gorillamen – Page 37

MiGS15: Last Seen…Building Character(s)

May 16, 2013 by gorillamen 2 Comments

This week we’re talking about characterization — in particular, characterization in fiction. While the episode skews a bit toward writing, what makes a good character should interest everybody. We talk about some of our favorite characters, characters that don’t work so well for us, and how we go about tackling strong characters in our own writing. No matter how grounded or out there a story is, chances are, one of the things that keeps you coming back to certain stories are the characters. Find out why some characters have such a strong appeal in this episode.

Also, the five fictional characters each of us would pick to survive the apocalypse!

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MiGS14: Last Seen…Acting Peeved!

May 8, 2013 by gorillamen 5 Comments

This week, it’s all about those little things that get under our skin: pet peeves! What’s the difference between a pet peeve and a complaint? We talk about that as well as how so many people inflate pet peeves into bigger issues. Is social media part of the problem, or does it all depend on how we use things? When is a pet peeve a sign of a bigger problem, and how can pet peeves actually be good? We talk about that as well as revealing our own pet peeves. Somewhere along the way, Shawn talks about eating chalk. Seriously. That part alone is worth the listen, but even beta listeners admit — from start to finish — that this is one of the best episodes of Men in Gorilla Suits to date!

Feel free to share your pet peeves in the comments, or leave a rating or review on iTunes if you like this.

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MiGS13: Last Seen…Managing Time

May 1, 2013 by gorillamen 3 Comments

If you think you don’t have time to listen to this episode of Men in Gorilla Suits…you probably need to listen to this episode of Men in Gorilla Suits. This week it’s all about time management!

We’ll tell you how to find the right time management system…for you! We discuss how having a day job can help you find time for your creative endeavors, and we praise the smart phone as a time management tool. (But probably not in the ways many “time management gurus” would tell us to use our phones.) We chat about time management tools and systems — including how some can take up more time than they may be worth for your needs. We share ways to identify bad uses of time, and how sometimes you just gotta suck it up and not do the things you want to do because other things take priority in your life for awhile. Hell, we even discuss the importance of allowing yourself to occasionally give in to being lazy (i.e. the Netflix Marathon).

Christopher shares the big time management tip that helped him tame his to-do list, and Shawn’s big tip for time management feeds itself each time he’s busy. There’s even a little Zen moment when we discuss if we’re like concrete or water in the way we create. Also: is waiting for “The Muse” a good idea, or is she a massive time management killer? (Spoiler: she’s really a succubus out to drain you of time you should just be creating!) Finally, we talk about the difference between multitasking (ick; you can’t do it, even if you think you can!) and task stacking (Hooray for task stacking!!!).

We know it’s asking a lot for an hour of your time, but that’s the length of a commute for most of us. We hope that by the end of this episode, you’ll get that hour back…and then some…

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Creative Links

April 28, 2013 by gorillamen Leave a Comment

This week’s podcast was all about being creative. In honor of that — and in large part because Christopher has been sick all weekend and watching documentaries and surfing the Web in between 5-hour naps at all hours — here are some links to things he’s stumbled upon over the weekend.

PressPausePlay

Friday night, Christopher watched PressPausePlay, a documentary mostly focused on music, but heavily supporting all we discussed in Episode 5: Last Seen…Democratizing Content.

Even though the documentary leans toward music and film, if you paint, write, or do anything else creative, it’s worth watching. The gist: it’s a great time to be alive and creating, even though there are downsides to anyone and everyone creating and distributing their work.

Searching for Perfect Wood

All crude jokes aside (Huhuhuhuhuhuh…he said, wood!), this piece about cultivating forests and creating the perfect wood for instruments is a beautiful article about the past…and the future. It’s not many articles that end like this one…a tiny work of art in its own right!

Let it Kill You

Finally, there’s this article by pianist James Rhodes about giving in to your creative desires and letting them guide you. Perhaps you don’t want to go to the extreme that Rhodes goes to for his art — that’s fine because he still lays out an easy plan to get things done. Most of us have roughly 360 minutes a day to ourselves in some fashion.

What you do with that time is often the difference between creating a body of work and having regrets at the end of the year…

MiGS12: Last Seen…Being Creative

April 25, 2013 by gorillamen 4 Comments

Last week we talked about the independent pursuit of creative endeavors. Before you can get there, though, you have to make something — and that usually means dealing with some level of creativity.

