Author: Bri

I’ve dipped my toe in the romance novel world before, but never stayed for long. And having officially finished all the Outlander books that are currently out, plus seeing a series of Instagram stories from filmmaker Yulin Kuang recommending some of her favorites, I decided to take a full plunge. Then I read 5 in a single 24 hour period and haven’t really slowed my pace by much since.

Reviews of what I’ve read so far (but please feel free to recommend more, especially WLW protagonists!), in the order that I read them. LIGHT spoilers ahead, but like, I don’t think it will overly surprise you the ultimate plot thrusts (heh heh) of these:

Will we still be in a pandemic by this time next year? WHO KNOWS! But I’m in a new city, trying for a new career, so things are full speed ahead for me whether it makes sense in the world or not.

1. Grow my Los Angeles community. It’s a cliche, but the entertainment industry truly is all about who you know, so a big goal of mine this year is to know more people, and have more people know me. There’s a few ways I plan to tackle this, from asking old contacts to coffee now that I’m in town, asking for new people I should meet and getting coffee with THEM, attending events and film festivals, and maybe even making my own new project to take out to festivals? We shall see! But the ultimate goal is friends and community.
2. Write 2 new original pilots. I learned a LOT from last year’s big year o’ submitting to screenplay contests. I’ll be submitting to some more now that I’ve retooled my existing samples, but I need to get into the habit of developing new ones as well.
3. Quit 2 of my jobs. I’ve been hoarding jobs and side hustles for over three years now after a series of losses of income through no fault of my own (I talked about this a bit here). Diversifying my income makes sense, and made a LOT of sense when I started hoarding, but it’s no longer sustainable and I definitely wasn’t being strategic about what kinds of jobs I was hoarding as long as they paid and someone wanted to hire me. But it’s officially not sustainable anymore because outside of heavy holiday months I struggled last year to take two full days off a month (and no, that’s not in addition to weekends), which doesn’t leave a lot of time to rest, let alone write and expand my community per resolutions 1 & 2. I’m also conscious of the fact that while I have absolutely gotten so much out of all my jobs, the actual financial security that comes from them is pretty negligible because I just said yes to everything fairly indiscriminately. I’m staying vague about which jobs because ideally I quit all of them in service of joining a TV writer’s room, and also because I’m trying to just stay open to the whims of the universe
4. Save $5k. This will be my most ambitious savings goal yet, but especially since I’ve got a wedding coming up in October (a wedding for me!) and I’m quitting a few jobs, my income is gonna start being a little unpredictable again and I need to be prepared for that. This will mean tightening the belt a bit, but will also hopefully future-proof me so that I have options for whatever happens next rather than instant abject panic.
5. Spend my energy better and more strategically. This is part of the quitting some jobs resolution, but it’s more than that. I have also been a hoarder of projects and leadership positions within them leading to a ton of unpaid, overworked responsibility. Also harkening back to last year’s resolution of developing non-monetizable habits, I have to remember it’s ok to just enjoy things without them becoming labor. It’s why when Christine and I wrap up Burn, Noticed (April for recording, July for posting/promoting!) we aren’t doing a new weekly TV recap podcast, because as much as I like talking about TV with her, having to schedule those recordings and then edit them and promote them is so much work that we aren’t getting paid to do. I can just… talk to Christine about TV if I want. I have been feeling truly so burnt out all of 2021 and it’s because of long-standing commitments I made to do things for the sake of being busy and FOMO. If I’m going to commit to something in 2022, long OR short term, it’s going to be because it’s worth it for my career aspirations, for the money, or because I genuinely believe in it and am excited to do it. The first two considerations take precedent though. Otherwise…
6. Take 3 full days off a month. Adding an extra day from last year’s goal! Not a significant change perhaps, especially when again, it’s not in addition to weekends, it’s including weekends, but realistically, with Burn, Noticed still going until at least April for which we need to maintain a pretty constant weekly recording schedule, with Breaking Out of Breaking In often needing to happen on weekends in order to facilitate guest schedules, and with my thesis advising commitments being a Saturday-Saturday schedule, I can’t commit to more than this. I can strive for more than three days off a month, but the bare minimum is three. And once Burn, Noticed is over in July, that will instantly clear four days a month or more from a nonnegotiable work commitment.
7. Take 3 trips with Quinn unrelated to our wedding/honeymoon. Now that we have a car again, we have far fewer excuses to stay in our apartment doing nothing. For Quinn’s birthday in November 2021 we took a very quick weekend trip up to Ojai and Ventura and Santa Barbara and it was wall to wall great, so we both want to do more of that, even if we can’t take full multi-night vacations quite yet (especially when a lot of vacation time will go into our wedding/honeymoon in the fall).
8. Get active at least three times a week. I have free gym access literally down the block now. Get it together, Castellini.
9. Incorporate healthier meals into meal planning. Since our long stay in Colorado last year, Quinn and I have significantly streamlined meal planning, grocery shopping, and reducing ordering in, but many of our go-to meals are still a little heavy on cheese or carbs or calories in general. This resolution is a dedication to adding more than one salad day to the weekly rotation with enough variety we don’t get bored or too hungry later.
10. Embrace what’s next rather than what if. This new mantra was the subject of a blog last month if you want a deep dive, but it’s a big focus of mine that goes hand in hand with spending my energy more strategically. I can’t keep up with the near constant breakdowns and existential crises, and I don’t want to. This isn’t a guarantee of or expectation of a particular brand of success in 2022, but it’s a commitment to seeking opportunity rather than wallowing in failure in whatever form is presented to me that feels aligned with my overall goals.

