Inspired Writer Collective Podcast

Episode 84: [Ananya Mody] Finding a Sense of Belonging Through Writing

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Elizabeth chats with Ananya Mody, a screenwriter for Netflix, about how she came to be a screenwriter and her insight for writers about holding onto their voice in the process. 

Finding her way to herself and where she feels she belongs after experiences in the writing rooms of the screenwriting industry. It wasn’t very glamorous, but she learned a lot about herself and it led her to build her own business to help creatives find their sense of belonging. 

Through her own experiences traveling and creating a sense of place wherever she's been, she helps others build their community 

Inspired by the Hero's Journey, Ananya is creating a resource for helping writers find themselves and step into their writer identity. 

You grow and change with every project you write. 

Writing stories connects all of us regardless of where we’re from because of common experiences we share.

Approaching your journey as a writer through play and not obligation. You’ll discover a different side of yourself when you allow for curiosity.

Meet Ananya:

Ananya is a Netflix-produced screenwriter, astrologer, and travel coach whose work centers on the intersection of story, soul, and self-belonging. After navigating the chaos of career pivots, cross-continental moves, and creative imposter syndrome, she now helps misfit women find their voice: both on the page and in the world. Through her platform The Belonging Way, she blends storytelling, astrology, and travel coaching to help others build a life that feels like home, no matter where they are.

Ananya on Instagram   

Ananya on Threads

The Belonging Way on IG ​

website under construction: ​www.thebelongingway.com

The Belonging Way on Threads

You're invited to join us for our Virtual Writing Retreat October 11 and 12 on Zoom! 

You’re invited to connect with us by joining our Embodied Writing Experience where you’ll get a writer’s retreat directly to your inbox on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays each week. Whether you’re working on a memoir, a novel, or journaling for yourself, this is an invitation to slow down, tune in, and write with embodied intention.   


Join our Embodied Writing Experience where you’ll get a writer’s retreat directly to your inbox on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays each week. Whether you’re working on a memoir, a novel, or journaling for yourself, this is an invitation to slow down, tune in, and write with embodied intention.

Get on the waitlist for the Memoir Master Plan cohort here.

If you prefer video versions of the podcast, you can find all of them on our YouTube channel.

Elizabeth:

Welcome back listeners to the Inspired Writer Collective podcast. Today I'm here with Ananya Modi, and she is a screenwriter for Netflix, and now she's gone on to start her own adventure, and so I'm so excited to have you here today to talk to us about what that process looked like, what all you learned, all the chances you took, um, the ways that you stood up for yourself, found your voice, and now how you're helping other writers do the same.

Ananya:

Thank you so much, Elizabeth. That was a really nice warm introduction and I'm glad to be here. I'm so happy to chat and I'd love to give like a nice perspective on screenwriting to all the writers who are writing great books and may want to option their rights and write the screenplay to that later. So that's a different process. World.

Elizabeth:

It's

Ananya:

of,

Elizabeth:

something people

Ananya:

so.

Elizabeth:

though, like just the other day yesterday I saw someone posted on threads like, what's your big dream for your book? Like what would it be? Is it selling a certain number of copies? What is it? And so many of the comments were. Having it turned into a movie, having it turned into a series or a show.

Ananya:

I get that because I mean, the mass appeal is much bigger, right? It's mass appeal vis-a-vis book, which is just energy consuming in this, in today's day and age. But having worked on adaptations, a few of them, some successful, some having gotten stuck in development health, which is what we call shows, which just gets stuck for years and years in the writer's room and just don't go anywhere. It's, um, things change a lot in the process and one thing I tell all writers,'cause I've seen this and my heart has broken for her, but a writer whose book we were adapting, she couldn't deal with the changes that we were making all the time. So, and I get it, but you know, what do you do about it?

Elizabeth:

right? What keeps a reader still reading

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

maybe than what keeps a viewer still watching and you, you have to move at a different speed. And so then some of those beloved moments that you might have in your writing just get cut and swept out or changed for more excitement or more just action on the screen. And I think that, that it can be hard for people, but I'd love to hear more about how you got into screenwriting.

