Recap of STORY Speakers — Part 2
3. Richard Walker – Film professor at UCLA. I came in late for this session, so didn’t catch all of it. I do recall him saying that story tellers (whether it is filmmakers, pastors or you and I) don’t necessarily need to make people feel good, they just need to make them feel. And it might be more beneficial to leave them with questions, rather than give them all the answers.
4. Jason Fried – business owner and author. I love the way Jason thinks outside the box. He runs his very successful software development business with some unique rules. He does not like meetings, because they kill productivity and give birth to more meetings. He thinks most great things happen in small settings, so he plans to keep his company small.
He talked about fact that most people start too many projects that they never finish. The way he determines which ideas to pour energy into, is to wait one week and see if he still has passion for that idea. If the passion has weaned, he forgets about that project — but if the passion is still strong, he moves ahead with the project.
He rejuvenates and refreshes his creativity by being alone and quiet. One recent place for him was a window seat on a 4-hr flight — he stared out the window at the clouds the entire time and landed with a cleared and refocused mind.
5. Andrew Klavan – author. It’s hard to pick a favorite speaker from the diverse lineup, but it I had to, it might be Andrew. He was raised a Jew, spent time as an agnostic, an atheist and is now a Christian. Making the choice to become a Christian was tough for him, because he was concerned that he would lose his natural tolerance for others and turn into a judgmental person. (isn’t something wrong with the Christian world, if non-christians think of Christians as judgmental instead of as love?)
He suffered from severe depression at one point in his life and wondered how he could live in that misery. He clung to something he heard a baseball player say during that time, Sometimes you just have to play in pain.
He believes he (and all writers) need to write about both the good and bad sides of life. He writes novels that expose the dark sides of life, but he tries to find the line in his writing of showing enough evil to make people understand how bad it is (and how good God is) but not too much evil or people are pulled down by it.
6. Gary Dorsey – artist. What a fun and unique speaker. He shared a contrast of movie and music clips from the past forty years or so. The contrast was between what was most popular in the ‘world’ at the time and what was much popular in the church. The sharp contrast between quality, style and creativity was amazing … and sad. He has seen that divide lessen, but says artists that are producing things for the church still have a long way to go. They need to invite God’s spirit into their art and then be real, raw and honest — show the shadows as well as the sunlight.
7. David McFadzean – TV show producer. I was tied up at my exhibit for some of this session, but one thing I did catch was him saying that the theologian and the artist need each other. And that art doesn’t prove the existence of God, but it does prove the search for God.
That concludes Thursday’s speakers. Recap Part 3 will continue tomorrow with STORY’S Friday speakers.
complete speaker list and part 1 of recap here .
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