Bringing Your Pages to Workshop: How Not to Squander the Rare Opportunity.

Your script is starting t0 take shape. I mean, sure, it's nowhere near finished but lately you're starting to kind of love it. Or think at least it has the potential to fascinate you for years to come. So at the next opportunity to bring pages into workshop you brace yourself, you put on your big girl pants and you do what takes a bit of courage: you take space on the schedule for one of your own.

And you wait. 

Or do you... wait?

What for, exactly?

Well now that all depends on who you are and who you think you are or suspect you might be every time you hear yourself announcing it -- your name alongside the title (working, of course) of this as-yet-to-be-fully-formed something. 

Well, at least you can be sure what you've put to paper so far is.... something. Surely you didn't just dream it. Last time you checked it was still waiting for you right where you left it on your hard drive. And, oh, by the way, now that you've uploaded part of it for the rest of the circle of writers to review, well now there's no way out. No denying it. This something you've started to build is now real. Because other people can confirm its existence.

And that may be the most frightening thing of all.

Secret writing that you never share with humanity can be delicious in its way. But the writing you dare to share with the world is something you can never ever take back. It really is a lot like a child you've birthed. You can't stuff it back into the womb. The cat will never get back into that bag.  So once it's out and read aloud by people who are not you, you must resist any compulsion borne out of fear, insecurity, or whatever to deny this something its own place in the world.

Never pretend you can take it all back, stuff it backwards down into the proverbial bag, down your throat and into your unconscious.

Oh you might try something to suggest we all pretend we haven't read it but if you do you will be making a terrible mistake. Because of course whatever words come flying out of your mouth in some spontaneous effort to hide in a corner or self-combust... well, none of it will work. So the best thing to do once the cat is out of the bag is sit back and let the cards fall where they will. To deny your offspring in public in front of  witnesses who are strangers to both of you will not snuff out your baby or even hurt it. Nor will it anesthetize any one of the slightly puzzled crew you've gathered for the occasion. But make no mistake. Your denial of your new something will absolutely hurt you with a wound strong enough to follow you to your grave.

So, in the words of Bob Newhart: Stop it!

Be a class act. Recognize this universal truth. At your baby's Bar Mitzvah you're not expected (or invited) to explain anything. Nope. Your job is to sit back and watch and listen and learn. 

Oh. And then when it's all over, when everyone has told you every little thing they think or feel about what you've started to maybe put together, then comes your only line:

Thank you.

You may wonder why I would suggest that you really can't have much of anything to say when the unfinished work is being shared. 

It's for two reasons at least.

1. You hope to learn how we perceive your something. If you keep explaining every little if, and or but, you won't know whether our comments are a reflection of the actual something on the page or have been unduly influenced by your running commentary.
2. A collection of artists who know just what's involved in attempting to build a something is a rare and valuable asset. Every moment you have with them should be treasured. And every moment that you're speaking is a lost moment when one of them could be offering you essential data which you will need when you set about improving this something.

Remember this. When you are receiving feedback on new work, the most powerful person in the room is not the person offering the feedback.

It's the one receiving it.