Green Room - Week 35 - Day 4

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

Early in the season (early in every season) I try to throw the newbies some advice. It usually involves things like:

- Don't let people drag you into their squabbles, even if it's tempting, even if they practically beg for it! ;)
- Be prepared for anything
- Write. Write. Write.
- At the end of the day, you are going to be eliminated. Everyone except one person will be - know that this isn't personal, or a flaw in the game, or anything other than that's the way the collective will of voters went in a given week.
- The closer we get to the end, the more these eliminations are going to impact the people not involved, and the harder it's going to hit those who are.

It's easier said than done - with those last bits, there are two things people always say tells them a lot about them: How you win, and how you lose. Not just Idol. But in general life experiences.

I posted this a couple days ago, in a comment thread in the Results from last week, but I was thinking more people needed to see it. It was in response to the quoted bit:

"It's Idol. It's just a game. And although it's nice to be in the game, it's still just a game."

The GREATEST GAME IN THE WORLD!

Seriously though, that's not just a tip on Idol. It's a tip on every writing experience out there. You can work really, really hard on something and it doesn't sell or you don't make the cut.
Then you look at someone else who got through and you go "Man, there's something up there! My piece is SO MUCH BETTER than that" - completely missing the point that obviously they were what that market was looking for at that moment.

It's not the end of the world. It's not a condemnation against that market either. It just wasn't what they were looking for at that moment.

It's the same with Idol. If you are able to learn that lesson, here or somewhere else, you are ahead of the game.

There is a lot of advice out there. Some of it is better than others.

But the other comment in that section that really caught my attention was the one that said that there had been an undercurrent of nastiness toward each other since the Top 25. I hope that people realize that it's the result of being in a locked room with each other for months on end, and put in direct competition with each other.

Some folks are going to react to it better than others - and when put in a position where you have to eat each other, there is always going to be the temptation to say "But that person has this irritating habit, and we can feed off them a little longer!" - where you might not always think that in any other situation.

Or, to put it in a family scenario (where, unless you are cannibals, or one of you is a zombie, you aren't going to actually *eat* each other.)- siblings are going to fight with each other. But let someone from the outside come in, and watch them circle the wagons.

Like it or not, you are now part of the Idol family. You are the Season 8 branch within that family. You can't always pick your family, and now you are stuck with each other.

Not just the people still in the competition - but every last person who showed up, who took the risk. You share something special.

The longer you are in the trenches, the more temptation there will be to find that thing that makes you justify why you lasted a little longer than the next person. Most people didn't come into this thinking they were going to win. Even if they say they did, or act like it.

Everyone has those self doubts, and a desire to be liked and appreciated.

I think as long as you can remember that, and that at the end of the day, this experience is going to be what you take from it, you should be fine.

Now enough of this hippie grap, and jump back into those trenches so I can fire some more shots over your heads! :)

The topic thread is at: http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/588906.html
I'd encourage people to go and read ahead! The deadline isn't until tomorrow night, but it's always a good idea to get ahead of things so you don't end up saying "I wish we had more time to read!"

The Work Room: http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/589256.html - if you need any extra help, or just want to welcome some of the Champions who have stopped by - (speaking of which - HELLO CHAMPIONS!!! If any of you are reading this!)

The Home Game is here: http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/589522.html for those who aren't currently competing, but still want to join in the fun - or for those who have already read the entries posted in the main topic thread. There's always some good stuff in the Home Game, so I recommend checking it out when you can!

***

Now that all of that is out of the way - how was your weekend?

Comments

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

Frist?

Gary, this is a huge wall of text and I will read it. I will, I promise. But I do enjoy the first bit of advice. :) Idol has helped me in a whole lot of ways, learning to accept that what I write isn't always what the audience wants was a great thing to learn.

[n3m3sis42.livejournal.com]

FRIST! And I actually read the wall of text.

P.S. That has been a really valuable lesson for me, too.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Congratulations! You are, indeed, FRIST! ^_^

[n3m3sis42.livejournal.com]

Damn hippie "grap". I think I was one of the ones who made the "nastiness" comment. It really did get to me for a couple of weeks, but I am trying to keep it all in perspective. It is a game and I have learned a ton about writing by playing it. I've met some people I really love.

I wish it could never end, but I do get that sooner or later, all but one of us are being eliminated.

[roina-arwen.livejournal.com]

Perspective is hard - ask almost any artist! :)

[roina-arwen.livejournal.com]

I had a very nice weekend, thanks for asking. My friend and I henna'd our hair with a Lush-brand product. It was sort of weird to use (it starts out as a solid, you have to sort of "melt" it down to a thin paste to use, and the paste smells like seaweed to me) and took far too long (you have to leave it in your hair for about 2 to 2-1/2 hours) but the results were pretty good. The red is more vibrant on her, but mine is a lovely auburn.

