Waking Up In The Land Of Dreams

Do you ever just have a moment where you take a step back and appreciate everything that's changed? 

I do too. And it always freaks me out, like that jump scare in a film you've seen a hundred times but you'll be damned if you don't still leap out you're chair. 

                                                

So, what's really changed in the two years since I last took an interest? Well my facebook has almost tripled in value, I've earned money from selling my own art, got a job, and I seem to have woken up in Hollywood.. 

The dawning of my new life of the British tinsel town was looking at my friends. Last time I looked my friends were collective bums or favour-jobs types. Now I somehow seem to know at least 6 people who live their life as models, a couple of professional artists, novelists and even professional singers.  

How is it you can wake up from the coma of unemployment and discover your friend is releasing a hotly anticipated single whilst another helps net over 20k in 9 months for charity? I mean hell I'm in the process of writing a novelisation to a feature film! How the hell did the reality of this slip past me?  

There was a brief moment I contemplated reality shortly after publishing From The Inside Out and getting the first wave of #BookSelfies but it was left with a bemused irony. Yeah I had lived the dream at least once, but I was still poor this was hardly the life of success. 

That was until recently when I read an interview with Ernie Hudson, known to many as the really cool black guy who seems to just pop up in films. In the interview he talked about his role in Ghostbusters and hitting super stardom instantly but still finding himself struggling with the bills. He was a face recognised and cheered by fans the world over, but that didn't change the fact none of them had really been actually paid all that much for the film, and now he found himself losing work BECAUSE of the instant recognition. 

                                                          

That struck home very distinctly for me, and sure for many others; the Hollywood life is not the lucrative playboy billionaire excess we would all associate it by default, it is living whatever dream you've set yourself and living it with your fans. 

I know I sure am lucky to be one of these people now, no matter how brief my 15 minutes may be, I'll always have this. And that ain't a bad way to be.

Vanessa René will be releasing her new single A Part Of Me raising awareness for CCUK as part of the amazing #GetYourBellyOut community on the 1st of Feb, and you can follow her - but only on Facebook and Twitter @VanessaReneUK! The music video of which can be found here 

And as usual you can follow me on Twitter @Chromosoner

and my book is available here