For many, creativity is an ominous thing, the fickle Muse that may or may not show up and shower you with inspiration. We’re here to tell you that the Muse is BS and that creativity, like anything, can be attained by simply working hard. Some highlights from this week’s show:

Tips for people who doubt they have creative abilities.
Rethinking what creativity is — The Creative Physicist and Programmer.
The power of breaks from creative pursuits.
How to take breaks from the things that distract you from finding time to create.
Why we’re not so enamored with those labeling themselves “Creatives.” (Hint: actions speak louder than…well, you know…)
How to deal with those wanting to exploit your creativity. (What we really mean: those who want to exploit your willingness to actually do the work!)
Some of our creative heroes. (Including a bit about Shawn getting email from his hero.)

It’s our hope that anyone doubting they have some creative ability in themselves will see that’s not the case by this episode’s end. As long as you’re willing to work hard, it’s amazing what’s possible.

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Gorilla Suit KO!

April 20, 2013 by gorillamen Leave a Comment

While listening to Men in Gorilla Suits just might make you smarter, sometimes wearing a gorilla suit has the opposite effect! (NSFW: Language)

(Of course, his name had to be Chris!)

MiGS11: Last Seen…Being Indie-pendent

April 18, 2013 by gorillamen 5 Comments

This week, we talk about the benefits and pitfalls of independent pursuits and the benefits and pitfalls of going the traditional route. Some sides are all or nothing: extolling independence over all, or shunning anything remotely done completely on one’s own. With recent leaps in technology, though, the lines are blurred — even people who have spent decades going the traditional route with the things that matter to them are finding success blending working with established companies and doing it themselves. In many ways, there’s never been a better time to do your own thing, even though it might be harder to be seen in the crowd.

We’d love to hear about (or see) the stuff you make — feel free to share stories and links in the comments.

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MiGS10: Last Seen…Being Positive (And Negative)

April 11, 2013 by gorillamen 11 Comments

This week’s podcast is all about the creative power that comes with being positive…and negative. This episode is about much more than attitude’s effect on productivity, though. We talk about the power of apathy as it can relate to happiness (or at least reducing stress from one’s life). There’s a bit about Pollyannas vs. Doomsayers, and how being extremely positive isn’t always a good thing. We ask if one’s attitude really is as simple as making a decision to be a certain way; also, how people use social media as a platform for their moods. Finally, the episode wraps up with a simple conclusion about life.

Disclaimer: We make a very clear distinction between negativity and depression in this episode. We know that negativity and depression are not synonymous, even though they sometimes move in each others’ shadows. When we speak of negativity in this episode, we are talking about learned behavior or making a choice to be a certain way — not the clinical reasons for some people’s moods beyond their control. At various points in our lives, we have both struggled with depression. At various points in our lives, we were simply negative. We know the difference and do our best to make that distinction in this episode.

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Just Make the Damn Thing!

April 10, 2013 by gorillamen Leave a Comment

Our previously unofficial slogan/now official slogan at Men in Gorilla Suits is, “Chill the fuck out, and make the damn thing!”

What do we mean by that? Life isn’t a difficult thing if you stop obsessing about the wrong stuff. Instead of filling your time fretting, just chill out and make things you like!

Tomorrow’s episode is about being negative or positive — how it affects creative endeavors…and life. As Ze Frank says in the video below, if you want to write — write! Don’t fret about it…do it!

It really can be that simple.

MiGS09: Last Seen…Having Hobbies

April 4, 2013 by gorillamen 7 Comments

This week, it’s all about hobbies! Are they inherent things we’re coded to do, or something that came about in more recent times? We discuss how people look at hobbies at different times in life, and how they can enrich all we do. We also talk about the downside of hobbies: when we become too involved in them or try making them a career and see that we sometimes lose the joy when a hobby becomes a job. Shawn and Christopher share their childhood hobbies, current hobbies, and talk about what hobbies they may find themselves doing in the future.

We want to know what hobbies you love — please take a moment and tell us in comments.

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Hit RECord

April 1, 2013 by gorillamen Leave a Comment

In Episode 5 of the podcast, we talked about democratizing content; that is, the ability for the average person to make and distribute their work at much more reasonable costs than in the past. In the podcast, we talked a bit about crowd-sourced content.

Actor Joseph Gordon Levitt has started a thing called Hit RECord, an open collaborative production company. (Okay, so Hit RECord has been around for several years, but it’s now opened up to YOU!!!) It’s a site where you can share your music, photos, written ideas and see if others want to jump in and do something together — or totally remix it all. Things that rise up and pushed to some level of commercial success see a 50/50 split of profits among the site and the creators involved. A neat idea worth checking out…especially now that it’s going to a variety show on cable.