No matter how much you love the character you’ve been chosen to play, an extended run of a show is a challenge. The key to keeping your portrayal fresh is allowing yourself to be present.

Half of what we do as actors is memorization. We memorize the blocking and our lines, and we become used to the rhythm of our scene partners. During the rehearsal process when we are discovering these elements, it’s easy to be present and alive because the entire situation is new. We experience one realization after another. The adrenalin pumps and we are primed to explore.

Unfortunately, as soon as we have uncovered the key ingredients that make our characters tick, and we’ve had time to allow the blocking, the lines, the accents and our scene partners’ rhythm to sink into the marrow of our bones, we run the risk of phoning it in.

One technical thing you can do to wake yourself up is to put a stone in your shoe. I’m not kidding. The presence of the stone is a constant irritant that keeps you from switching to automatic pilot. You have to be present to deal with the discomfort, so you are also present to hear and see things differently moment to moment.

This discomfort, this obstacle is also a reminder that your character has baggage under the facade he shows others. This baggage is the character’s point of pain, which is the fuel behind all of the character’s actions.

This bit of technical magic can liven things up, but beware. You can get used to the stone in the same way you got used to your blocking, lines and exchanges.

Another means-where-by you can keep the life of your character fresh is to realize and embrace the fact that they are human. They are flesh and blood entities with lives that are bigger than the scenes the audience sees them in. The scenes that happen off stage are much like a subplot. These scenes provide or unearth the other issues the character must deal with as they attempt to work through the action on stage.

Your job as the actor is to select one of these off stage scenes and play them out in character until you discover the seed of emotional truth that the character can carry with them when they enter into the on stage scene.

We do this in our daily lives. We have a rotten day at work. We become cranky. We go home and no matter how nice our loved ones are we bite their heads off. We never intend to be cruel. In fact, after a horrible day, I’d venture to say that most of us simply want to come home and relax, settle into a cozy embrace or even do something fun. But our objectives get blind-sided by our internal hell. It’s never a pleasant scene, but it is fresh and we are present.

Be careful here too. I’m not asking or suggesting that you make things up. The off-stage scenes must be relevant to the plot. They are the scenes we talk, or know about, but never get to see. Find the life of those scenes and you will re-ignite the flame in your onstage life.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to move onward and upward.

The other night I dreamt about Gregory Peck. We were married—a new marriage that coincided with his election as the president of a small country. The details were unclear, but I gathered he lead the protests, which toppled the former regime and embedded peace.

Optimism soared and the people and the media were hungry to learn what his plans were to move the country forward. I too was inundated with inquiries, especially from his staff. Every First Lady was a spokeswoman for something, so what cause was I planning to champion? Try as I might, I couldn’t pinpoint a passion of my own.

Mortified by my indecisiveness and fearful of apathy, I remained open and listened to any group with a mission who wished to pitch to me. Though I empathized with each group, I still could not come to a decision.

A year later, I was still at a loss and the staff backed off. They were professionally pleasant, but their eyes told me they thought I was hopeless. I could almost hear them questioning my husband’s decision to marry me.

Shortly before the country’s celebration of independence, a minor unrest broke out in one of the less populated regions. Rumors circulated about another uprising and the end of Gregory’s reign. My husband worked overtime with his advisors to find a solution and announced he would reveal his plan to fix the problem during his Independence Day speech.

The afternoon of the celebration, Gregory Peck, the man most admired for his quiet inner strength in the face of adversity came unglued. He broke down in front of me and shared all his doubts about his ability to heal the country.

I didn’t have the slightest idea of how to erase his fears, but I knew how to listen, support and love him. We spent the afternoon doing just that—loving each other until the world fell away.

When the call came to prepare for the evening’s festivities we were ready. My husband stepped out on the balcony. He allowed himself time to absorb the anxiety on the faces of his countrymen, then he glanced at me and poured his soul into his address. Unanimous support for his plan followed and once again peace cradled the country.

That same evening, I pulled a staff member aside and informed her that I had chosen my husband as my cause. His mission and goals were mine and I was ready to go above and beyond whatever I had done before to help him strengthen the country we both loved.

The end.

I’m sure some readers will find this dream dated—A 1950’s mentality in regard to my role as a doting spouse. But that’s not what this dream is about.

After a seven-month hiatus, I decided it was time to go back to my novel. I chose to take the John Irving approach. I wrote the last chapter first, and then an opening chapter for the protagonist and one for the antagonist.

