[Callers] on being a beginner

The SharedWeight list grew out of a callers' class at Pinewoods. The impetus for setting up the list was to provide a way for callers to support each other. The list includes many who are relatively new to the caller's mic, plus others who've been calling for some time I recently found something relevant by Ira Glass, host of "This American Life" on public radio, and would like to bring it to the attention of new callers in particular. He's talking in particular about storytelling, making videos, but his comments apply to any creative endeavor, such as calling dances. David Millstone Lebanon, NH === quoted material follows: "Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it's just not that good. It's trying to be good, it has potential, but it's not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn't have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I've ever met. It's gonna take awhile. It's normal to take awhile. You've just gotta fight your way through." --Ira Glass === Here's a video clip of him talking, from which these quotes were taken http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BI23U7U2aUY If you want to see the words animated: http://vimeo.com/24715531