I haven't gotten a real break in ten years.
The crazy thing is that it wasn't always this way. When I was 23, I built a complex Turing test AI formula, raised the financing for it (about 3 million) and went into business.
At the time, though I did have a very good formula, I had no experience, no skills, and I was a raging alcoholic. My behavior was terrible, I had zero skills of any type other than just base intellect. I would drink a half gallon of whiskey before noon, and just scream at people on the phone until whatever resource I needed was delivered. I could barely stand up most days, had no real business plan, and often passed out drunk during the business day. I had tons of supporters, and people actively worked together to help me out. I ended up king of a small city, the talk of the town, with cars and buildings and a bank full of cash. I had a stunningly beautiful girlfriend, and everyone around me looked up to me. Groups of girls whispered to each other and adjusted their hair when I walked by.
This was at a time in my life where I was a terrible person, stupid and immature, with very little to offer the world aside from the technology I'd built. I was garbage.
Over the years I saw the error of my ways. I sobered up for good about a decade ago, with my very last investment ever recieved being during the last year that I drank. I got that investment while drunk. Every investment I ever got in my life I got while wasted drunk.
After I got sober, I improved a tremendous amount. I wasn't just a nicer person, I was more productive, better educated, more experienced. I developed a strong work ethic, and spent countless hours fully educating myself in dozens of disciplines, My business plans made sense, I kept every promise, returned every phone call. I was honest and reliable, hardworking. 14 hour work days became the norm. I often worked for 300k a year salary executives, designing their media campaigns, developing their corporate assets etc. They showed up late, left early, and stopped for a couple hours mid day to get buzzed at lunch, talking and laughing and drinking. I was often invited to join, but always declined, far too busy working myself half to death under the pressure of 20 or 30 thousand people showing up the next day to this convention or concert where my work would appear on giant signage screens. The last one I did was 250 ft wide and 22 ft tall, in downtown Las Vegas. I was treading water to survive.
So the reason I sometimes sound like I've gone insane from frustration, is that from my perspective, the better person I became, the fewer people tried to help me, or were willing to invest in me. I think I just had a lot more friends back then.
Since I got my act together, beat alcoholism and became a person worth working with, I have not recieved a single break of any kind, other than occasionally being overworked and underpaid, during the lucky stretches. I burned through my savings and now live in poverty, dust covering my Red Epic that I bought in person from Jim Jannard himself.
I guess hope springs eternal, so I'm back with a new plan that I'm working hard at, but honestly it's difficult to maintain a positive attitude. Every time I'm told I don't deserve even the smallest bit of help, I go home and turn on the TV, and there's a news story showing 30 white supremacists carrying crates full of 3500 dollar rifles into a 10 million dollar compound. As the reporters interview them, you can see dozens of friends behind them, supporting them, paying them, investing in them. They are barely able to compose sentences, and many have swastikas tattooed on their foreheads. Maybe it's unfair, but that image sticks in my head when people are telling me that my doesn't deserve a 10k loan with interest owed. To be honest, I don't believe them, and I think they are poor judges of character.
I know it's a depressing topic, but it eats away at me in a way I wish I could resolve. Has anyone else had a similar life experience? Does anyone know how the drunk people with swastika tattoos are able to garner so much more support than filmmakers that want to make the world a more interesting and vibrant place? The stupidest people I've ever seen have literally raised enough money to fund an army. I really don't even have one person helping me at this time. (Edit, I now have a few people helping me, since writing this post) Many indie filmmakers I've known are isolated and desperate. It's a shame. I think a lot of them are good people, bright inventive souls that deserved better than they got.
I just wish I understood all this in a way that made sense. Despite all this I never think about drinking again. I know I'm on the right path, and I'm pretty sure the decision to turn things around saved my life. Still, I often wonder if the things that should make a difference ever actually will.
Sorry to be a bummer, but I never grow or advance from exchanging simple pleasantries all day. Sometimes you have to talk about what's really bothering you.
The crazy thing is that it wasn't always this way. When I was 23, I built a complex Turing test AI formula, raised the financing for it (about 3 million) and went into business.