A day or so later, inspiration hit for a new take on another completed manuscript that has been gathering dust for years. The new angle was so exciting, I wrote a logline and query letter in a snap. The ease with which these two elements materialized made me question my resolve to tackle another draft of the current WIP.

Maybe the story was really dead. Maybe I learned all I could about crafting a story from that project and it was time to move on. Maybe, I don’t really have the tools as a writer to sculpt this particular story into a marketable draft. This was my inner turmoil as I fell asleep on the night I dreamt of Gregory Peck.

Ah, Gregory Peck—an interesting choice for my subconscious mind. He’s an actor from the heydays of the Studio System, an actor to admire personally and professionally. And an actor I would never presume to be in the same league with.

Exactly. In my dream, I literally coupled with someone out of my talent pool, and yet my heart and soul belonged to him. I had no doubts. I needed to be by his side no matter what.

As a writer, I am an amateur. Although, I’ve been called to the page since childhood and I understand a lot about the craft, I’m still toiling to find my roots and voice. I struggle with rejection and am often led astray and influenced by writers I admire.

But what never crumbles is my desire to express myself through the written word. I may never be published, may never earn a dime for anything I create on the page, but nothing will prevent me from pursuing the journey.

L is for Love.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.

Don’t douse the fire.
Let it burn
Run rampant in the forest of your heart.

Turn away from the knife.
Select the dagger.
The shaft heavy
The blade sharp, sleek and pointed
Thanks to the whetstone of your heart.

Let the colors of your mood fly Bold and
Peacock the truth of your pain.

Grab the dagger and choose the target with care
Refuse the daisy whose stem snaps with a breath.
Latch onto heather,
Coarse and thick
Sticky and uncontrollable.

Dive into the heather
Raise the dagger high
Hack away until your hands are raw,
Arms and legs scratched,
Then let the scent of the nectar burn into the skin
And brand your soul
For all to see.

I am a rehearsal junkie. The process of discovery revs up my heart better than an aerobics class. If a living could be made from rehearsing a show without ever performing for an audience, I’d be the first to audition.

Fortunately, the theatre doesn’t work that way. I’ve also been around long enough to understand that the rehearsal process provides only the backbone of the production, or the roots that ground the action and character objectives. The play doesn’t find wings or the nuances that enrich the tale until the players connect with an audience.

The electrical charge the actors experience with the audience through their laughter, rustling candy wrappers, tears and silence expand the actors’ understanding of what each moment is meant to reveal about life, and the conflict the play is designed to explore. Then, if the actor is willing, a new evolution begins for the character and for himself, as he expands and deepens his proficiency in the craft.

Sharing your work—no matter how long you’ve been polishing or shaping—is never an easy undertaking. But it’s a step that cannot be skipped if you wish to reach the summit of your journey.

If you’ve already been cast or signed the book contract, your moment of sharing is inevitable. When opening night or launch day arrives you will still possess jitters, but you also have a support system in place to help you navigate through the highs and lows of your work’s reception.

For those of us without an agent, role or book contract that first step of sharing can be terrifying. Doubts and our need to get it right or perfect can manipulate us into believing we are not yet ready for prime time. So, we hibernate surrounded by books on craft, or become workshop addicts or rewrite junkies.

But here’s the rub: No performance or book is perfect—at least not from the artist’s point of view. Nor should it be.

An artist—by nature—evolves with his craft. What the artist produces today will be extraordinarily different from what he produces in ten years. Is one better than the other? No. Each work of art is as perfect as it can be for the time it is created.

We can only work from where we are in the craft. So, we need to embrace the strength of our skills at the moment and move unto the breach without hesitation. We need to go forth with gusto and exam what works and doesn’t later.

The only way to grow or reach the next level is to move through our fears—not avoid them.

G—is for Go.

Over the last several weeks I’ve been reworking a short story, polishing it up for the submission process. The story was originally written for a themed contest on Backspace. The feedback I received was spot on and I dug into my rewrites certain that the application of the input would make the story shine.

Although the changes I made improved the overall quality of the writing, the story itself didn’t zing. I tweaked and tweaked, but nothing changed. Then over the weekend, I realized the theme was holding me back. The contest theme had been a great stimulus, but clinging to the theme during the rewrite actually blinded me to the story that needed to be told.

Once I let go of the theme I was able to rid myself of extraneous scenes and sink further into the character and allow her to experience a full emotional arc.

