix, Ninjastix. Ninjastix. Ninjastix. And I'm going to know I'm going to make it about you. I'm going to do like a flip in the air. That's why we're all black. I'm ready. It's about you, so, okay? It's about you. You drew, so you wrote it. Okay, so we're good. Okay, anybody else have any questions? The link goes there. So you can write. How's your little girl? She's like 12. How's your little boy? He's like this tall. He says, mama, can I tell people I'm 7? I'm like, no. But people think I'm 6. I'm like you're 5. I'm like, but people think I'm, I'm like, so. He says, but the press and the like doesn't tell the truth so much. Oh. Did you really say this? No, I didn't. No, he said, well, he said, the knucklehead clown won. That's what he said. That's what he said. I'm like, I tell my good dad. So any of you watching now, we've got, we've got, yeah. So tell him what you need to tell him. Hi everyone, Annie here. So for those of you watching at home. Or at Starbucks. Or at Starbucks or anywhere really. Please, please, please tweet us or your questions at watchmeworkslp with the handle howl around. That's H-O-W-L-R-O-U-N-D. Thank you very, very much. All right. Does that have to say hashtag SLP? No. I did that. Okay. Okay. So everybody got it? Everybody know what we're doing now? Okay, great. I'm going to use my phone for the timer even though that's not a good idea, but I'm going to do it anyway. You going to tie my hand? Okay. Ready? One, two, three, go. You're just, you're just, you're just very quiet. I mean, oh. You have a, you have a timer and it, when it rings, you know, but I mean, if it works for you. Don't. Like a, maybe like this. But you're like, oh, I like. Well, that's why I wake up in the morning. Because I need you to wake up in the morning. Oh. We have to have a long conversation about, you know, things that you shouldn't use your phone for. That's pretty nice. Like, yeah. I don't think, I don't, I think, I mean, this is like, you know, case of an emergency. Yeah. Use your phone as a timer to work with, but, do you use your phone as a timer? Do you do? Sometimes, sometimes. Sometimes. In emergency. Like when you come to watch me work and you forget your timer. Yes. And the prop stopped working like four years ago. This doesn't work. Sorry. Did I blow it for you? Absolutely. It's not like on TV. It's not like on TV. I know. It's so not. It's so not. But anyway, no, your timer, your, your phone, I would suggest not using your phone as a, as a timer. Why? Did someone say why? Have you noticed that if you lean really close to your phone and inhale, you get like high? Have you noticed that? You haven't noticed that? You haven't noticed that? Because your phone, I mean, I don't know. No, I guess if you, have you noticed if you put a match underneath your phone? Like this. You can get distorted sense of reality. Sure. Yeah. And this is a crack. That is a crack. It's actually a crack. In the pipe all ready to go. And, and you just need to be mindful that that is what that is. It's a crack. Whatever the drug is now that makes people like ride on the street. Anyway, that doesn't have to even, anything with anything. Does anybody have a question? You got a, you're in the grand jury. Carol's in a grand jury. She came. Not yet. Just, oh, sorry. It was the first day of its secret. Oh, sorry. So don't tell us. She's not, I just made that up. We're not allowed to even tell you go to the grand jury. What's it? We're not allowed to say, like, you're, It's all secret. It's all secret. I'm like, Jane Carson heading HUD. It's a secret. Sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. So when he kicked me, he wake up and I'm like, Wake up! Carson, he's gonna be like, You know what? I'm beginning to doubt that. I think somebody needs a lobotomy. Quick. Ben. So, he's not a wonderful neurosurgeon. He's not. He's not. Well, okay. Well, that's... Are you sure it's your grandson? He might be sweet. I don't see. I still... I don't think it was Ben Carson. I don't think it was Ben Carson. He was very different. I think it was another man. I wish he was still under... Johnny Carson. He's a wonderful neurosurgeon. Anyway, so does anybody have questions about their work? Sure. Your creative process. Yes! In regards to writing, Hi, I'm Lisa. Hi, Lisa. Hi. I really wanted to actually talk about the timer. Do you use the timer often when you're writing plays, or is it... Are you about to do the ninja thing? What? I said, are you about to do the ninja thing? I was just asking. No, no, no, no. Because we're making fun of you. I did the flip. I flew to the air and... I did the thing and... Yeah, thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Do you... Like, should you use the timer when you write? Well, I've never used a timer, but it's good to... Sure. In terms of timing to say, I'm going to write about this concept within a certain amount of time, or is that... Yeah, yeah, the timer. The timer. So first of all, the timer. Why I'm not into the phone. Because the phone has so many wonderful features and apps and, you know what I mean, right? And so I suggest you do the phone for when you want to have some playtime and not for when you want to close the time to work. That's all. It's just a real distraction, okay? So I suggest you use the