I think a lot about hamster wheels these days. For some who loves to research and research and research some more (did I say ‘research’?), it’s easy to misunderstand action for wheel-spinning. When I look back fifteen years of learning about screenwriting, for example, from the early days of writing shitty short films on Movie Magic to reading through transcripts from the Scriptnotes podcasts to reading another book about screenwriting structure, I realize I’ve spent nearly half of my life preparing for doing the actual thing. That’s a lot of wheel-spinning. A lot of assuming and guessing and constructing knowledge that hasn’t had a chance to fail yet. Because that’s probably the point: you can’t fail when you’re always preparing. You don’t think you can feel too guilty about the lack of work if you’re still working on the skills to even begin the lack of work.
But it’s all a facade.
Yes, it’s good to invest in learning. But so much more learning comes from actually doing the thing. From studying those who have done the thing. From learning from the mistakes of applying what you learned and just how well it did or did not turn out. I’ve written first drafts of four feature-length screenplays in the past four years, but two of them came in a 2-month span at the beginning of the COVID lockdowns, when we had plenty of time at home to finally put some things in action. I learned more writing those last two scripts than I did in any of the transcripts or books I read, or any of the thousands of screenshots I took from various screenwriters and screenwriting wannabes. And there is still so much more to learn! But it’s easier for the car of new learning to merge onto something worthwhile if you actually got your own traffic going. And traffic only exists where movement lives. No one wants to drive into a never-ending loop.
The best way to deeply understand a concept is to apply it to a different domain. Let’s shift from screenwriting to basketball. If I spent fifteen years of reading about how to finally set up some basketball plays or how to finesse my shooting stroke or how to negotiate a professional contract, all of which without actually playing on the court: would you sign me to your team? If I spent years and years in school learning about teaching and universal design and curriculum and lesson planning and all that fun stuff without ever actually stepping foot in the classroom: would you hire me?
That’s the thing about lifelong learning that, to me, separates fun facts from fulfillment. When it’s just things you’re vacuuming up but not applying in any physical, intentional way, you’re inevitably going to run into an emotional wall where you wonder what the point of all of it is. But if you’re applying and failing and trying again? It’s easier to enjoy the work for what it is.
Being stuck is being in an infinity loop where the surface changes – from stairs to streets to slides to ladders and back again to stairs – give you the short-term sense of accomplishment without actually getting you very far. You know more, yes. But knowledge without some kind of application is an unbalanced, wobbly head bumping through the hallways of life.
