First Draft: Step Up Your Game With These Seven New Year’s Resolutions For Screenwriters

7. Stop Relying On Others 

It’s good to feed your brain. It really is. Whether it’s from gurus, pundits, story seminars, writing groups, screenwriting books, podcasts, and yes, even blogs. In the end, you have to rely on you. There are no secret formulas or easy pathways to success—there are only general guidelines, expectations, and practices that can perhaps better your odds. It’s time you stop looking to others and spend that valuable time on developing your own process and writing those scripts that you need to stack your deck.

And yes, this also means that you need to stop relying on the input of others as well, whether it be from friends, writing groups, or services. By all means, it’s required to get some solid feedback. But in the end, you have to just consider it, take what you can from it, and then decide for yourself because the only person that can make this happen is you. When you do strike gold and get that coveted assignment, you can’t bring anyone with you. The powers that be will be hiring you—not you and your friends, writing group, and consultants you’ve hired. And legally speaking, you can’t take what you write on assignment and have others even look at it anyway.

If you want to be a writer, you need to take ownership and make your own path. Mentors and feedback can only take you so far. In the end, you need to stop relying on others, take what you’ve learned, leave behind what you’ve discarded, and venture forward. MM

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