I'm Starting Over...
I Miss What I Didn't Know
The more you see, the less you know. The more you find out as you go. I knew much more then than I do now.
— U2, City of Blinding Lights
That lyric’s been haunting me this entire year.
The older I get, the more it rings true. When I was younger, I didn’t think twice. I just jumped into creative things, ignorant of the obstacles that awaited me. I said yes to everything. I didn’t know how much could go wrong, and in some ways that ignorance was… freeing?!
My first ten years in Los Angeles were like that. I leapt into anything that came my way. Make a feature film with a $6000 budget? Sure! I can do it! A web series that ended in a nearly feature length finale episode?! Why the heck not?! Over 100 short films with insane turnaround times and ambitions and exactly zero dollars of production budget?! Let’s freaking do it. I had no roadmap, but I didn’t care.
Now? I know what it actually takes to finish something. I know how many things I have wanted to create that remain unfinished. I know the cost. And weirdly, that knowledge makes me more cautious. Sometimes stuck, even. Caught up in a tornado of ambition and overthinking.
I miss that part of myself who didn’t care if it was messy, who just said: we’ll make it work.
The Curse of Knowing Too Much
This year I’ve been on a mission to reconnect with creativity. I’m NOT talking about “business”. Blech. I’m so sick of thinking about “the industry.” I mean the sacred stuff. The reason you get up in the morning and the reason you stay up until all hours of the night getting ready for the next day of creative work. The reason I wanted to do this in the first place.
And honestly, I’ve felt more inspired than I have in a long time. But when I sit down to actually do it… to write a script, to sketch out an idea, to make the thing that actually matters to me… my brain throws up a wall.
Not yet. You’re not ready. Think about all the ways this could fall apart. Don’t you realize how hard this is?
And the worst part? I frequently listen.
Experience makes you better. It can also make you jaded and wary.
Overthinking has always been my gift and my curse. I’m good at spotting plot holes, at catching story problems before they wreck the whole piece. But I also turn that same problem-solving brain on myself. And suddenly every new idea feels like a doomed ship… sunk before it even leaves the dock.
A Mile Wide, An Inch Deep
For years I thought the solution was to just outwork the hesitation. Say yes to more. Multitask harder. I thought my ability to overcommit was my superpower. “I’ll just do so much, something is BOUND to hit,” I’d tell myself.
And yeah, I’ve done some REALLY cool things because of that. I’m proud of the scrappiness I’ve developed. I can make cool stuff on a dime and stretch that dime really, really far. But lately I’ve realized I’m spread too thin. A mile wide and an inch deep. I’m planting seeds all over the place, checking in on them once in a while, and then wondering why nothing’s growing.
The truth is simple: you can’t scatter your energy and expect depth. You have to water the thing you actually want to see grow.
There’s Only So Much Fuel in the Tank
If I go to the gym in the morning and lift until I’m fried, then come home and try to build a house, it doesn’t matter how much I want to build that house. My muscles are shot. I can’t pick up the brick. I can’t lift the log. I can’t nail the beams.
I spent all my energy at the gym, and now I’ve got nothing left to build the thing I actually care about.
That’s exactly what I’ve been doing with my creative life. I often burn myself out on everything else, spreading myself so thin that by the time I get to the projects I say I care about most, the tank is empty.
So I’m trying something new. I’m cutting things. I’m saying no more often, not because I don’t want to collaborate or take on cool stuff, but because I want to make sure I have the energy for the projects I care about most.
To keep fuel in the tank for the journey that matters.
Starting Over
I don’t want to look back and realize I gave my best energy to everything except the things I said mattered most.
So this is me starting over.
Not from scratch. But fresh. Clearer. Saying no more often. Protecting my energy. Giving myself permission to focus on fewer things and go deeper with them.
I don’t know if it’ll work. I don’t know if the stories I want to tell will connect, or even get made. But I know I need to try.
If you’ve ever felt frozen by knowing too much, or missed the freedom of just beginning, or maybe you’ve felt your best energy going into everything but what you actually care about, then you know where I’m at.
And maybe this will resonate with your own creative journey.
I don’t have it figured out. But I’m done waiting. I’m going to invest fully in my own ideas.
And honestly, I think we all have to. Nobody else is going to believe in our work as fiercely as we can. Nobody else will care the way we do.
We have to invest in our own ideas. If we don’t, who will?
🎥 Watch the companion video:
I also unpacked all of this in a new YouTube video. If you’d rather watch me process it out loud in real time, you can watch below: