Steven Barnes's Blog, page 68

Overhauling the car while rolling down the road

 

Basically, I’ve run my entire life as an artist.  Basically a big kid, and was smart enough, and played hard enough, to get away with it.  I’d say I made most of my own luck, by seeking out people who could help me and knocking on enough doors that I finally got to “yes.”  Of course, I’m patting myself on the back for those successes, but also taking responsibility for the asininities along the way, and ALL of my disasters.

 

But it was pointed out to me that I wasn’t handling money maturel...

Day 2 of the 100-Day Funnel plan

 

So on the second day of the marketing plan took me two days, because it is a combination of concepts and execution.  The execution part is learning to make a web site hooked to an email list (done this before), but I had to find how to mesh Clickfunnels with Aweber, my email list.   At no time did it feel “easy” but at no time did I feel overloaded, either.

 

The other part of the game was refining my “Attractive Character”.  This is my public personae, the specific aspect of my personality...

“XXX: The Return of Xander Cage” (2017)

“XXX: The Return of Xander Cage” is the kind of dumb movie smart people make when they’re stoned.   I don’t mean roaring falling-down drunk. I mean sitting around doing shots and smoking Purple Urkle (specifically referenced), and asking what kind of madness Vin Diesel’s alter-ego Xtreme Sports legend/Master spy could be up to.    Basically, there is some nonsense about a device that makes satellites fall out of the sky, forcing Xander from retirement (he’d been pretending to be dead) to catc...

HJ 2-3 and fear

I made a very specific set of goals for 2017, and can feel my life fighting back to retain its original state.  One of the things it uses is fear, which never goes away if you are healthy.   Only an unhealthy brain is free of fear, which is a core survival emotion, telling us that there is a challenge in the wind.   The trick is to correctly interpret the signal, and then to anchor your emotions to a goal, and use it to motivate action.

 

For instance (gulp).   I have always been insecure abo...

HJ #4: The Hero Accepts the Challenge

(From 2004)

Well, obviously, unless the hero accepts the challenge, there is no story, in the simple sense. Of course, there are stories that deal with the process of decision (“Ordinary People”), and stories where the character is incapable of deciding. These are generally delicate, small stories requiring more advanced skills. What has to happen for a character to begin her journey? There must be more pleasure associated with the process than pain. There must be more motivation to move forw...

Day #1 of my 100 day marketing experiment

I promised that I’d detail what I was studying as I work to re-structure my business to take it to the next level. The first thing I had to do was look at the structure of my life, and see where the business fit in.  The next was to look at the different aspects of a business.  I had NEVER done this from the perspective of a business owner.  Always, ALWAYS, it was working “Up” from the lifestyle of an artist.  In other words, I didn’t even know what I didn’t know.  The total picture included...

The Hero’s Journal #2

(from 2004)

Hero Rejects the Challenge.

Why? Because a challenge great enough to really expand you, or move you to the next level, will threaten your ego. Such a change is interpreted as “death,” and will trigger the same fear response. I remember attending a sexual magic workshop once, and all I was being asked to do was go back to my cabin and make love to a beautiful woman. I freaked out, and had such an extreme fear response that it felt as if I was going to die in the morning.

If this se...

Our first virtual Screenwriting Workshop!

T woke up on Monday with the idea, bubbling with notions, and I think it's a fabulous way to explore the new media potentials for a virtual classroom. We can teach these things at UCLA or The Learning Annex...but sharing them with the whole world? Wow. That's my baby!#################
VIRTUAL SCREENWRITING WORKSHOP Nov. 1-Dec. 1: Are you working on a screenplay, or do you have a screenplay idea you’re not sure how to start? Do you want input on your screenplay or idea? Are you an author who would like to learn to adapt your own work to film?
For the FIRST TIME, hubby Steven Barnes and I are offering a 30-day ONLINE screenwriting workshop Nov. 1-Dec. 1. Because this is an inaugural course, we’re offering the workshop for the low introductory fee of $200 for early registration. Take this workshop from anywhere. SPACE IS LIMITED. We may repeat this workshop in early 2015, but not at this price.Here's more info, or you can inbox me:http://tananarivedue.blogspot.com/2014/10/join-hollywood-revolution-30-day.html

