Meet Zack Be | Award-winning SF/F author, Obscure Songwriter, & Couple and Family Therapist

We had the good fortune of connecting with Zack Be and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Zack, what’s the most important lesson your business/career has taught you?
The best lesson I’ve learned is to always focus more on sharpening “the knife,” rather than the object you are currently carving. In essence, this means treat yourself (the knife) like a factory and make as much of whatever it is you make as possible, rather than perpetually editing and re-editing each piece you make (the carving) in the hopes that you can whittle it into some unattainable perfect form. In the end, you will have learned a lot more about the content you make and progressed significantly more as a creator, vs. having one very over-edited piece of content. Although I believe this lesson applies across all areas of my creative and professional life – writing fiction, writing and playing music, working as a psychotherapist, and teaching – I initially learned this lesson at a science fiction/ fantasy (SF/F) writing retreat for winners of the Writers of the Future contest (the world’s biggest contest for emerging SF/F authors). On Tuesday of the weeklong retreat I was asked to produce a complete short story with a coherent beginning, middle, and end (hopefully a cool idea to boot). Going into the experience, I was nervous that I would not be able to complete the challenge. Most of the fiction I had written and sold in the past resulted from weeks or even months of slow writing and careful editing. How could I possibly recreate that in 24hrs? I didn’t help myself by spending the first 9 hours of the challenge taking the LA metro to the beach (did you know LA has a metro?) and back. Yet despite it all, I turned in a 5k word story at the deadline the following day, and that story has gone on to be sold to one of the biggest SF literary magazines in the world.
What I needed to recognize was that I was being too precious about each decision, and in many cases the constant mulling-over of the work and endless editing may have been robbing it of its inherent X-factor, thereby turning it into something smooth and featureless. Once I let go of the pressure to perfect each piece and began focusing more on just ~making more pieces~, the quality of the work and my confidence as a creator skyrocketed. The same has proven true for writing / performing music, and even for psychotherapy and teaching as well. If you allow each piece to be what it is – whether that is a short story, a song, a session of therapy, or a lecture – you can learn from it and come back sharper next time. If you spend too much time trying to ensure that each piece or moment takes a perfect shape, you are likely to become blind to the value of the work as it is, produce less, and overall have less confidence.

Please tell us more about your work. We’d love to hear what sets you apart from others, what you are most proud of or excited about. How did you get to where you are today professionally. Was it easy? If not, how did you overcome the challenges? What are the lessons you’ve learned along the way. What do you want the world to know about you or your brand and story?
In all honesty, making the art is, and continues to be, the easy part. You just sit down and do it, and you don’t judge yourself while you do it. Then you remain humble when you show it off. I’ve never had trouble with this part – in fact, I’m pretty sure I would have a lot more trouble NOT giving myself a creative outlet. I’m not entirely sure what would happen but I assume I would be shaking like a caffeine addict with blood coming out of my pores. So instead of facing that horrible existence, I just make ~a lot~ of stuff. The refrain I hear most often from people around is me “where do you find the time?!” I laugh at this because when I look at my own schedule I can always find holes in the week where I feel like I didn’t accomplish anything at all. That’s probably just the anxious part of me wagging it’s finger, nervously insinuating that I better hurry up and make something good “before it’s too late.” There is a line in an LCD Soundsystem song that goes, “And be honest with yourself/ How much time do you waste? / How much time do you blow every day?” And if I’m being honest that lyric has haunted me for a long time. I have things I’d like to do with my one, limited life including writing books, producing records, playing big shows… luckily for me, the thing I love doing in my free time helps me work toward these goals! The truth of the matter is this: when I talk to other people about their relaxation time, they talk about bubble baths, watching TV, going out drinking, and the list goes on… and there is absolutely nothing wrong with those choices, they just don’t do as much for me as sitting down in front of my DAW and focusing on music for a few hours, or writing a horror story about someone who has blood coming out of their pores (pro tip: be economical with useful visuals). This is exactly the type of time I need to recoup from my day job as a therapist / PhD student / teacher, which tugs at a completely different part of my brain. I would feel antsy sitting on the couch and doing nothing after talking about suicide, trauma, and sexual dysfunction all day. As a result, art is made.

The hard part for me has always been “getting it out there.” The biggest lesson I had to learn was: no one wants to hear or read your art. That is, at least not when you are starting out, and certainly if you aren’t giving back. There is just so much noise in the system already, and the content wave is only getting bigger as more and more artists, creators, and corporations battle for your attention. I distinctly remember feeling frustrated in my late teens and twenties that no one cared about anything I made and I couldn’t gain any traction. I was doing it all wrong – if you want to be heard, you have to start by listening to everyone else. Go to shows, read other people’s work, make your own spaces for sharing art, and above all just share gratitude for the fact that you are alive and can share in creating with so many others. The biggest shift in my life as a creator came when my roommates and I agreed to turn our garage into a DIY concert venue back in 2015. Prior to that moment, I was hyper focused on trying to get people to hear me, and after that moment I made it a priority to listen to others and offer them a space to play. This was the key decision that changed my entire relationship with art and helped get me into the DC/DMV music scene where I continue making music with so many amazing people today. Make as much art as you need to make, but make sure that a good chunk of your time is spent really listening to others and forming those relationships. Socially, personally, artistically, and professionally you only have things to gain!

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
DC is my favorite city, bar none. I love that you can be in the middle of downtown and within roughly 45 minutes of driving be out in the middle of nowhere Maryland (my home state) or Virginia. As a result you get all the benefits of being in a major US city alongside all the benefits of being able to easily escape the city and get out into the wilderness. Plus DC is pretty small, and the young side of the workforce is highly transient, so if you stick around long enough it can feel like you know everyone. I’m sure there are more cities with more ~stuff~ happening but I grew up just outside the city and I continue to love it. So what should you do being in DC for a week? The obvious answer is to it the Smithsonian – we have an amazing array of FREE museums, my favorites of which are: Hirshhorn (modern art), National Gallery (all kinds of art), Natural History (“stuffed animals”), both Air and Space Museums (spaceships), and the African American History Museum (frankly amazing masterpiece of architecture and museum design). Between that and the monuments you could burn every day of your week. Don’t sleep on the National Arboretum – it’s got this weird planet of the apes vibe that I kind of like, even though a lot of people say it’s boring.

In the evening, I like music! For local flavor, go to Comet Ping Pong or DC9 to see all the best bands. For something a little more national, don’t sleep on 930 Club (my favorite stage).

Personally I’m not a picky eater, or a foodie, so this is my weakest area, but Union Market has some really good options; you won’t be disappointed.

I don’t drink, so I have no idea where the good cocktails are. I give my drink tickets at shows away to friends. Hit me up for one if you’re ever at one of my shows!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
This is such a hard question to answer because there are so many people! As a musician, I would be nowhere without the the DMV music scene overall, but especially the members of my band Pretty Bitter: Emelia Bleker, Miri Tyler, Jason Hayes, and Chris Smith> IG: @prettybitter.mp3

As a writer, the shout-out goes to all my fellow vol. 36 & 37 Writers of the Future winners with whom I shared that wonderful experience.

And as a therapist, the shout-out goes to my friend and collaborator Kathryn DeYoung

Website: https://www.zackbe.com/

Instagram: @bezackbe

Twitter: @bezackbe

Facebook: facebook.com/bezackbe

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnXGWPmFhnyAsgEfA3f5a1Q

Other: be.zackbe@gmail.com

Image Credits
Mike Kimichi Meredith Wohl Kevin Shanahan