Here’s to a healthier, happier, and more intentional 2022, everyone. What are YOUR resolutions this year? Tell me in the comments!

“Everything happens for a reason” is a phrase I heard a lot growing up because it was my mom’s favorite refrain, and I always resented it. And not just as a militant teenage atheist (one of the worst kinds of teenagers) but also as a young adult. I fundamentally do not believe that cosmic forces (whether an intelligent designer or the whims of an unknowable universe) conspire towards a particular end. My disbelief in fate and in soulmates follows the same line of thinking- at my core, I think things just happen and there’s no set in stone conclusion to them. They happen as a result of millions and billions of tiny circumstances and choices, and I find that often the reaction to a belief that “everything happens for a reason” is passivity. Either you’re the kind of person who tries to find a silver lining after a mass shooting at an elementary school or you become so disillusioned by your lack of control to a perceived personalized agenda of misery from the universe that you give up entirely. I find both of these reactions highly suspect.

Five years ago I rediscovered a “bucket list” I wrote when I was a teenager, and posted it to Instagram. Didn’t do a ton of reflection, and my old handwriting is rough, so I wanted to recreate it here and see how I’m doing.

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A post shared by Bri Castellini (@brisownworld)

(Revised) Bucket list:

• Solve a rubik’s cube
  • lol why tho
• See Death Cab for Cutie, Paramore, and Switchfoot in concert
  • Here’s the thing about concerts- I don’t, uh, love them? I find that being surrounded by a crowd of people isn’t my favorite. I would rather just listen to music I like while on a road trip with my friends.
• Meet Stephanie Meyer and Libba Bray
  • This and the concert one date this list to at least 2005/2006. I still think it would be neat to meet these women, even though prose isn’t really my jam anymore
• Publish something
  • Complete! There’s a Brains short story published in a literary journal called the Kudzu Review, and I also have some poetry in an anthology coming out soon.
• Travel to Italy, London, Paris, and Norway
  • Been to Rome and Paris, and technically I’ve flown through London but I know, that doesn’t count. Someday!
• Graduate from college
  • And grad school! Boom! Love being in debt (:
• Meet Sean Homburger
  • Ok this actually does date this bucket list to when I was 16, around 2008. We don’t need to get into this one again.
• Love
  • lol at the wistfulness, but check!
• Live in New York for a year
  • Bit of an overachiever over here, since I lived in NYC for 7 years! It was wonderful and nightmarish and I don’t regret it but I also don’t regret leaving.
• Skydive
  • Someday!
• Grow a flower
  • Quinn and I spent much of April and May helping my mom plant her garden/backyard and many of those plants remain alive against all odds. Some even grew from seed!
• Paint a room orange
  • Already crossed out at the time of discovery because I eventually painted my childhood bedroom orange (it was recently repainted because orange is a real weird color to paint a room). Fun fact: I wanted to paint a room orange because it’s said to stimulate creativity but mostly because I knew it was Liam Aiken‘s favorite color
• Win an award
  • Also crossed out already at the time (I assume from speech and debate)
• Die happy
  • why is this in the MIDDLE of the list?
• Go to confessional
  • lol so Sean from earlier in the list was Catholic and this was a Big Topic of Conversation with him (allegedly not because he was interested in converting me, but because it was something Everyone Should Try)
• Stay up all night
  • I guess I pulled an all-nighter for school or something? I’ve sadly also done this many times since
• Be a part of a protest
  • Still no, technically. When you know who was elected I had an infected ingrown toenail and couldn’t walk, and I was too scared of COVID to in-person participate in anything in 2020, but as with many of the things on this list, someday.

9.5/17 isn’t bad! And given that three aren’t things I’m interested in doing I’m feeling even more accomplished. Back in 2008 when this was likely written, it would have really bugged me to hear that, because to teenage me the point was not if I wanted to do something or not. If it was written down declaratively, it needed to come to pass or else I’d be worthless. But like, worthless to who? I don’t care about Rubik’s cubes or concerts or going to confessional so my Facebook not-boyfriend would be happy. Arbitrarily assigning myself things and sticking to them after they stop being interesting to me is a net neutral at best to my quality of life, and if I’ve learned anything in the 13 years since this was written, it’s that literally no one cares. No one cares if I solve a Rubik’s cube, least of all me. Changing my mind doesn’t make me flaky, and it doesn’t mean I lack conviction. It means I changed my mind.