Ananya:

Oh wow. Good question. That was never the plan. I didn't tend to be a screenwriter. I thought much like all our listeners that I would be an author to at some point in the distant future, because it's not like a realistic career or dream or So you're told, right. Growing up. So I finished my degree in finance and accounting and management and all those sensible things, and I thought I'd be a financial journalist because you know, that would have a certain amount of writing thrown into the mix. But that also, actually, I learned that financial journalists don't make money either. So who makes money?

Elizabeth:

top most people of whatever industry seem to make the money. It's, and it's never anything I've done.

Ananya:

Me neither. Me neither. So yeah, that was the plan. And then one day I was lying in bed with a torn, um, you know, thing in my foot. So much for a writer's vocabulary and, uh. I saw this program that Disney Plus, or back then 21st Century Fox or Star was running to train new writers. So they wanted to train you for six months and then put you into the company to write for their shows from the studio's like perspective. So they put you into the production house writing rooms to make you. I'm like a bit of a spy, honestly, so that you know what the writers of the production house are doing. So, because how it works is that you have the writers at a production house writing, and then the material comes to the studio. The studio vets, all of that gives its feedback, all of that. But they hoped to shorten the time between, um, the production house in the studio by having the studio's perspective in the itself.

Elizabeth:

that totally as like a cost saving metric, right? Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

Yeah, exactly. So I guess they saved days by paying us a salary, which was decent by industry terms, but definitely in terms of the back and forth, they probably saved, it's hot. They would save a lot, but the writers weren't looked upon very favorably in the room when. But, uh, I wouldn't know that, but I digress. Let's go back to chronological order. Got a bit of a flash forward. So this was, uh, so I applied for the program and um, I got through, there were about three, four rounds of interviews and. That. And, uh, for six months they trained us at Star, at Disney and they taught, taught us all sorts of writing tips, tricks, and methodologies because we were writing for like general entertainment channels, is what we call them in India, GEC, which is where you have essentially the soap or the Ella novella format of like 24 minutes every day, you know, five days a week. So you really need people to be churning things out fast. They also wanted the quality to be decent, so they hoped that these tips and tricks would sort of help you advance at a faster rate with a certain level of quality, and I live up to

Elizabeth:

Oh

Ananya:

informed six.

Elizabeth:

Was it, were the, the, the background they gave you helpful or was it really insufficient for what they were asking you to do? Like how much did you carry that with you? Like how helpful was that? Like background knowledge and training, I guess, as they called it?

Ananya:

To be perfectly honest, I've never used those met methodologies again in my life. I haven't looked back at them. Yeah. I don't write to churn out. I write fast. I write deliver on time. But who's writing to like, like, oh, here are five. Romance and chemistry techniques are my characters in love. They're.

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.

Ananya:

Yeah. So, uh, yeah, I was fired from that program six months in, and then I was, I was young, I was 22 back then and wondering what do I do with my life now? So I did the obvious thing and I went on a baking screen. That's my midlife crisis had come early. Yeah. And through all this, one of my friends noticed my crisis. He was like, look, I am working for this director who is directing an Amazon show. Season one is on Amazon. It's India's first, um, OT show, and um. We're directing season two and they're writing season three and they're looking for an intern in the writer's room. So do you wanna your hand at it? I was like, sure, I've already been fired once. What are they gonna do? Fire me again. So I went in for the meeting and honestly, quite intimidating. The man, he was a great writer, but he was a scary individual, so I was fairly intimidated in that meeting, but I got the gig. So, but I think it was because I submitted a writing sample beforehand, so they kind of read it. So they were like, okay, she's a typical writer. She's better on the page than she is in person.

Elizabeth:

I feel like that's what Shonda Rhimes said. Um, in her masterclass that I've taken, and she talked about how like writers will come and pitch to her with their, you know, scenes or whatever, and she said she doesn't really care about the quality of the pitch as far as like whether they're looking down at the page'cause they're so nervous and they're just reading, you know, exactly what they wrote because like. Same kind of thing. She knows like it's in the quality of like the output, the scene, like did you hit the beats? Did you, you know, show the emotion? Did you capture everything? Is it, you know, captivating versus like, how well does this person, you know, show up and advocate for themselves?

Ananya:

Exactly, exactly. We're writers for a reason. We like being behind the camera. So, yeah. And, uh, yeah, I, I interned with them for a few months and it was, I think, the best learning experience of my life because. You just get to be around these great minds doing their thing and you get to observe their magic and wow. Like I, it's of course a role that I could take up only outta a position of privilege because they pay you a pitance. But definitely if you can go for it, like even six months of just observing the dynamics and sure you see the in practice, but what you really see is how a.