timer. Totally. Yes. And get a timer that's just a digital timer. I don't have my things. I ran out of the household. It depends on you. And I... You know, a digital timer is like a kitchen timer. Yeah. You can get one of those kitchen supplies or it's like for 10 bucks or something. And they have batteries and very... I like digital one. You can get one of them online. It's great. So you set it for, say, 20 minutes. Which is a good amount of time. And then you turn it on again and you write. It helps you focus. It helps you focus. Because if you say, okay, I kind of... I have something I want to work on, whatever it is. You know, writing or whatever. And you say, wow, I don't know. I just... I kind of trouble getting started. I'm going to trouble sitting down. I'm going to trouble focusing, right? You say, I'm going to give myself 20 minutes. Okay. I'll sit down. This is going to sit out. You're going to focus for 20 minutes. You're going to set your timer. And that's going to help you. And every time you feel like getting up, you look at your timer. The timer is just three more minutes. And you just sit there. Ideas come. They don't come, whatever. You're going to be putting the time in. Which, in my experience, and I have trouble working, my number one question is, are you putting the time in? That's me talking to myself. Yeah? Are you putting the time in? Are you putting the time in? And when I find that I'm not putting the time in, then the first thing, and the best thing I can always do is sit down and put the time in. 20 minutes is a good time for me. That's kind of a go-to time. But if 20 minutes seems like a long period of time for you, or anybody, or you just don't have the 20 minutes, or whatever, 10 will do. 5 will do. 2 minutes will do. 1 minute will do. Sit. 1 minute. So that's why. And again, the timer is better, because all it does is keep the time. That's all it does. So that found it very helpful. I have many, many, many, and I use them for all kinds of things, to become a joke around my house. One day I'll tell you about, we'll invite my son over, and we'll put on the timer, see what he does with the timer rings. It's weird. But it's a mindful tool. I use it to meditate in the morning. 20 minutes. Sit down and have a timer. Some people don't use a timer to meditate, but I do. Because I want to know. I get antsy. I look at the timer. You're waiting just, ssss. You gave so many. Yes, so many. Nice to see you again. Hi. New Chicago? I did go to Chicago, but I got a job, and that's why I couldn't do Monday night and more. I was working. Good to see you too. But yeah, I'm at Columbia now for the MFA there. Thank you. I really try to make in why you work, and they just weren't helping up the money. And I was like, well, bye. Thank you. I'm actually applying to this thing with the Kennedy Center in a few days, and I'm just like, how do you let go of like, is it ready? Can I make it more perfect? Talk to you, just let, send the work in, and be okay with it, you know? A deadline is great. A deadline, a finish line, you can call it. It's not going to be dead, it's going to be finished, right? So when you take it, think of all the people, anybody around the Marathon, who are all of you? Yeah, I read it. I read it 5K. You read it 5K? It's a little baby. It's a little baby, but I don't run, so that was a big deal. In the finish line, you made a marathon, so there you are, right? You ready? Two. At the same time? Right. And you were like, yeah. Right? You crossed the finish line. So that's what you've got to finish line, which is great. And what you're going to do is you're going to finish line, I'll put it in a couple of days. A couple of days, they just said it. Great. So a couple of days. So December what, 9th? 7th? Great. Oh, like from Monday? 10. That's all. It's, you don't have to think about it. You know what I mean? You've done all, you've done the work. It's as good as it's going to be on December 7 and then you guys can do it. It's okay. My question is very much related to Lisa's. So my question was, I'm having trouble figuring out when a certain creative endeavor is over. And there isn't, there is no deadline. And I just, I'm having trouble sussing out like, do I need to put this down for a while? Is it, like and come back to it? Or is it just not happening? Like, does it need to take form in a, in a different incarnation that I'm not aware, you know what I mean? So you're having so, let me, let me get back to you. So Annie's having, having trouble figuring out when a certain creative endeavor is over. Or whether it just needs to be put down for a bit. You've got to put down like a dog. Sent to a farm. Sent to a farm. Yeah. Sent to a farm. I feel like you're working on something that's kind of not coming together kind of. I don't know whether it's feeding me anymore. You don't know what? I don't know if it's feeding me anymore. Feeding you. Like it doesn't feel like I'm in flow with it anymore. Right. Have you ever been in a relationship? Sometimes, you know, you start the relationship usually it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, you know, it should be going like, you know, it can kind of slap line sometimes. And you think, well, are we still doing this? Right? And so you ask yourself that