My experience on the page made me ponder the creative process for actors and I realized that we are so easily misled when we approach a role—especially one that has been around for a while.

I’m a big advocate for first impressions. The images, words and phrases that leap off the page when you read a play for the first time are gut impulses that are filled with honesty and heart. You must trust them, but you must also be careful not to get sucked in to the dominant qualities you’ve uncovered. You must tap into those dominant qualities, but you must also recognize and allow the contrasting qualities to weigh in—otherwise your character will be one-dimensional.

Also, analysis is crucial to understanding a character, whether we are developing it on the page or on the stage, but what you’ve imagined in your head may not work once you’re in the trenches. As an actor you need to physically apply what you’ve learned on your own in the rehearsal process. Only there when you pit your  “objective” or your character’s “point of pain” against the other characters in the scene can you get a true sense for whether your discoveries are valid or not.

We must encourage ourselves to experiment, and be flexible enough to re-examine what fell short against what we found to be valid. It is a process that takes patience and persistence. We must be gentle with ourselves and not force results.

We must not force results.

This is so much harder than it sounds, because as actors we know how the play ends. Take Death of a Salesman, which is having a magnificent revival in New York at the Barrymore with Philip Seymour Hoffman at the helm.

If you’re playing Willy Loman, you know he is a broken man that is going to kill himself. His brokenness needs to be present at the beginning, but not in full throttle. If he’s completely broken at the start the character has no journey, and the scenes become infested with an unpalatable angst. But if the actor plays against the defeat through childlike hope and denial then the brokenness seeps through and the audience grows to care and yearn for Willy’s salvation. Then when the truth is revealed and Willy finally breaks, the pain is devastating for the audience and the characters in the play, but because the journey was so complete we understand the end was inevitable—but only at the end.

We must not force ourselves into a story or a characterization. Our need to create an impact, or achieve results faster than we are ready, can cause us to latch on to ideas about our stories or qualities in our characters that may actually distract us from the truth we need to communicate.

So my fellow artists, the next time you hit the page or step into rehearsal, ask yourself, are you going for the bells and whistles to make a splash? Or are you allowing the complexity of the character to surface through your honest portrayal of the moment?

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.

I recently led an audition workshop. Major fun. By the end of the three days the actors were pumped, confident and ready to tackle the competitive world of auditions. Since then many of my students were cast in leading roles and others were selected for the semi-final and final rounds in a regional competition. Yippee!!!

This surge of success raised an issue I believe every artist needs to examine—rejection.

Rejection is a yuk word. Rejection deflates the spirit faster than a tornado demolishes a town. Fear of rejection squashes creativity, kills instincts, immobilizes and can be avoided.

That’s right, you don’t need glasses or have your prescription checked.

The fall out of rejection can be avoided.

I know this is true because rejection is a process. Ye of little faith will say, “No way. Rejection happens. How is not getting called back, or receiving a thanks-but-no-thanks letter in the mail a process? If an actor or a writer auditions or submits material the agent/director on the other end either likes you or doesn’t like you—end of story.”

I followed the same logic until I asked myself, where does the story begin?

When I was a freshman in high school Emily Dickinson knocked on my soul and I opened. Words and images flowed from my heart on to whatever scraps of paper I could find. Notebooks and journals refused to remain blank. Eventually, my hunger to share my inner landscape exploded.

I knew nothing about publishing or the submission process, so in an age before computers*—I bought a new spiral notebook, loaded my best fountain pen with a full cartridge of ink and copied my favorite poems. I stuffed the notebook into a manila enveloped and addressed it to one of the major publishing companies in New York City.

If I were to do the same today my material would be dropped into a circular file and forgotten. But when I was in high school life was not something people rushed through. My material was returned and I hadn’t even included a SASE. A small note was included, a thank-you for submitting and a regret that the material was not appropriate for their publishing house. They wished me well.

Sure, I was disappointed but I wasn’t devastated, AND I never—not even for a second—felt like a failure. In fact, that very day I wrote another six poems. My spirit wasn’t crushed because I never left the process of creation.

Of course, at the time I had no experience with endgaining.

When we endgain we are invested in the result we wish to achieve rather than the process—or the means where by we reach the end.

Naturally, I hoped the person reading my poems would insist on publishing them. But I never considered what that meant or how publication would impact my world. How was it possible to be so naïve? Simple. I was a poet. This was my truth. It wasn’t something I needed to prove by getting published. I never linked my passion with a job, paycheck or success. I believed I would attain those things, but what I wrote had nothing to do with those ends. I wrote because I loved to write.

