“I saved your blog posts…”

I received this email the other day, reprinted by permission:

Hi Scott,

I wanted to take the time to email you to say a big thanks for your advice and encouragement through your blog!

The last few years I’ve been a bit lost creatively. I’d keep starting projects and screenplays and never finish them. This would devolve into a crippling cycle of self-doubt and I’d never get anywhere.

Fast forward to this time last year. I had just got married in the summer of 2014 and already my confidence was beginning to return. But it was reading your series of posts for the end of the year and writing goals of 2015 that truly helped galvanise my work output. Your mantra of ‘The only way out is through’ is what pushed me onwards.

I saved your blog posts to my Evernote and re-read and re-read them through the course of the year.

And this year I completed two feature screenplays! One by summer which I entered into a funding scheme here in the UK run by Film London. It got me to the semi-finalist stage but there’s still continued support with development.

Whilst I waited to hear about that, I started and completed a first draft of another idea I’d been brewing. I’m currently rewriting with the aim to be done by the end of the year.

I can’t tell you how much confidence just finishing the first script gave me, let alone a second one and it all started with reading your advice.

Thank you again!

Azhur Saleem

From time to time, people ask me why I host Go Into The Story, how it is I’ve written over 18,000 posts and blogged for 2,766 consecutive days.

It’s because of writers like Azhur.

I was a complete outsider when I broke into Hollywood by selling a spec script in 1987. I had zero formal education as a screenwriter and precisely one contact in the business.

Because I know what it’s like first-hand, I have always been acutely empathetic toward the experience of aspiring screenwriters, particularly those who stand outside the walls of the entertainment industry.

Go Into The Story is my attempt to create an online resource providing quality information and honest inspiration: Quality because what I write about here is based on nearly 30 years of boots on the ground experience of working in the front lines of the movie and TV business; Honest because I am committed to tell the truth about the challenges we all face in trying to make it as writers in the field of entertainment.

There are no secret methods, no golden paradigms, no insider tips to ease your way into Hollywood.

It is an incredibly competitive arena where the odds are stacked severely against monetary success.

And yet, I can’t deny my own life experience, that it is, indeed, possible to write a script… with a strong story concept… great characters… emotional resonance… and get that script in front of someone who can change your life.

To do that, you need to learn the craft. Watch movies. Read scripts. Write pages. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Take a clue from Azhur. He is being productive. Cranking out scripts. Learning the craft. Writing with passion.

So let’s make a deal: If you keep working hard, like Azhur, I’ll keep working hard, too.

And together, we’ll keep climbing that ladder!