question, what, is it over? Or what should I do? My suggestion is put the time in. Are you putting daily time into it? You are? Yeah. You are. Daily time. And you still feel like ah, this just isn't minutes a day you're putting into it. Yeah. So why don't you spend the next week putting 30 minute or what, is that too little is it too, does it feel like when I say 30 minutes a day does it feel like too much? Put it in front of it. Yeah. Why don't you just talk to it? Why don't you just open a dialogue and say, hi, work, I'm going to talk to you for 30 minutes a day. But let me talk to me. Let me do more listening than grind to you. You know, like your work is a, is a spouse. And you're going to say, okay, my name's, we're, you know, we feel kind of lucky lately. Let's talk or you talk, I'll listen. I'll listen to you. I just might not even know what your work says, you know. Try that for 30 minutes for a week. Ask your work, are we over? Should I put you, send you to the farm or put you down? You know, maybe in your world will say, yeah, put me down for a month, you know. Or no, no, no, no, this is, because this is what I really want to do. What am I, ask your work? What am I not doing that I should be doing? What am I missing? What am I not hearing? You know, for your significant other, significant, SO, your SO, everything is done. Two or three letters. Does that make sense? I see, I see, you're going to try it seven days in a row, seven days in a row. For at least 20 minutes a day, that's not too much. That's too much, just 10 minutes or something, okay? Yes, Drew, how are you? Yes, very well. So my biggest problem for me is my inner critic, just like constantly, it's like this constant I don't know, I'm at this point in our relationship where I'm like, do I just invite him along for the ride? Or like, because it's mostly negative, it's very rarely that it's positive, and I don't know if, I mean, notice you mentioned meditation and what not, I haven't tried that, that would be a good idea if I've heard you mention that. But yeah, I don't know if, yeah, I'm just very confused at how to control the inner critic, and yeah. That's what you need to do. You need to control him. Is it a he? What do you think? Is it here? It's like, it's me, it's an identical replica of myself. An identical replica of yourself? A very grungy, like five o'clock shadow, like smoking a little cigarette. Interesting, and you want to control him? Yeah, well, I don't really want to control him, I just want to kick him out, but you won't leave. You won't leave. So who has the thing for the inner critic? Not necessarily but the five o'clock shadow. So you, you see, you don't have an inner critic? You don't have an inner critic? Yeah, but I just write it down. You what? I write down what I think. Oh, no, that's a good one. So Lisa writes down, so he becomes a character, so Lisa writes down what her inner critic is thinking. So that's a great, that's a great idea. Yeah, you write down, what about you, do you have a, Yeah, yeah, I have a clown teacher, so just put him in the back and a little door into your head and put him in there for a while and then say, and then say, and then say, well, you know, great idea. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, excellent, put him there, you have, if you can feel in the back of your head, you probably have a little door. No, I have one, but I have something that lives back there already so it would be like, no, but I would need the inner critic. Yeah, yeah, I'm here, TRX and I will put that inner critic up. But like, Watch some late night TV. Who do you have? Are you selling clowns? Put it in the back of your head. Put yourself in the back of your head. Anybody else? Chris Barlow? What do you have here? Put him on for later. Calm him away. What does that sound like, Chris? It sounds like a shower. I'll sit on the bathroom floor and run the shower. Which is terrible for the environment. It really silences that and focuses. That's really good. So you can sit on your bathroom floor. Get a white noise machine. That's better for the environment. But Tim didn't say that. I mean, yeah. Get a white noise machine in. A shower for the people at Standing Rock. Just because. Their asses are on the fucking line. I want all the occupied people who were like yelling for like a year down in front of my building. Like, y'all got a calling. Oh, just kidding. There's something to do there. But anyway, I love that. So a shower or what you could do is run the shower for two minutes. Record it on your phone. Play it back to yourself. Okay. Then you could have that would be great. Yeah, that's a great idea. And you sit on the floor of your bathroom. It's uncomfortable, but that helps as well. I just want to write the thing I want to write and forget everything else and get out and stretch. Pain and running shower. Is the temperature of the water matter? I like it to be kind of like sauna-ish. Okay, so hot water so you develop a little sweat. All right, there you go. Okay, this is a good one because Chris is a good writer over there. He can't do shit now. Anybody else have a you have another one? Get up early in your critic and sleep. Very good. Get up early in your critic and sleep. What do you got? I was going to ask a question. I have one