It is no secret that I have long struggled with boundaries, in pretty much every facet of my life. Today I want to focus on professional/personal, since that’s the most common one people like myself are terrible at. Because I have some thoughts.

Continue reading “On Boundaries” →

Welcome to mid year! In an unexpected twist, I’m still in my childhood home in Colorado, but not for long, because… Quinn and I got an apartment! For a bit more per month than we’d hoped, but in a great location (an 8 minute walk from Vinny) with amenities we really wanted. We’re moving June 29th, with zero furniture and probably not quite all our stuff, but it’ll be nice to be on our own again (though we’ll miss CJ and the garden and all the space Colorado affords)

1. Start every day by reading. Check! I have literally started my day every day this year by reading. Sometimes it’s just a page or two on my Kindle app, sometimes it’s a full twenty minute sesh. It’s nice to not start my day on Twitter or email or Slack; highly recommend. Because my progress is fairly slow, I’ve mostly been continuing to make my way through Outlander book 5, The Fiery Cross. There’s a lot to like (the day to day of living on Fraser’s Ridge, with the two future women figuring out how to use 1700s tech to make penicillin and interior plumbing and syringes), but there’s also a lot to dislike (y’all… the amount of rape is too damn high).
2. Take 2 full days off work a month. So far, so good, barely! May has been much better due to Mother’s Day weekend presenting an obvious reason to be in the moment and my brother visiting for the first time since Christmas 2019, so if I was trying to be a real stinker I’ve technically banked enough days off to get me through two more months of ALL WORK ALL THE TIME. But I’m trying not to be a stinker or a workaholic this year. Also, if you want to check my work, my days off have been: January 16 & 31; February 20, 21; March 22, 27; April 5, 17; and May 8, 9, 15, 16, 22, and 23.
3. Cultivate 2 non-monetizable hobbies. Have gotten back into painting already, which has been SO GREAT. I have a mood tracker app now for some reason and even after a shit workday, if I paint for a little while it has a huge impact on my mood, especially if I paint outdoors. I also learned how to plant a garden/pot flowers, which I hope to continue in LA.
4. Save $3k. It’s amazing what you can do when you aren’t paying NYC rent. I’m gonna try to exceed this savings goal by as much as possible, especially given our new apartment is maybe a little bit of a stretch per month, plus our new car (and gas and insurance) payments. But that’s why you have a savings account! I’m better at tracking my budget now, too, so I think I’ve got this.
5. Make progress on my physical health. Part of my morning routine since being in Colorado (see #9) has been taking my mom’s dog for a walk every weekday morning. We also have helped a lot in my mom’s garden, take the dog for walks in the park, and home cook nearly every meal. It’s not enough, but I hope that my new apartment’s two floor 24 hour fitness center will further push this goal forward.
6. Finish a new pilot. Done!! The Crossriver Case Files is an adaptation of my best friend Rachel and I’s childhood detective agency, with an imagined future where we are estranged but then find ourselves living in our hometown again after the murder of our favorite teacher. It’s been getting pretty good feedback so far, and I really love it, and I hope something happens with it.
7. Submit to (or prep for) 2 writing contests/fellowships per season. I’ve really blown past this estimation because the first half of the year is kinda fellowships/contest season, so I’m not sure how much more I’ll submit to. Especially once my living expenses go up again (screenwriting contest submissions are EXPENSIVE). So far, I’ve submitted to:
   1. February: Stowe Story Labs (ACCEPTED! See ya this week, Stowe!!), Script Pipeline TV Writing Contest
   2. March: Script Pipeline First Look, Austin Film Festival, WarnerMedia Fellowship
   3. April: Ubisoft Fellowship, Writer’s Assistant Training program
   4. May: Black List X Women in Film Episodic Lab, Scriptapalooza Fellowship, WeScreenplay TV Contest
8. Make at least one room in my new apartment feel permanent. Well, I’m not in my new apartment yet, but I will be soon.
9. Develop a morning routine. I have absolutely developed a solid morning routine which will need to be tweaked once I get to LA, but I hope the work I’ve already done will provide a solid foundation. I wake up, read a bit, do my skincare routine (a single product, it’s still me after all), walk CJ, make coffee/breakfast, head to work. The only real thing that I’ll need to swap is walking CJ (sad!) but I’m confident I’ll figure something out.
10. Only say yes out of interest or excitement, not out of fear. I’ve said no to a fair few things this year that any other year I probably would have said yes to. It’s not that I don’t think I would have gotten something out of them, but I’m nearly (gasp) 30 and I’m tired, y’all. The boundaries have been really good for me, and they’ve opened me up to making progress on the things I’m really passionate about, which has been really exciting.