Regardless, I think I'm going to stick to Miss Clairol or whatnot from now on, as it's MUCH easier and quicker!

As far as what Gary wrote, I wouldn't have stuck around these Idol parts for so many seasons without learning how to deal with losing, LOL. I'm a good loser anyway, but I enjoy meeting new folks and making new friends from season to season - some will stick with you after each Idol season ends and some don't, but I value them all anyway!

Tonight we're going out to see the new Batman movie, which is showing at the theater right across the way from the indoor gun range... Wish me luck!

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

I hope your movie outing is uneventful.

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

waah wah wah wah waah.

My Home Game Champion biffjoanes and I posted our HG entries this weekend. I'd love it if everyone would go over and see him and say hi, since he's completely new to Idol.

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

Already did :)

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

Everyone has those self doubts, and a desire to be liked and appreciated.

This. Which is the attitude I tried to being into the season to treat everyone with respect down to the very end. Regardless of rather you don't like their writing or think they deserve to be here, each and everyone of us is still a person behind the screen. And most people (Gary is the exception of course) has feelings. They have insecurities. Most people want to be liked. It's human nature. Even people who swear they don't care what people think of them can be hurt. And when it feels like you've been targeted, that people are bad mouthing you behind your back, etc... It's gonna hurt. Sadly it does usually get nastier around this time because as I told someone in a comment to a post of mine recently, like in The Hunger Games, there can only be one.

But do I want to be that one person badly enough to hurt people on personal levels? No. Do I want to win it unfairly and through ugly ways? No. Do I want to get farther than the collective audience thinks I deserve? No. Personally, I'd rather people think I'm deserving and not win rather than win and not deserve it. To me, it's more about how people see me than anything. I have hardly had to promote myself (only last week really) to get to this point, I know it's getting uglier and uglier, and to keep up with others doing it, I'll do it too. It's part of the game sadly.

But what I'm trying to say is this... I won't make it ugly and nasty if I can help it. To me, what's the fun in winning if I had to hurt people and play dirty to get it? That's just not me. Yes, I'd love to win it just as badly as anyone else. It would mean the world to me. But it would hurt me more to win it and not deserve it than not winning it at all. That's just who I am.

It's a game, yes, but I take the way I play games seriously. I play with integrity. If I have a friend who's cheating or playing unfairly? Yes, it's going to impact how I look at them since it shows their character. I don't care if it's Scrabble or Hanging With Friends or Idol. I value integrity in the people I call friends.

So far, it's been a pretty friendly season with a few bumps in the road. I hope the next couple weeks can stay positive instead of getting ugly.

My weekend was wonderful :)

I am mostly finished with my Idol entry and I actually like it very much, so that's good. Java and I had lots of snuggle and sappy time, we relaxed and ate junk food. I feel really good today, though I'd feel even better if it was still the weekend.

[halfshellvenus.livejournal.com]

Personally, I'd rather people think I'm deserving and not win rather than win and not deserve it.

This. It's a hollow victory if you've won and nobody understands why, and it is after all a (fantastic) game in which there is no lasting fame or fortune to be had.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Do I want to get farther than the collective audience thinks I deserve? No. Personally, I'd rather people think I'm deserving and not win rather than win and not deserve it.

I wouldn't want to win if people don't think I deserved to do so. I must admit to wanting to be liked, but I don't want to turn completely to the Dark Side in order to get admiration (even if they have cookies). I value integrity as well.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Whoops, that was supposed to be a response to pixie117's comment!

[millysdaughter.livejournal.com]

One thing I learned when working for the paper -- there are times when a written-in-a-hurry to meet the deadline piece will still be hanging on somebody's kitchen cupboard many years later, and there are times when something you pour your heart and soul into ends up causing people to throw bricks at your head.
Lacking a crystal ball, you cannot "predict" everyone that will be in your audience...and there are times when that one "important person" you aimed the story at will not get to read it at all.

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

there are times when a written-in-a-hurry to meet the deadline piece will still be hanging on somebody's kitchen cupboard many years later, and there are times when something you pour your heart and soul into ends up causing people to throw bricks at your head.

I've totally noticed this happening in my own (and others') Idol pieces. Sometimes the quickest-written ones (or just the ones I liked the least) will get the most comments and admiration, while the ones I liked best will languish with relatively little attention. The entries that got me eliminated were some of my favorites ever, so yeah. You really can't easily predict what the audience/market will end up liking.