Not until I segued into performing and my parents went berserk because they thought I’d swallowed a delusional, irresponsible pill and was drinking too much scotch neat, did I connect what I loved to do with my survival. Then auditions became a chance for a regular paycheck, roles were examined for where they might lead my career and doubt entered my life. The process of rejection sparked. From then on the idea hovered over every opportunity.

When we start to think about what will or will not happen as a result of what we do, we invest less in the process and more in the end result. We take ourselves out of the present. When we cling to the future we invite failure into our soul, which mucks up the love.

Endgaining breeds failure and magnifies the impact of rejection.

However, if we focus on the process—the means-where-by the end is achieved—we eliminate the pressure associated with what others may think of our work. Art needs to be about our hearts’ expression and when we focus on process our expression soars. When we know inside we have done our best whether we’re cast or signed or get the check doesn’t matter because we know without a doubt those ends will arrive when the time is ripe. In the meantime, we can enjoy the ride—the journey of our life.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.

* Remember the first person to guess the decade I attended college will win a copy of my novel when it’s published—provided I live long enough to finish it.

We study our crafts to improve our skills. We become skillful in our crafts in order to own our talent.

To improve we must change.

Change is impossible without awareness.

Well, duh! Who doesn’t know that, right? Otherwise no one would ever say, “If it’s not broke don’t fix it?”

And there’s the rub. Change is dependent on awareness—self-awareness. And self-awareness is impossible without honesty.

Marjorie Barstow (the first student of F.M. Alexander to receive an official teaching certificate) used to say, “You have to be very honest to do this work.”

Honesty—the bottom-line of bottom-lines.

We’re so eager to gain approval, attention, praise, the role, or the contract we drive ourselves forward with blinders on. If we just create a strong enough mask for the character, if we just master punctuation and deliver the elements of story, if we learn how to play the game, polish the query letter, snap the Wow headshot, create a slick resume and never give up, we’re bound to achieve our goals. Right? On a certain level—yes. With patience and persistence everyone has the opportunity to succeed.

But doing what everyone tells us to do doesn’t mean we’re improving or growing as artists. All of us can name actors and actresses who are box office sensations. Then you look at their body of work and all their characters are simply variations on the original theme.  We see this problem with authors too. I’m not speaking against genre. Every writer has a strength, but we’ve all come across an author or two whose new book is simply more of the same. Entertaining? Yes, but also predictable and in the end rather ho-hum. These are the books you can’t remember ten years down the line. In some cases, the story is so forgettable you start wondering whether or not you read the book.

Sameness breeds from denial.

Denial: the refusal to acknowledge the existence of something, the refusal to face unpleasant facts, opposition to allegations.

When we’re in denial about our skill level change is impossible.

It’s never easy to accept we’re off the mark. But when we embrace denial, we’re enabling the habits that hold us back and we remain exactly where we are.

Interested in breaking the cycle? Read on.

Digesting feedback like every other part of an artist’s journey is a process. (The process—what a great name for blog. I love how titles are everywhere.) A process is a series of actions directed toward a specific end. Here is a sequence of actions you might consider to dismantle denial and increase honesty. The choice is yours.

1-Listen to the feedback with an open mind

I hear the “duhs” echoing on the other side of this screen. But I can’t emphasize this point enough because denial often begins even before this step. Bad prior experiences with directors or editors can hoist up our armor so that the suggestions given bounce off our shield even before we hear them. When we invoke the armor we step out of the present. Here and now is where change will occur. Not the past. Also, if we refuse to examine other viewpoints we will never dig ourselves out of our rut.

2-Record the feedback

Whether you jot the notes on your manuscript or in a journal, write down the suggestions. I know we all think we have these amazing memories. But we don’t. And memories are not always trustworthy. If you don’t believe that gather a few people together and play telephone. We remember what we want to remember—like the good stuff. We also have a tendency to misinterpret. Feedback is something we work on later—on our own, so it’s easy to forget exactly what was said an hour or a day before. Best to have it in black and white for future reference. Also, never be shy about asking the person giving the feedback to repeat what they said to make certain you heard them correctly.