Using the Ancient child

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I’ve been working and testing the “Ancient Child” technique for about five years now, and what people asked for was a fuller explanation, as well as a “plug and play” approach to using it.    I’ve done that, and it will be available very soon, on the new blog I’ve been creating with Wordpress guru Lorelle VanFossen.  
Let’s discuss one application of the technique: emotional abuse.  Especially if the abuse originated in childhood, this can be devastating.  A parent who damages heart and body, or fails to provide protection for same, changes the profoundly important relationship with your core self, affecting:
AmbitionSelf-loveAbility to find honest healthy relationshipsSelf-discipline (why bother if you aren’t worth it?) Co-dependencyCreativityArtistic success (which is a balance between “creative child” and “marketing/agenting adult)Body composition issues (obesity and anorexia)Self-damaging (cutting, etc.)Drug and alcohol abuseSexual issues
And much much more.  The “Ancient Child” technique can have a powerful effect here, because the “child” image you create is, specifically, a representation of the child you were BEFORE the abuse began.   (Note: if you have serious abuse issues, please seek therapeutic assistance.   Your  therapist should be aware of what you intend to do here)
What you have to do is:
Enter a state of deep relaxation.   Meditation or self-hypnosis.Connect with your own heartbeat and “source of love.”Visualize the child self.Connect with the child self: visualize holding, hugging, playing with.   Remember the first time you held your own child, or held a baby sister, brother, or cousin.    Find the “protective” door in your mind, even if it was only for a puppy or kitten.   It’s there.  You have the wiring.  Or: remember/imagine being held and nurtured in infancy.   EVERYONE was, whether you can remember it or not.  Human beings who are not nurtured in infancy DO NOT SURVIVE.  You may have blanked it out...but it happened. Find it.  Meditate and search within yourself until you can find this strand of love, unbroken through the generations, back to the beginning of our species.Commit to being your own mother/father.  To DIE before you let anyone else hurt that child again.  To protecting her dreams and hopes.    To spending every day loving and nurturing.  Tell her/him.  Say the words. Speak them aloud: “You are the most precious thing in all the world.  Daddy is here, and I will never leave you alone again.”Listen to what that “child” self has to say in  return.   See if there is a conversation to be conducted.After you have emerged from your relaxed state, use your non-dominant hand (your left, if you are right-handed) to write a letter FROM your “child” to your current, adult self.  Read it aloud.
This process can be of stupendous benefit.  Please, please--even if you are “healthy” you will find it useful to connect to your creativity and aliveness.  But if, like most of us, you’ve been banged up by life or have issues with parents, it is close to miraculous.

The process was given to me by a succession of phenomenally wise men and women.  And now...it is yours.
NamasteSteve

Ancient Child: Evolution

About twenty-five years ago I adapted Joseph Campbell’s Hero’s Journey to the process of designing your life.
 And called it “Lifewriting.”   Since that time I’ve taught Lifewriting to thousands of people in person and through audio and video courses, lectured on it at the Smithsonian, at Mensa, on radio and television, at universities and workshops, and have been blessed to receive countless letters and emails and hugs and tearful thanks that the technologies I grouped into that very special pattern have changed and saved lives.
But there was a limitation to “Lifewriting”, something I always saw but wasn’t wise enough to improve.  You see, the limitation (I won’t call it a “problem”) was that it was a mental technique, a strategic syntax for organizing resources into an optimal pattern. It works, no doubt about it.
But...the greatest path in human life is that of evolution, of awakening, of becoming an “awakened adult”, and my great spiritual teacher Sri Chinmoy taught that that path can be approached by opening your heart OR awakening your body…but never by creating mental models.
That was what I’d done, created a wonderful mental model. That meant that it was great for navigating “the dream”, but not so much for going beyond. What I needed was something that did both.   Having a great time in consensus reality is no mean feat.   I may consider that just the beginning, but it’s nice to pay the bills, be popular, win athletic awards and all that good stuff.  
But...it’s just the beginning.
What I needed was something that rooted there but went way beyond.   That healed but also supported growth. That was simple, very simple--or rather that was “complex” rather than “complicated.”
In essence, something that was smarter than I was.  And I couldn’t “create” such a thing.  But began opening myself to the possibility.  Going more deeply into my own process, listening to what every teacher or  student taught me.    And spent time every day for over a decade going “into the silence” to find something deeper and truer.
And the seed came.  I was the beginning of the “Ancient Child”.  Yesterday, I created the overview audio explaining exactly how it grew, and how to use it.  Tomorrow, I create the visualization that will root this in healing your heart, and move from THERE to loving self and others...and then re-discovering your deepest dreams and values...tapping into your intuition on a level you’ve never experienced...and using all of this to support your daily actions so that they have a power and clarity that will carry you as far as you are capable, in alignment with everything good and true within you.
It is my very best work, applicable to every core aspect of human life.  Generative, rather than specific.   I did not “create it”, I merely let my teachers, experiences and meditations point me toward greater truth.
And it is almost available.
I can’t wait to share it.
Namaste,Steve