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

If you wanna work in tv, which always entails a big room, it's important to understand how to put your point across, or how other people receive your point, what things you trigger. It's understanding character, understanding human behavior, but live with actual consequences. So. That was great. And um, then our showrunner wanted to write two episode himself, the last two the most,

Elizabeth:

the

Ananya:

and, um.

Elizabeth:

that you met with initially? Okay.

Ananya:

Yes, yes. Yeah. But over the months we had developed a good relationship. I was still scared of him. I think for all the five years, six years that we worked together. I was always like slightly scared of him a little bit. We, um, got on well and he wanted me to do a first draft of, uh, both the episodes and he is like, just, just gimme a skeleton. You know, don't, um, do, do what you can. I'll take it from there. Yeah, I guess, what do I have to lose, right?

Elizabeth:

See, it amazes me that you had that mindset, though, like the whole like, oh yeah, just write up, you know, baseline outline, whatever, skeleton version of this thing for the showrunner. Who, oh my gosh. Like I feel like that would intimidate most people. Like for you to already have the confidence at that point, to be like, I mean, how long have you been there at that point? Like, that's insane to me. I would just be so fraught with nerves.

Ananya:

But I was. I absolutely was. But the thing is, I couldn't turn it down. Right. I can't be like, no, it wasn't an option given to me. It's like, this is your job. I'm asking you to do this. You do it. I find I. But I remember I was so nervous that when the first round of feedback on it came to me, I didn't have the courage to look at it by myself. I called up a friend of mine and said that comments have come in. I'm gonna read each and every one out loud, and you have to listen to them with me. I don't care if you're violating any NDAs at this point. Like I.

Elizabeth:

this.

Ananya:

Um, and yeah, my runner liked it. He liked, uh, both the episodes, so he decided to gimme writer credit on them and

Elizabeth:

Well just goes

Ananya:

yeah. Yeah, I got very lucky.

Elizabeth:

out there, and granted, I understand what you mean, you didn't have a choice, so

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

of like, what did you have to lose? But like there's some amazing opportunities that come about sometimes in life and it's like you just do your best and then you got your, essentially your

Ananya:

sure.

Elizabeth:

credit out of that, right? It's a big blow.

Ananya:

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. It was, it was wonderful. Yeah, I, I'm really grateful that I had him at that point in my life to recognize that.'cause I know so many writers who've done the time who've done the work, but. They're not out there. Oh. But yes, so that was a great journey. And after that we worked on a bunch of projects together. So this Amazon one, a bunch that obviously are stuck or will never get made. We worked on for like two years, three years. And this Netflix one, uh, which, um, we have season one, season two comes out in a couple of days. So on Netflix. Um, and yeah, one for Disney Plus, which was quite funny because, um, one of the people who is part of the writing team.

Elizabeth:

I know where this is going.

Ananya:

In fact, a one up, it wasn't a person from the writing program where I was fired. It was one of the people who ran the writing program from which I was fired.

Elizabeth:

it to.

Ananya:

Yeah, exactly. I had to rewrite her story, so,

Elizabeth:

I love that for

Ananya:

yeah.

Elizabeth:

that full circle moment.

Ananya:

Yeah. It's um, yeah, I feel like it's like Freud, right? Like

Elizabeth:

So

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

at some point you reached sort of a dead end with that. Why? What happened as far as

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

before we talked about the, the loss of voice and the fact that. In that industry, everything has to be so uniform despite who's writing, how do you control that or work within those constraints, I guess?

Ananya:

I think working within those constraints is the easy part. Because, uh, when you're casting a writer's room for a show, you're very deliberate that people have had varied experiences, but share the same value system. So even if you're writing a show, which is set in like a super patriarchal context, then you'd hire people who understand that mindset. I'm not saying share that mindset, but have a certain understanding of it. You wouldn't hire someone like me, for example, so. We could align on most areas in that way. And what also helps in having a Unif unified voice literally is that a, you have a showrunner whose literal job is to unify all the voices across 10 episodes. And also we would get in specialized dialogue writers who would go in and rewrite the dialogue based on which part of the country our characters were from.