[ashgaelsonaria.livejournal.com]

Miserable. Been fluish and I hats pollen.
Seriously pollen is evil.
Itsy little microscopic barbed ball of weponized evil.
I think my head is going to splode and it will be. Messy.

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

Though Gary, with your comment above, I think you do miss a vital piece of the fans. Self promotion. Sometimes it doesn't come down to who wrote the better piece, it comes down to other factors such as friends list size, newbie versus vet with name recognition, who's wrote what throughout the season. But those things also impact it. Especially self promotion, which is allowed.

And it still goes back to RL... Sometimes you can work really hard, but other factors come into play and you don't make the cut. It doesn't say anything about you as a person or your talent, but that's life. I could interview and be perfect for a job, but Joe over here knows the hiring manager. He has less experience, but a factor other than something negative about me, got him the job instead. Does that mean I suck because I didn't get it? No. It meant something other than my ability to do the job got in the way.

It happens every day. Idol is no exception. It's not purely a writing contest and you've told us that from day 1. It's just hard to remember sometime when you write to your very best and your very best isn't good enough, though maybe it was better than so and so's. It happens. Just like in RL, it happens in Idol.

[theun4givables.livejournal.com]

I agree with all of this. I think some of my favorite authors this season got hurt a bit by not having a huge friend's list. And as someone with a almost non-existent friend's list, I know how tough it can be to stay in when you don't have other means of support. I had to accept that fact when I continued under armyandleg. The fact that it took me about 8 weeks after changing names to get eliminated showed me it is possible to get rather far, even if you're not relying on name recognition alone.

[copyright1983.livejournal.com]

Weekend was awesome. Full of Scrabble, karaoke, golf, poker, family, food...basically everything I love.

Awesome enough, in fact, that I have to take today off work. But hey, everyone should be allowed to take their birthday off, right?

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Happy Birthday!!! ^_^

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

In case anybody's curious, it was my birthday yesterday. I didn't do anything interesting, though. I'm not exactly super-pleased about being 25 on account of having lived a quarter of a century without accomplishing as much as I would have wanted. I know birthdays are supposed to be happy, but I didn't exactly feel happy on mine. So yeah.

[lrig-rorrim.livejournal.com]

*big hugs* Happy belated birthday! I tend to treat birthdays like huge holidays, and spend a week doing little things to celebrate. The world is a shinier, niftier place with you in it, and I hope you have a great week filled with lots of pleasant surprises!

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Just out of curiosity, did you ask for the concrit or was it unsolicited?

[myrna-bird.livejournal.com]

"Like it or not, you are now part of the Idol family. You are the Season 8 branch within that family. You can't always pick your family, and now you are stuck with each other."

THIS is Absolutely my favoritest part of the GREATEST GAME IN THE WORLD!

I now have friends around the world who are in my Idol family. How lucky is that!
I have so much more confidence, not just in writing, but in just being myself and I am still learning every day. I love the people who opened their hearts to me with welcoming and kindness. The people make this such a great game. I guess I don't tend to look for opposition. If I sense it, I overlook it because we are all individuals and have a right to our opinions and the right to change our minds.

Can't wait to read more entries. Don't everybody wait till the last minute now!

[lilycobalt.livejournal.com]

This part of the season is always so hard. I hate seeing fabulous writers start to question their worth as writers at this stage of the competition. You're all wonderful!

I have to say that I'm surprised at the mention of nastiness. It may be an outside-looking-in thing, but I had the sense that from about the top 50 on, the remaining competitors were a very close-knit group. So that makes me sad. :(

I've been very tuned out as the result of the bar exam, but I might do a rec list of favorite entries by as many people as possible once I get to stop taking exams. About this time last season, we had a GR about our favorite entries from the season, and I liked that a lot.

Now, off to have lunch and be questioned on my moral character.

[myrna-bird.livejournal.com]

I've missed you. Hope the exams are going well!

[lrig-rorrim.livejournal.com]

I had a pretty nice weekend. There was kitty sitting on both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday I did some writing, but mostly I just hung out with my sweetie and relaxed. I did visit with my awesome neighbor and talk some about the Chinese brush painting workshop she attended last weekend (we used to go to those together, but I just haven't been able to wrangle my schedule lately). I'm hoping I'll be able to pick up my brushes again soon. Sunday was Even More Writing (tm), and I managed to finish a first draft of my Idol entry. I'm still tweaking it a little bit, but I'll probably put it in the topic thread today at some point. I also went to breakfast with a friend, ran some errands, and then went to a cookout at another friend's house.