more before we move on. Write fast. Yes, your critic, even though you say he's just like you, he probably smokes. He's not as fast as you can outrun a motherfucker. That's what you do. Write really, really fast and he'll be like, oh man, you know, he'll teal with his body box shadow and just hang over. So write fast. Write fast, write early, turn on the shower, write everything down and then he says, you're over it. An exercise. That's good, yeah. Very good, that's very good. Okay, so creative projects. Three projects, you've got three projects. So like one, I'm really excited about but I'm not writing. It would be creating a cabaret. So I'm excited about that but I'm not writing. I'm very emotional but I feel I need to birth it and I feel there's a need to create it and see where it takes me. And then there's the other project that every time I see I feel like any time I consume other media I'm struck with creating something that reflects all my life experiences but I don't know what form that is. Right. So I'm working on the accountability sitting for 20 minutes and creating but I find that each day I don't necessarily want to do the same thing. And so I don't like I guess it's a question of like do I say for what I don't want to be scatter I'm not sure if it's going to be scatterbrained and jump from one project to the next each day or if it's to say like this week I'm looking at this piece but I see the need I see the benefit of all three and I'm not really sure where to put my energy Right. So she's got three projects very different projects and wonders how do I get work done on each of them so structurally should you have three nice boxes like inboxes you could get nice little maybe with tops on them but not whatever like nice boxes so you could put some materials and they could be big enough to house the materials for each thing a lot of times you say yeah we're going to put everything on our phone or on our iPad or whatever but sometimes it's nice to have three containers right or even three really nice you know shopping bag you know the kind of shopping bags you get at Whole Foods or whatever you know those kind of bags if you want OK. So the question is so how do I work on all three projects without feeling scattered right how do I do that because a lot of us work on more than one project at once right and we don't want to just work on one and get to the finish line 200 you don't have an hour guess what 20 times 3 is 60 20 times 3 is 60 so you could do 20 minutes on this project I mean if you have let's give you an hour and 3 minutes you have an hour and 3 minutes 20 minutes on this project 20 minutes on this project 20 minutes on this project here's your hour and 3 minutes rest in between right. You could do that or you could say for this today I'm going to put in my hour on this project and then the next time I'm going to put on my hour on this project you could rotate them like that if you wanted to Okay, I mean a lot of us will have more than one thing going on and you just you know in the morning I wake up in the morning I'm going to do my meditation and then I'm going to work for 20 minutes on project a and then When I come home from work or whatever I'm going to after dinner or whatever I'm going to work for 20 minutes on project B In the morning the next day. I'm gonna work for 20 minutes on project C Then our project a and you're gonna rotate them like that Do you watch TV? Never You watch TV watching help you're really you watch it for research or you watch it because Yeah, yeah, yeah, but do you watch it for research? You just watch it because I can eat it on wine Okay, so cut the unwinding then don't mind You know what I mean? Yeah. Okay. I mean if you if you you know a lot of us spend like an hour a day Looking online it's like stupid You know, you know Stupid and you know, it's like You shouldn't dress her because you know I'm gonna dress So we have to just catch ourselves Actually, why is this up? You're all wound up and angry and if you feel hopeless you feel like you don't want to do your thing because You know And I think putting things in boxes is helpful or bags or you know three separate drawers It's helpful space giving the space a sense of different spaces Anybody Um, so sometimes I have a hard time showing people my work because it contains certain controversial elements Oh, and in person I try and be very nice and diplomatic and sometimes I'm afraid, you know What will people think of me in theory of this kind of crazy stuff that's in my head Oh, and you know, I know your work contains a lot of controversial elements as well But you're a very nice person, you know, so I'm just wondering how do you deal with that? You know, how would I deal with that? Yeah, how would you deal with it? So, okay, so Jesse says that he's he's a little concerned about showing people his work because it contains controversial elements and he's a nice person And he said yes, you're a nice person and your work contains controversial elements So what do you do when you work? I show up in a lot of places and give talks to people and they go Wow, you're so nice And happy Interesting so, you know No, don't worry about it, you know, unless you start to change your behavior to reflect your work a lot Don't worry about it work, you