Elizabeth:

choice and stuff, like that's not a common phrase here. They would say this instead is a customary greeting that's just with a friend or that kind of thing. Okay.

Ananya:

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Things like that. So the literal voice and the thematic voice of the show weren't as much of a problem, but the constrictions, oh my God. Because, I mean, we all know about the writer strike of Hollywood, and that was so important. And in India we're 10 steps behind them, and 10 is me being very kind. So it was like we were signing all these contracts, but never seeing money. If the platform didn't feel like giving you feedback just yet, you didn't get paid because the, the next payment, tran was linked to approval from their end. So.

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

Yeah. And then because it's a gig economy, everyone's really insecure. So they're like, are you going after my job? Like, what are you trying to do? Don't step on my toes. And then there's this, and because everything works in relationships, it's more about who you know than how well you can actually do the job. They don't ever, they never mean to you, to your face. So. They're maybe not gonna make your project, but they'll keep you hanging. Like, we'll get back to you. It's such a great idea. We're just figuring out where to put this in our slate. And I'm, tell me it doesn't fit. It's fine. I'll go into my bedroom and cry. But that's okay. Like,

Elizabeth:

on to something else. Yeah.

Ananya:

yeah. So it, and then once people get insecure, they start taking out their tempers on you. And of course. Eventually I did develop my own voice and bits of, it's that bits of that started creeping into the writing. And that did cause friction too between, um, me and my mentor. And it was fairly evident that we had kind of outgrown each other in that sense that we couldn't creatively collaborate without one of us. That is me, uh, suppressing her voice and the way she wanted to do things. So we had to call it quits after a certain point together. And I realized that anywhere in this industry, this is what one had to put up with. So if you want to, like, you see people with like great shows coming out everywhere. I'm like, what have you like suffered through to get here? You know, it's one thing to put in hard work. I'm completely on board. You know, you have to sometimes pay your dues, right? For like 10 years. Perfectly fair. Do you have to get exploited in the process of doing that? No. That's, that's not okay. Like you, we can't conflate struggle with exploitation. That led to me, well, not exactly stepping away from the industry. I'm still looking for great projects to do out there. Things where my voice can really shine. But, uh, I've been exploring other things. I taught English in Madrid for a year. I moved to Barcelona Digital Nomad, and while writing, and now I live in Mexico City, where I writing one project remotely for production house based in India. But I'm also like developing my own business, which comes from the same sense of how I felt throughout my whole time. During my writing phase, which was, yeah. The thing about being in an industry like film is that on the outside it's so glamorous, right? Everyone wants to be doing this, so you kind of buy into that. And you buy into the fact that, oh, everyone's working 18 hours a day, so I'll work 18 hours a day. That's fine. Okay. And no one's getting paid, so maybe it's okay if I don't get paid too. And you know, it's if your mind will really go to this great extent to protect you. Right. And um. I felt this constant sense of frustration that I'm suppo supposedly doing this great thing, which is like, oh, working in this amazing industry and writing these cool shows and, you know, going for these parties and, but I was like, there's so much more to life. The reason I got into film was because I get to live so many different lives to so many different characters in so many different worlds. One day I'm writing about like. The richest, pious family living in like, you know, like the world of succession to another day, like the somewhere someone in the boondocks, you know, like pulling out their guns. Like, this is all right, because I'm unfortunately in one human body, I'm constrained, but. In fact, I just felt, I felt just as constrained as I did before. I'm like, I can't, like if I'm stuck for 18 hours day in a room, I'm gonna run out life experiences to put into my writing.

Elizabeth:

in a room all day, you're not having new experiences to pull from.

Ananya:

Exactly. And I can read and watch movies and do research, but all of that's secondhand. I'm not gonna channel that emotion. So I was like, I'm like, I don't fit into this industry. Do I like this? I, I'm not buying into this myth anymore. Like

