Hey, welcome to the screenwriting life. I'm Meg Lafour. And I'm

L'Orian McKenna. We are professional screenwriters. We've worked together as a

team and separately. We've worked on studio and indie films, live action and

animation, from my work on Inside Out and

Captain Marvel.

To my work in Pixar Story Department on Up, Brave, and Inside Out.

We are here to share our insights on the craft of screenwriting and also the life.

Had a not only survive the ups and downs but thrive.

We want to help you become the best screenwriter you can be and to reassure you that you are not alone on this journey.

Hi guys, welcome back to the screenwriting life.

Today we are discussing a topic that's so important but often ignored.

Boundaries, boundaries is the topic.

Yeah, so whether it's drawing boundaries to give yourself space too right or to not

let your creative life become all-consuming, it's a very delicate balance and we're going to

get into it today. But before our topic, we're going to talk about our

weeks for what we call Adventures in Screenwriting. Lorian, how is your week? My week was, I sort of, God, I don't know, nothing tragic or bad happened, but I had one of those weeks where I just hit a wall. I'm just so tired. And I find it ironic or funny or whatever that we're talking about boundaries because like, I don't know how to do boundaries. and that's what happened this week is that I just feel like I'm sort of expending energy in terms of every interaction I have and I'm not nobody's filling my bucket. I don't know how to ask for what I need to fill my bucket. I don't know how to draw those boundaries to carve out the space with other people but also with my own time too. I don't know how to rest. You know, when you

you're working out, they say like work out this many days and then you have to have a rest day and I think that's really hard to do but it's even harder for me at my whole life I feel like I've been in this

grind about get the A, get perfect attendance, be the the best be productive and when I'm not I feel like such a failure and that's what happened this week that I just couldn't anymore I just like I spent two days in bed reading a book you know like and I I guess I

needed it but I feel so bad about it and honestly I, I'm also just, I'm tired of feeling bad. And what I'd like to start being able to do is recognize this before it happens, like to start to understand or just like have a schedule for myself like today I'm not going to feel bad about reading a book. I'm not going to feel guilty about not actually producing something today because this is part of the process.

And you know, I just delivered a big script, you know, and I sort of the release of that is always a big sort of like exhale and I wasn't paying attention.

I've done this before. I delivered a huge script that I've been like turning on and then I was like,

great, now I'm going to jump right into this next thing and I just was like oh I cried for a week you know like I I need that time that exhale and I didn't give it to myself because I'm great I'm a motor I can keep running forever and I just I can't part of it to what I'm thinking about is in Los Angeles

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