All of y'all with kids? I salute you. The friends we visited last night have three girls, ranging from three years old to eight. And wow, those kids have SUCH energy. I don't know how parents keep up, honestly. It must be a helluva challenge, and I am impressed.

And now I'd better get moving on all the things I need to do today. Maybe I'll do some painting tonight, if I don't decide to scrap the story I've got and write something entirely different.

[halfshellvenus.livejournal.com]

there is always going to be the temptation to say "But that person has this irritating habit, and we can feed off them a little longer!"

Lifeboat cannibalism! That never gets old. :D

On the Idol front, I have my champion, and I'm working on my story (and making a prayer shrine that it will captivate the voters. Think I need a better shrine right now...)

One thing I do want to know: WHY are all the names I'm making up for the Corporation in my story already taken (at least via respelling)? Zanteum (Xantium, Zantium), Centillium, Stellaris, Aquadine, Dynexine (Dynexin)...

On the flip side, looks like there could be a marketing job waiting for me in pharmaceuticals... :0

[alien-infinity.livejournal.com]

Unsolicited naming advice below, feel free to ignore:

You could try mashing some of the taken names you made up into new names? Like take Stellaris and Centillium and make Stellium? Or Zantuem and Stellaris, to make Zantaris?

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

I think my point above was taken the wrong way. I'm not bashing self-promotion, basically telling people who don't have that behind them that there are other factors at play and that you shouldn't let that affect your self-worth. Because I know from experience, it's easy to take your dwindling poll numbers as a sign of people not liking you... But there's more to it than that.

I pimp. I pimp a lot. People from previous seasons will tell you that. I'll do it again too. Why? Because there's nothing wrong with it. But am I going to let my poll standings (regardless of when I go out) tell me I suck as a writer? No. And no one else should either because it's a game that's more than just about writing.

I even gave a RL example about how it applies to every day life and is a good lesson to learn. I'm not sure where the confusion lies in what I was saying and how people took it, but somewhere communication got blurred.

I'm not bashing anyone or bashing pimping. Period. If you take anything I said personally, I'm sorry. That's not my intention. I struggle with self-esteem issues so for me, it's hard to pimp. But I don't judge others who don't mind it. Never have. Never will.

Late Commenter League: Frenzy time!

[beldarzfixon.livejournal.com]

I have posted my traditional post-Idol-elimination Friending Frenzy (http://beldar.livejournal.com/768090.html) over at the beldar account.

Come on over and join the fun. =)

[kathrynrose.livejournal.com]

Pimping = check
Concrit = check
Being eliminated =/= Writing talent = check

Any other Idol standard issues we want to cover in this Green Room?

[alycewilson.livejournal.com]

Why can't we all just get along?????

[pixiebelle.livejournal.com]

I'm opening this up to LJI as a whole:

Post a comment, I'll say something nice about you and what I like about you. Stolen from a friend that left me a comment and it made my day. So I figured I'd do the same to others.

Anyone can pipe in on other threads to, but it must be nice things only.

http://pixie117.livejournal.com/665713.html

[noodledays.livejournal.com]

question for you, Gary - so (talking percentages) how many of these pearls did you have figured out before Idol, and how much did you figure out along the way with everybody else? ;o

[clauderainsrm.livejournal.com]

I found most of them out the hard way, with my own interactions with writing and publishing.

That was part of the point of Idol for me, finding a way to melt that world with my love of reality television and use the two to create something where one could mirror the other.

The years have taught me Idol-specific examples of things that happen in real life. I'm 40, and still learning a lot of those lessons. :)

[kittymichaels.livejournal.com]

I read through some of this looking for my name. I mean what you wrote, Gary, and the comments. I didn't see my name.

[beldar.livejournal.com]

Master! You've returned!

[whipchick.livejournal.com]

Apologies for not being very present in the Green Room/Work Room lately - just so's I don't seem all cold and unfriendly, I'm at the Winnipeg Fringe Festival, doing both an outdoor street-performer-circus show, and my one-woman show indoors. (facebook.com/allthegoodtrickshurt)

1) If you know anyone in Winnipeg, and you like my work, please mention TRUE STORY at the Fringe to them - it's very hard to sell tickets when there's 173 shows and I'm not from here and don't have a fan base.

2) I'm swamped as hell, with doing the shows, passing out flyers and promoting, and seeing other artists' shows to support them, too.

I will still read everything (Best part of Idol!) and am still on board, and I apologize to all the people who are so cool and send me messages that I am VERY OVERDUE on responding to :)

[beldar.livejournal.com]

Any chance you can do the IndyFringe (Indianapolis Fringe Festival) one year? Next year will be the 10th.

I'd come see you. =)