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

drinking the Kool-Aid and. And, but outside too. All my friends and family, they were not in film and they were working like proper jobs and living like good lives, making good money, you know, advancing in their career. But I'm like, I, I don't want that either. So what is the middle ground to this? And that's when this idea of belonging came to me. I. Where do I as a person belong? What is my place? Not just in terms of like careers, because that can be figured out, right? There are a hundred ways to make money, but how can I live with a sense of peace within myself and with those around me? And then I reflected on all the travels I've done since I was quite young. I took my first solo trip at the age of 19 when I went to work on an organic farm in Northern California after quitting a corporate job. And it. There were people from all over the world. Remember, you know, there was a British girl doing her thesis on dysmorphia and Mormons post birth. There was a Danish girl going to alternative school, uh, to just study like under the forest and trees. And I was like, there's so many different ways to live life and maybe. If I feel so much at home with people doing all these different things, maybe that's what I should be looking at, you know, as a way of living life. And that stayed with me. And many years later when I was thinking about what next after firm, I revisited that experience in my head. Like I've always felt a sense of belonging away when I've had this blank canvas to create a world around me. Which is something travel provides, right. Unlike, or something even writing provides.'cause you're creating this world around you, like travel and writing are essentially the same activity, just one is at your time traveling on a desk. Exactly. Yeah. So. I decided to, and I decided, I saw that when I had lived in Barcelona, or not that much in Barcelona, but in Madrid especially, I created the sense of home. I wasn't actually living in Madrid, right? I was living in my world in Madrid. I had curated my people. I knew the places I loved, and I frequented those. I had a relationship with my past, like all my friends back home. That, and I liked who I was. I liked who I was becoming in these new environments, and that stayed with me again. So when I moved to Mexico City, I experienced this all over again. Like, wow, this, this is how one creates a life of belonging by getting out of your environment and recreating it for yourself more intentionally. So, so that you are not a product of your environment, but your environment is a product of what you put out there. And that has, that has fueled my new business as such, which I'm thinking about where I'm like, I think I know how to do this, and now I'm trying to figure out how to bring my methods and turn it into a repeatable process. Other people from other walks of life who've been feeling like, oh, we don't fit in and be yanked out of their surroundings, and like guided through the process of creation, which I did by myself. And, you know, there were failures, there were successes, there were ebbs and flows. But if people can avoid, you're gonna fail anyway. But if someone can guide you through it and talk you through it, oh, that would be a dream. That's, that's just what I wanna do for people.

Elizabeth:

It's one of the core themes that runs through the memoir I'm writing, because when we moved here to Colorado, I had just left my career as a forensic scientist, so I was transitioning from being the breadwinner and going to work, you know? Um, 40 hours a week to being the stay at home mom to a then 2-year-old. And we were, when we moved here, we were living in an rv, so it felt really isolating. We were in a brand new state and it, it, I felt really lost and I had to go through that same sort of struggle that you talk about of like, okay, I curate. That world of community and belonging around me, because in the past, you know, in college it was just like, oh, my classmates become my friends. Or when I worked a, a job it was like, oh, my coworkers, you know, some of them become my friends and my social network,

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

I was a stay at home parent in a box. So it's like there was no one around for me to like just naturally, um, commune with. And so I really had to go seek it out for myself and. you said, there were some failures. Like I tried doing roller derby for a bit, but because I had also just gotten sober, there was, you know, a lot of drinking involved around the kind of like, after hours and things. Like, I realized that the, the unity and the closeness that that community felt with each other in the outside hours, not in like the skating time, you know? So then I was like, well, I can't really fit in with this group. And I ended up, you know, going to some sober recovery meetings where. Those people became, you know, my friends and everything else, and like built my community around those things. So, but it's tough and it, there's definitely that level of, you know, self-reflection that you have to do. You know, when you talk about like, what do you bring from your past with you as far as like keeping connected with, you know, past friendships. Like, I lost a lot of my friendships when I left my career. Um, it was a very dramatic way that I had to leave and so. There were a lot of bridges burned and there were a lot of hurt feelings and lot of people that just didn't wanna talk to me anymore. And so, and they, I, I don't blame them. They did not understand. I couldn't talk about the, you know, real details of why I was leaving. So, to them it looked one way when it was actually something different. But that's in the memoir. If people are interested in that story, um. Yeah.

Ananya:

Very much.

Elizabeth:

yeah, it, it can be really hard to figure out like, what do I take of even my habits, right? Like I knew that my, I had this past

Ananya:

Yeah.

Elizabeth:

socializing by, you know, revolving it around alcohol. And certainly here in Colorado I could, I could go to, you know, different things, events, at the breweries and meet people, but I just did not want my life to look like that. I was trying to get healthier. had come out of a really bad. space, physical health space, I, I just didn't have room for that. And it's, yeah, it can be really tough. And so I think that's great that you're providing some guidance for people about, you know, how to kind of reflect on those things of what do you really wanna bring forward with you? What will make you feel. what are those pieces that you absolutely need and need to find that in your new place, and what are those things that you're ready to move on from and grow out of? That's a lot of heavy lifting. That's a lot of work.