3-Give yourself time to comprehend the note

This step may seem silly after the last one, but it’s a crucial moment in the process—the first moment of no return. We’re so eager to solve the problem and garner the rewards of the outstanding performance, or the gotcha first chapter we often miss the crux of what really needs to be adjusted in our work. In order to prevent a band-aid fix we must understand why the note is given. You need to know the motivation behind a character’s actions or the new slant in what they are saying, otherwise you’re only going through the motions and you can kiss believability good-bye. Comprehension takes time. So let the feedback sink in before you start making changes. You’ll find, especially as a writer, taking time to absorb the input can mean the difference between rewriting five times or once.

4-Examine your work from a third person perspective

Denial is a sorceress. She casts a spell that lulls you into a false sense of knowledge. Beware. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard actors say, “I thought that’s what I was doing?” One way to break the spell is to examine someone else’s work. Look at the first chapter or watch the next scene and see if what your missing in your work is present on the page or stage.  If it is, ask yourself, “Am I accomplishing that level of believability or vulnerability in my work?” Don’t sugarcoat and don’t engage in the soft-shoe of excuses. Tell the truth. Oh, I hear the argument—how can I compare myself to so-n-so when they have X number of years more experience? Sure the depth or polish of the work may not be comparable, but believability and vulnerability are what they are at every stage of the game. Once you can accept the truth of where you are in the process and identify what is missing, then you are on the road to improvement. Hooray!

5-Questions and Options

For every note you’ve been given proceed as follows…

Say the note is the audience doesn’t believe the character is devastated when he says, “You really don’t recognize me do you?”

First identify precisely where you were physically and emotionally at the moment. Were you thinking about the next line, or clinging to the last? Did you even hear yourself say the line? Maybe not? Get specific and determine to the best of your ability what it is you might have done or didn’t do that made the line hang like a ramen noodle.

Then ask yourself what you could experiment with to improve the emotional connection to the moment. Make a list such as…establish eye contact with my scene partner, recognize earlier in the scene that she never looks me in the eye, or allow my character to throw themselves head long into the expectation of reunion prior to her cue line, “Yeah, well, I grew up in Galena and I’m never going back,” then let lightning strike before you open your mouth.

Once you have your list of options, physically go through each one (separately or in combination) until you discover what it is you need for the moment to shine.

6-Trust yourself

Once you feel confident in how you’ve improved your work, then embrace the changes. When you go into rehearsal, go with gusto. Believe in your discoveries and allow yourself to embrace each moment as it comes. Only then will you discover if what you have stumbled on in your private sessions is true or false.

7-Commit

After the wrinkles have been ironed and you’re on the correct path go one step beyond trust—commit to this new level of craft and ride with your entire soul. If you do, the next level of transformation will arrive with less denial and more honesty and the waves of change will carry you always onward and upward.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to write on.

I walk my hyperactive husky/lab, Abi, every morning. A ritual. A prayer. A means-where-by we greet the day and encounter discoveries. Today’s realization was a two-part whammy.

A little over a mile down the road Abi paused, as she often does to take care of business, but at that moment she had no such intention. She simply stopped walking. I tugged on the lead. “Abi. Come.” No response. Another tug. A second command. She didn’t even bother to look in my direction. Jeez. Even Nick and Nora’s dog Asta will at least acknowledge their existence. Then my awareness widened.

My intention was to walk so I could write, while Abi had forgotten all about walking. Her only intention was to figure out why these particular blades of grass smelled so amazing. Was the scent hers from a previous outing, or did it belong to the hot Polish Sheep Dog down the road? Wham.

I was endgaining*. Abi was present. Bested by a dog. Yarg!

As soon as I embraced the truth of the situation my second awakening arrived. (Please note: When we are truly present the end of one moment always leads to the next) My intention to walk had met resistance in the form of Abi.

Resistance: opposition, refusal to give in, a force opposing another, repression of a thought.

Abi was my opposition. The only way I could walk on was to let go of the leash. Ah. To Let Go. I talk a lot about letting go in my work with actors, Alexander students and on this blog. However, it is easier said than done. But unless we let go of what we are holding on to—our habit—it is impossible to experience the physical ease and emotional depth or freedom we desire.

The trick is to discover what specifically we are holding like a death grip in our souls. This may sound over the top. But I’m not exaggerating. Here’s a perfect example.

I was in an Alexander session. This particular student has been studying acting and AT with me for a couple years. (I know. Two years seems like a long time. But the amount of time a student studies is directly related to how much the student wishes to learn about their use, the craft and themselves. Personally, I don’t think artists ever stop studying or evaluating their craft.) He has been incredibly receptive from our very first session and has done his best to incorporate the principles of the work into all aspects of his life.