know concern yourself with the quality of your work not how it dies with your persona You know what I mean, and don't ever really feel the need always feel the need to be yourself and be authentic to yourself Don't feel like because you're an artist or a writer or whatever that you've got to have an attitude You know Always value always realize the value of kindness. That's one of the most important things especially now you know So that's really the most important thing kindness generosity compassion and writing as you know the level of craft Whatever you can so people go wow, man, this is really fucking far out. You sing so nice Jesse I have another life You know, this is why you're not like hurting anybody if you are will turn you in I'm serious. We'll find you will send people after you make you stop But you know assuming that you're just not going to try some deep stuff You know Next question And so, you know But I'm a little concerned about sort of the influence of not fun writing How what are your tips for keeping the two separate? So she has a lot of writing like grant writing and you know kind of like Syria You know, I'm not fun writing you call it right, okay, and then you have your more creative writing for you Okay, so how do we keep them separate? I mean, they're just gonna be different you're trying to write To get a grant for example, and you're writing a short story or something. I I think they'll naturally Separate Like oh my god, I can't write my short story of my novel or whatever because I'm I mean, maybe that's a good thing. Maybe your creative style will be heavily influenced by technical writing And that's gonna be your cool thing You know, don't let it stop you. You know, I mean just keep Getting your writing done and see what happens and not not to worry. It might be like It might be your cool way of writing that like other people don't do because we don't do that kind of Yeah, those kinds of things that we think you know hold us back, you know Oh darn, I have a thing and I have to figure out. Maybe that's You know Let's treat it as an opportunity, you know How do you nurse yourself as a writer Hey, so Nina says how do you nourish yourself as a writer when the world at large is shitty? That's a technical Framing it's a constant. It's like hypnosis. It's a constant framing activity, right? We can say the world at large is shitty or we can and we can say 2016 a lot of t-shirts Really Really, I know someone a friend of mine had a baby This year. Do you see what I mean? So we can we have to really be specific and do a lot of framing Right, so we can say the world is shitty and doesn't support artists or we can say I've been doing it most weekends this year, you know That's a good thing. So we have to start to make a make a daily list Of every wonderful thing that happened to you to that, you know every day try that start to reframe your Your mindset and think about the good things that are happening and this is I'm not saying Let's put our head in the sand and not see the shit that is coming down because there is shit coming down But to say the world is shitty You know what I mean is not giving the good stuff a chance Okay, so start to think of that good stuff. Like I bet you can name 50 really wonderful things that happened to you this year Things that happened to me Okay, okay For my job and anytime I try to do anything fictional that's characters or sort of inspiration for characters I end up just like and I can't sort of I don't know if that's Any techniques for sort of letting people be inspiration for characters versus being like I'm so I have to be so detail oriented for my job that I find it hard to sort of turn that off and let the people inspire Right, what's your name? Rachel Rachel. So Rachel does a lot of Technical right journalist Journalism right or a back based back based, right? Although, yeah, we can talk about that. Yeah Back based Right, okay real facts and the truth and things like that, right and what she does creative writing She's like, how do I turn that brain off? How do I? develop characters Instead of these, you know reporting on the real people that you've met I would say maybe also this might be futile Maybe think of ways you can transition. Maybe turn off some music. Maybe dance around Maybe sit in a different place than you would do not. I mean, maybe try all these things before Sort of get yourself in the mood. Maybe um develop a listening to your inner voice which is not connected to your Work because we all have other things that we do in our lives, you know, I mean, I'm not a journalist But like I have a kid so the the voice I use to address the child is not the voice the mom voice is not the writer voice Otherwise Jesse, we know I would be in trouble Yeah, okay, so there are things that we do to sort of put our stuff in a different head space Okay, and also see it as maybe that's your strength, you know, maybe uh, what do they call? not fictional Creative not fiction is a whole Awesome feel to it. So again see it again as an opportunity To do great writing instead of an impediment. That's kind of a mind trick. It's a great question I think we're are we done? Are we done for the year? Are we like free? I'll be back. We'll be back in 2017. This is gonna be so much better