Ananya:

That is deeply work. I'm just gonna guide them it. I've done my work, I hope. Yeah. Thank you for sharing. That was

Elizabeth:

Thanks. And now you've created a resource using the hero's journey. Will you talk a little bit about that?

Ananya:

Yes. So writing, as we all know, is a very lonely process and non-writer don't get it and it's fine. It's not their job to get it if we wish we did, but I mean, they'd be writers too, if they had the heads we had, right? So. When you feel so isolated, both physically and emotionally from all your people. Like when you go out and they ask you, so how's your book coming along? And you can't exactly say that I'm stuck at this plot point because I have this idea, but it doesn't go with this guy's character. And if he does this, he'd be a different person can bring in this guy to this here, but it would be wrong. We have to go back and change things in like chapter two because it doesn't make sense in chapter 19.

Elizabeth:

all that. They just wanna hear making progress, but what does progress look like anyways? When you do so many rounds of drafting and rewrites and edits, it's like, yep, still editing. Still editing. Or it's like, I found it was editing. Now I'm just fully rewriting.

Ananya:

Yeah, quickly. Exactly. So this resource I'm trying to create is for our writing community, how can we find a sense of belonging throughout our writing process? And our writing process essentially emulates the hero's journey, right? So every journey in life we take the journey from here to my dining table is the hero's journey too. So this. This, uh, sorry. Excuse me. This resource essentially leads our writers from their starting point of deciding that, um, of having the wish, the desire, the deep internal desire that I wanna write and not acting on it to, you know, having the call to action to like. You know, bling between the two to finally like breaking into act one and saying, I'm gonna do this to fun and games to raise the rising action. And, you know, raising the stakes, all the 12 steps of the hero's journey, but. Through the lens of belonging. So at this point in your life, okay, you need to belong to yourself. You need more self-trust. How can you build self-trust? You don't just build it within yourself.'cause we're interdependent as a species, right? So how do you look outside of you? How do you build spaces that you can trust around you so that you're like, I'm ha, I'm not able to think today. I don't know what I wanna do. I'm feeling scared. Oh, I feel good around green spaces. I know that there's a spot in the park that I love, so I'm gonna go there. It's ritualizing your writing and that's belonging to yourself, belonging to the place. So then when you're coming to fun and games, you probably need to like meet more people. You need more inspiration. You have to like watch things, need to have conversations. So what activities can we do here so that that part of your life is kind of activated. And then it's the return home because you've gone on the same journey as your characters and you've gone on your own journey because it's a very, um. Thinking of the politically correct word here, but I don't have one. So, but it's an experience where you're living through multiple personalities Right. At the same time. So you've, and you grow, right? You grow through every project you've written. You are a different person. And I don't know if you've ever felt this, okay, but I have because I'm not a very good human being.

Elizabeth:

I feel like I'm gonna relate to whatever you're about to say.

Ananya:

Okay, well that makes two of us so that when you've been through all these changes, and even if they're in your head, mostly in your head, and people have lived the same life day in and day out, and you're at the other side of a different person, it's like, I'm kind of better than you.

Elizabeth:

it's just like they don't know how to see you. A lot of times, especially if it's someone you've known, a long time family, long-term friends, whatever, it takes a while for them to upgrade their view of you to the way that you see you now, because like, like you said, it's so much internal growth and it's not something that's easily reflected outwards, but it's the way you view the world has changed and the way you view. Your role in the world and your space that you're willing to take up, and the ways that you're gonna advocate for your value, your worth. And people then get surprised when all of a sudden it's like, oh, this person's

Ananya:

Yeah,

Elizabeth:

on me. I don't really like that. Now that they're a little bit more boundaried or they're, you know, they, they value the time a little bit

Ananya:

Yeah,

Elizabeth:

me they're not gonna drop everything that come help me do this because they're prioritizing themself or they're writing or they're whatever. yeah, I think.

Ananya:

yeah, exactly that. Like you've grown but they're stagnant and you don't know. And it also comes from your insecurity, right? Like.

