And Suddenly That Was It...

Stay with me, folks. This will all make sense by the end, I promise.

The past few years I’ve been getting more and more involved in crowd-funded film projects. It’s an amazing experience I’d recommend to any and every film fan. If you are new to the concept here is my take on it: You go to the movies and buy yourself some popcorn and a drink and that’s $30 right there, give or take. Maybe you really enjoy the film, maybe you don’t. Either way you are paying your money for the end product and coming into it at the end of the process. And you’ve picked the film you watched out of a selection of about a dozen films of different genres.

With fan funded projects you get in on the ground floor and your choices decide what films get made. Instead of paying $30 to see a movie that’s already been made you pay $30 to get a movie you want to see get made. And that’s just the start! There are always perks to fan funding like getting your name in the credits, getting the DVD or merchandise, etc. PLUS the fun of being involved in the indie fan funded community and getting to see and be a part of the process from go to whoa.

I’ve just got to say that I love these people. It’s such a fun, enthusiastic, supportive bunch of people. And we never would’ve met if it weren’t for twitter. In fact we’ve never met outside of twitter. But there is so much positive energy there it makes me feel so excited and invigorated every time I log on. People are reaching their funding or follower goals and sharing their experiences. Not to mention the interesting film projects that they are working on. Following along with the whole process from dream to finished product is incredibly exciting.

Jumping tracks a little here. I had really lousy self-confidence and low self-esteem for most of my life. There are so many situations I look back on and realise that it was debilitating. I was at the point that not only did I find it impossible to be myself around people a lot of the time; I had essentially lost who I was. 

I look back over the last 5 years or so and I can see a long, drawn-out process in which all that started to, and continues to, change. There have been ups and downs, but over-all there has been so much progress 25yo me would be astounded to meet (almost) 31yo me: I got my driver’s licence, I got steady, full-time work, I moved out of home, I challenged myself to try new things (see my “I’ve always wanted to...” blogs for just a few examples) and I discovered that I really, really, really love horror movies...  

This last one feels like the crux of the whole experience in a way. I would’ve always told you I didn’t like horror: I’m a girl and we don’t like icky, scary things. But now I do. I love horror, in fact, and I’ve been desperately trying to make up for lost time by scouring blogs and fan site looking for essentials I have missed. You would not believe what I haven’t seen yet. I digress. About six months ago I found some things I wrote when I was quite a bit younger – about 7 or 8 maybe. Guess what? It’s pure horror. There were murderous ghosts, screaming banshees, all kinds of weird and wonderful things. (Edit: Actually I was 10 or 11 and you can read them here: http://sjmasonworksinstone.blogspot.com.au/2013/03/poems-from-1993.html.)

I burst into tears when I found them. I’m crying now remembering how I felt. My love of horror wasn’t a new discovery after all. It was a rediscovery. Somewhere between then and now the person that I was had vanished. I don’t know what happened to me. But I do know that I spent much of my late teens and early 20s suffering from severe depression (which went undiagnosed until I was 22). If you’ve never experienced depression it’s something along the lines of Fantasia being destroyed by the Nothing.

But so many parts of who I am have come back. And with them some long dormant dreams. They had always been there but I simply did not have the confidence to believe in them for myself. This meant that I had all but stopped working towards them. Although I have friends who never stopped believing in them for me to whom I owe so much.

Now my self confidence has grown to a strong level and I’ve been feeling something for a while. Boredom. So... incredibly... bored. I’ve achieved a good amount of small goals, which was absolutely essential, but I’ve been feeling like I’m going nowhere and doing nothing. And my life-long, not-quite-forgotten dreams keep popping into my head. The big one being filmmaking. I’ve been feeling little nudges inside of me for some time now.

A rediscovered love of horror films, nudge. An amazing online community of indie filmmakers, nudge, nudge. Writing a lot again, like I used to when I was at school, big nudge. A growing feeling of self-confidence coupled with a growing sense of dissatisfaction with my current life while quickly approaching yet another birthday, nudge, nudge, nudge.

And then wham! I’m clicking around twitter and I find out that February is Women in Horror Month. And suddenly that was it. All the pieces fell together. Everything had been leading up to one defining absolute moment I could not ignore or turn back from. I couldn’t stand one second longer of not being wholly me anymore. I had to start right then and there or I was going to claw my own skin off with my own bare hands. So I started. See I told you this would all make sense by the end. Like life – when you look back on it.

The feeling I felt is almost indescribable, so do me a favour and listen to Pat Benatar’s All Fired Up – which is now my theme song.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gAJvG2w0Ug

So to sum up:

It took a long time for me to find myself.

It took a long time for me to find the confidence to be myself.

But suddenly here I am.

Watch this space.