Imagination. Seeing yourself in a different situation, believing in yourself with untethered persistence
until what you imagine, what you desire and the life you will create becomes reality. This is something
very different than wishing and hoping with no plan. I have been fortunate to have this engrained as part of my DNA. Seeing what is possible and having a plan of action combined with persistence to achieve the goal is how I roll. I have done this consistently over the course of my life and it has produced fruit in abundance.
Being away from the world and putting my life on hold for a time has its own set of challenges. Having a plan and knowing without question my best and most productive years are ahead is the Kryptonite against my current surroundings and situation.
I recently read a story of how Steven Spielberg became one of the best known film makers the world
has ever known. He did this by being the master of his own fate. He dreamed in his childhood of being a film director and made amateur films as a kid. His story begins when he took a tourist’s tour of the Universal studios movie lot. He slipped away from the tour and hid in-between a few sound stages until the tour ended. When it came time to leave at the end of the day he made it a point of saying a few words to the security guard. Day after day he went back to the studio over the course of 3 months. He walked past the guard and waved at him and the guard waved back. He always wore a suit and carried a brief case to appear as if he was one of the summer interns at the Studio. He made it a point of befriending writers, directors and editors. He even found a vacant office and listed his name in the building directory.
He made it his business to get to know Sid Sheinberg, the head of the production studios television arm. He showed him his college film project which impressed Sheinberg and he put the young man under contract with the studio. His first full length film Sugarland Express achieved critical acclaim and won best screen play award at the Cannes film festival.
Unfortunately it did not do well at the box office. His big break came a year later when he discovered the book Jaws.
The studio had already decided to produce the film and had chosen a well known director. Spielberg desperately wanted to make the film despite the financial failure of Sugarland Express. His self confidence had not diminished and he persuaded the producers to dismiss the chosen director and give the film to him. When Jaws was released in June of 1975 it achieved a two fold success: It broke box office records and the critics loved it. The film took in 60 million dollars at the box office, an unheard of amount of money at the time. He later went on to create his own production company and named it “DreamWorks.” Do not only see, smell and taste how life will be but also live as if it is your reality and take action to make it so. Being in this place puts restrictions on taking any action. What it does not restrict is preparation and planning. I will hit the ground running and get back everything that was lost 10 fold.
The day before I was indicted I put the finishing touches on my first short animated film “I Knew Superman”.
I had zero writing, directing or film producing experience. What I did have was desire, vision and persistence.
I was able to engage the services of an Animator in Argentina and to make a long story short that film went on
to win awards at 19 film festivals including Best First Time Director, Best Musical Score and Best Animated Short
film. It was one of 5 short films nominated for an NAACP Image Award that year and was long listed for the Oscars.
This is an era when breaking into Hollywood is for the well connected and well financed. Some of the films I went up against and beat from the major studios had budgets of hundreds of thousands of dollars. I made “I Knew Superman” on a budget of just $5,000. This all took place while I was facing Federal charges and my world was being turned upside down. I was not going to let anyone or anything squash what I put my heart and soul into for the previous 9 months. There is a link to the short and a list of the awards it received at www.danacrypto.com Today I was reflecting back on that time and it helped me to understand where I am now is not who I am and not who I will be. I refuse to let this system label and define me. Many people give up after being exposed to the criminal justice system. It can make you a shadow of your former self and destroy your self confidence and self worth if you let it. Society will and to a great extent has passed judgement on the person they think I am because of a single act. In many ways, what I am going thru now will be one of the best things to happen in my life. It may not seem that way today but I’m not looking at where I’m at or my daily life and surroundings in the present moment.
For those old enough to remember the TV show the Six Million Dollar man, the main character was Steve Austin the first bionic man. After a crash doctors replaced his arms and legs with robotics. I can only imagine what this fictional character was thinking and feeling in the months immediately after that crash which the show does not mention or elaborate on. Maybe that his life was over. The shows opening went something like this…Steve Austin, a man barely alive. We can rebuild him, we have the technology. He will be the Worlds first bionic man. He will be better, faster, stronger. Kind a Like That.