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

they relate to me? Will they see me? As you said the way I am. So how do you determine who stays from your past? Who goes, like you said earlier, like you lost, like we all lose connections when we leave certain institutions, the workplace school. But here it's about intentionality, right? Because physically we're usually in the same place. So how do you align your physical realities? Of your past and bring it into your present. So that is really important too. And the thing is, we know all this. We are making our characters do it day in and day out in our writing. We just don't use it in our day-to-day life.'cause I mean, who takes their own advice?

Elizabeth:

Well, I. would

Ananya:

So this is the.

Elizabeth:

for people to walk through. And it makes me think like, I know you phrased it as like when you first get that idea and you're just starting out, but also I could see people utilizing that tool when they feel like resistant to their writing project, or if some people might call it writer's block or, you know, just in a down season, right, to like just reignite that interest, that passion, the reason you're doing it because. It may just be that

Ananya:

Sure.

Elizabeth:

You don't have the community that you need, you don't have particular resources or inspiration or any of that, and. Uh, I know that you know this about our podcast platform. We're really big on community and supporting and trying to motivate people. Intrinsically tapping into that intrinsic within yourself as a writer, um, through inspiration, through hearing these stories from people like you who have been in these writing industries who have gone through it, and knowing that those struggles are not. Singular to you. Like there are other people going through that same thing, but so much of the time we operate in a silo and we can forget that

Ananya:

Yeah,

Elizabeth:

that we are going through are struggles that are sort of universal to the writer experience.

Ananya:

exactly. For sure. Exactly. That's why you create this podcast, and that's why we create art in general. Right. It's because we want to see ourselves reflected and the darkest parts of ourselves reflected, which we feel like we can't communicate with others. Like I had this really invasive thought about my mom and I don't even not gonna tell you in which direction that goes, but oh, look like with this movie and this character felt the same thing. So that means at least one other person. The director of this film, the writer of this film has felt that, so I am not alone. And that's why we make art. Like that's why we can watch films in Korean, in Japanese languages, which are so far removed from our reality and still relate to it because we feel seen, we look across oceans that are people who are having the same feelings we're having. Like, isn't that wonderful? Like isn't it wonderful that we have this entertaining, beautiful, heartfelt medium to talk about how we're all the same? That was my Ted Talk.

Elizabeth:

universality of the emotions and that sense of belonging and that that longing for that sense of place and being a part of something and being seen for the good, the bad, the ugly, all of those pieces. Um, I just, I wanna say thank you for being here with us today, for being willing to talk about your experiences and the ways that you're showing up and helping other people get to a place of belonging through your new company and coaching. We'll have links to both your website, the Belonging Way, as well as that freebie resource, um, that Hero's Journey toolkit for belonging for writers. So, um, I just thank you so much. I wonder if you might be willing to leave. Us with just any one nugget of advice you have for a writer who is any stage of their just first big writing project, maybe feeling stuck, maybe not sure what to do, what, what advice would you have for that person?

Ananya:

Approach it with a sense of play.

Elizabeth:

Mm-hmm.

Ananya:

Yeah, every time you're stressed is because you're too worried about the outcome and the moment you switch it in your head. Uh, I'm just here to have fun. That's it. I'm not married to the outcome. You will have so much fun doing it, and all your heart and soul will just pour out into it and the outcome will be brilliant. I'm not here to tell you that you won't care about the outcome. You're human, you will. But approaching it from the sense of play will just change everything for the better and change how you feel in the process of creation. And that energy will be visible in your writing. So just play the world is our playground.

Elizabeth:

that advice, and it's one of the reasons I chose as my Word of the year curiosity, because I wanted to tap into like that less serious, you know, outcome based, uh, approach. And I have on the, the page like, what if. If and, and the word play is there too. It's like, what if I just tried this? What if I submitted the short story to this contest? What if, I mean, it's all for fun. Kids do it all the time. They're a great role model for how to just play in the world because they're not worried about how they're gonna look or what the particular outcome's gonna be. So I love that you've shared that advice. Thank you so much for being with us today. And listener. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Please leave comments. Um, for Ananya, please look into those socials and those links if that's something you're interested in and finding that way, that sense of belonging, um, both in the world and within your writing and happy writing.

People on this episode

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Elizabeth Wilson

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Stephanie Oswald, Ph.D.

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