Totals:

3 completed

6 in progress

1 no progress (yet!)

Feels good! Feels right! See you soon.

Ok a full week into 2021 and an attempted violent coup later (once again, in case I haven’t been clear in other posts, if you support Trump and anyone who’s stood by him, you can see yourself out), I’m ready to outline my intentions for this new, seemingly equally terrible year!

1. Start every day by reading. While I didn’t finish every unread book I own for last year’s resolution, I did read a lot more than previously, and liked it. I’ve also been known to doomscroll a bit early in the morning, so since I have my books apps on my phone, I figured this would be a gentler way to wake myself up in the morning. Right now (no judgement) I’m making my way through The Fiery Cross (Outlander book 5, back at it after almost a year’s break)
2. Take 2 full days off work a month. Not day job work (though who knows!) specifically, but as you may know from knowing me, I have trouble with stillness. I’ve cultivated so many side hustles and projects and podcasts that much of last year I went months without taking a day off from work of some kind. And I could feel myself burning out more and more until I was basically ash by the time my holiday break came around. No more burning myself to ash this year. I may not be able to take vacations due to a global pandemic, but by god I should be able to take two days off a month to read and play video games before marching back to the grind!
3. Cultivate 2 non-monetizable hobbies. A companion to the resolution above, one of the reasons I have such a hard time taking a break is because when I’ve nothing to do but plenty I could be doing, I just do those things. Hobbies are a healthier way to handle this inability to sit still, and I specifically want to get back into things I’m not trying to monetize for my intended career. Right now (particularly once I move) I want to get back into painting and maybe amateur herb gardening. Who knows!
4. Save $3k. Against all odds, my savings goal last year went really well (that’ll happen when you work 5 jobs and never take breaks!), and it’s a good thing too, because I’ll be moving, buying a car, and adjusting to a whole new state this year. I don’t expect to save money on top of what I’ll need to take out of my savings to get settled in LA, but I can’t just deplete without attempting to even things out.
5. Make progress on my physical health. Every year I have some kind of physical health-related resolution, and nearly every year it’s the first to fall by the wayside, and it’s crushing. This year, I just want to feel like, at the end of the year, I haven’t make worse choices. Part of this will be trying to get more exercise once I have access to a vehicle to transport me away from potentially infectious neighbors, part of it will be better food habits aided by a hopefully less depressing kitchen, part of it will just be genuinely making my health a priority. I’ve only one body and mind and I ought to be doing better by them.
6. Finish a new pilot. It’s been too long since I’ve gotten a full new writing sample, and now that I’m moving to LA…
7. Submit to (or prep for) 2 writing contests/fellowships per season. Despite my constantly doing work to the contrary, my ultimate career goal is to be a writer. The way I have the most control over my own ambitions is writing contests. Ergo…
8. Make at least one room in my new apartment feel permanent. Something that’s been a problem the last 6 years is the lack of permanence every residence has been plagued with. We never intended to stay in New York, certainly not as long as we did, so we never put down roots. Everything I own is cheap and designed to be taken down and shunted to a new terrible apartment as easily as possible, so nowhere’s ever felt like home. I want at least one room in my new apartment in LA (wherever/whenever that ends up happening) to feel put together without the lingering future frustration of moving and tearing it all down/carrying it down stairs.
9. Develop a morning routine. Despite my entire ability to do things being dictated by routine, I’m very lazy about actually developing one that’s healthy and productive. Some of it is certainly depression – when I was in Colorado last year even for a little while, my entire self felt better and I was able to fall into routines easier – but some of it is just me resisting for no apparent reason. If I want to be healthier in body, mind, and work/life balance, I need to have a routine that hell nor high water can shake me from.
10. Only say yes out of interest or excitement, not out of fear. Nearly every decision I make is based on fear- fear of losing a future opportunity that may come from the current one, fear of losing income, fear of people thinking badly of me. I want to stop making decisions (and saying yes to new jobs/responsibilities) out of fear. No matter how long it takes me to find success in my intended field, I want to enjoy my life before. I don’t want to live my life waiting for when I’ve finally “made it,” when I’ll “finally be happy.” I want to be happy now, even if I’m not professionally fulfilled. I choose happiness, and I trust that I’ll figure it out if one of those other fears comes true.

How about you? What are the intentions you’re setting this fine (terrible) year?

Distressingly, though many an Instagram graphic told me not to worry about accomplishing tasks during a global pandemic, I stayed true to my brand and refused. In fact, I worried HARDER. Like a CHAMP. My results haven’t overly changed since my mid-year check in, but I’m a completionist. Let’s do it!

Continue reading “How I Fared: 2020 NYRs” →