At the time, though I did have a very good formula, I had no experience, no skills, and I was a raging alcoholic. My behavior was terrible, I had zero skills of any type other than just base intellect. I would drink a half gallon of whiskey before noon, and just scream at people on the phone until whatever resource I needed was delivered. I could barely stand up most days, had no real business plan, and often passed out drunk during the business day. I had tons of supporters, and people actively worked together to help me out. I ended up king of a small city, the talk of the town, with cars and buildings and a bank full of cash. I had a stunningly beautiful girlfriend, and everyone around me looked up to me. Groups of girls whispered to each other and adjusted their hair when I walked by.
This was at a time in my life where I was a terrible person, stupid and immature, with very little to offer the world aside from the technology I'd built. I was garbage.
Over the years I saw the error of my ways. I sobered up for good about a decade ago, with my very last investment ever recieved being during the last year that I drank. I got that investment while drunk. Every investment I ever got in my life I got while wasted drunk.
After I got sober, I improved a tremendous amount. I wasn't just a nicer person, I was more productive, better educated, more experienced. I developed a strong work ethic, and spent countless hours fully educating myself in dozens of disciplines, My business plans made sense, I kept every promise, returned every phone call. I was honest and reliable, hardworking. 14 hour work days became the norm. I often worked for 300k a year salary executives, designing their media campaigns, developing their corporate assets etc. They showed up late, left early, and stopped for a couple hours mid day to get buzzed at lunch, talking and laughing and drinking. I was often invited to join, but always declined, far too busy working myself half to death under the pressure of 20 or 30 thousand people showing up the next day to this convention or concert where my work would appear on giant signage screens. The last one I did was 250 ft wide and 22 ft tall, in downtown Las Vegas. I was treading water to survive.
So the reason I sometimes sound like I've gone insane from frustration, is that from my perspective, the better person I became, the fewer people tried to help me, or were willing to invest in me. I think I just had a lot more friends back then.
Since I got my act together, beat alcoholism and became a person worth working with, I have not recieved a single break of any kind, other than occasionally being overworked and underpaid, during the lucky stretches. I burned through my savings and now live in poverty, dust covering my Red Epic that I bought in person from Jim Jannard himself.
I guess hope springs eternal, so I'm back with a new plan that I'm working hard at, but honestly it's difficult to maintain a positive attitude. Every time I'm told I don't deserve even the smallest bit of help, I go home and turn on the TV, and there's a news story showing 30 white supremacists carrying crates full of 3500 dollar rifles into a 10 million dollar compound. As the reporters interview them, you can see dozens of friends behind them, supporting them, paying them, investing in them. They are barely able to compose sentences, and many have swastikas tattooed on their foreheads. Maybe it's unfair, but that image sticks in my head when people are telling me that my doesn't deserve a 10k loan with interest owed. To be honest, I don't believe them, and I think they are poor judges of character.
I know it's a depressing topic, but it eats away at me in a way I wish I could resolve. Has anyone else had a similar life experience? Does anyone know how the drunk people with swastika tattoos are able to garner so much more support than filmmakers that want to make the world a more interesting and vibrant place? The stupidest people I've ever seen have literally raised enough money to fund an army. I really don't even have one person helping me at this time. (Edit, I now have a few people helping me, since writing this post) Many indie filmmakers I've known are isolated and desperate. It's a shame. I think a lot of them are good people, bright inventive souls that deserved better than they got.
I just wish I understood all this in a way that made sense. Despite all this I never think about drinking again. I know I'm on the right path, and I'm pretty sure the decision to turn things around saved my life. Still, I often wonder if the things that should make a difference ever actually will.
Sorry to be a bummer, but I never grow or advance from exchanging simple pleasantries all day. Sometimes you have to talk about what's really bothering you.
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I think that's as much a reflection of the "American" approach to creation (and Creation 
) compared to us Europeans. On this side of the Atlantic, we're surrounded by mega-projects that took literally hundreds of years to build - and not just stone-and-mortar monuments like cathedrals, but softer objectives like formal gardens where the designer knew that he would never live to see the panoramic landscape he'd laid out, because he planted trees that would take 100 years to reach maturity. 
That's a near-perfect description of 
Probably not the best metaphor, because you do, in fact, build a staircase "all at once" 