We were doing hands on work and discovered a block. The student said, “I feel like I’m fighting myself.” I agreed. My hands could sense his legs fighting direction. One layer wished to follow the direction of my hands while a deeper layer was clenched.

“What do you think that’s about?” I asked. Silence.

A few weeks back this same student mentioned that we needed to talk about something. I had asked him what he wished to discuss when our session began, but he offered nothing. A few more beats passed then he blurted out in one sentence what was on his mind—or rather what was stuck in his body. As soon as the words hit the air his legs released and he fell to the floor.

We continued the lesson on the floor while we processed his outburst. When he got back on his feet he said, “I feel like I’m learning to walk all over again.”

Interesting, eh? My students are such wonderful teachers. They never cease to ring the bell of realization for me. The bell doesn’t always ring instantaneously, but no matter. This morning I heard a gong.

What have I been clutching in regards to my WIP?

Denial surfaced immediately. Don’t be ridiculous. What could you possibly be resisting? You’re not even working on your novel because you’ve been on a five month furlough. Wham! Wham!

• Furlough: a leave of absence
• Absence: failure to be present
• Leave: to depart
• Depart: go away

What have I been running from?

As soon as I posed the question, Abi released herself from the blades of grass and we walked on. We walked on and this is when the double whammy sent up a right and left hook.

If I was running away what was I afraid of? Failure. Duh.

Then the truth seeped in. Failure has been an integral part of my journey as a writer forever. From the time my college writing professor ripped every assignment I handed in to shreds through my latest rejection in May, failure has been a through-line on my journey to publication. Even my first blog post—The Beckett Challenge—dealt with failure. Good Grief! Was I sabotaging myself? Possibly.

By this point Abi and I had upped the pace. And as the rate of my pulse climbed and more oxygen poured in, I remembered one of the most intriguing one-man shows I’ve ever seen. Circumference of a Squirrel by John Walch. The story is told by Chester the son of an anti-Semite. The father-son relationship is riddled with complexity. We see Chester with his father at different stages of their lives. Near the end of the play after his father dies and his own marriage has collapsed, Chester is still unable to move forward. Why is he resisting? Because…

If I let go of my hatred for my father then who am I?

Huge, right?

So, I asked myself…If I let go of my need to fail then what?

Wham. Bam.

I might succeed.

Then what is really holding me back–failure or success? My actors know the answer. An actor never plays one emotion when he can play two or more. The same goes with resistance.

Whatever we are fighting against has a flip side. If we can’t see the entire habit—and resistance is most definitely a form of habit—there is no way to let it go. And we can’t be in the present if we’re holding on to the past, or fretting about the future.

I can’t think of a better way to enter a new year than to let go of past habits and all the resistance that goes with them. So, rather than making New Year’s resolutions, you might examine your circumference of resistance. You’ve got nothing to lose except your habits.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.

Happy New Year!

*Endgain—when your mind and actions focus on the result and avoid the present moment, which is the means-whereby the results are achieved.

Wait!
Hold back
Don’t move
Don’t go there
Caution…
What if I’m wrong?
Off balance
Off the mark
Out in left field
See—the clichés…
I am wrong—not good enough
Who am I kidding?
What’s the point?
Others are better
They’re naturals
Uninhibited
Unafraid
Willing to risk all.
Risk what?
What if no one cares?
What if they don’t like my dance, performance the story—ME?
Ah…
And what if they don’t?
Is their dislike enough to make me stop exploring, growing, creating,
Blossoming forth as the artist I am inside—deep down where the embers of my love and passion reside—safe from harm, rejection, pain, ridicule, judgment.
Will I stop? Can I stop?
No…
But I can remain safe in the womb of my private expressive world…
Tucked away in dreams I can thrive and prosper as the artist I am.
Wait…
Stop!
If I create only for myself am I still an artist, or a wannabe soul afraid to fly?
If I release, yet never receive will the inspiration, the desire to reveal, expose and transform continue to tap on my soul, or will my soul dehydrate and spiral me into a shell of regrets?
The latter is quite possible.
I want to let go, stop holding, gripping, burning with fear, but I’m tired.
It takes a lot of effort to be perfect.
And how is that working out?
The effort, the struggle, the work, work, work—the regiment of discipline that shuts me away from the pulse of life…
Life, the natural cycle of creative energy, love, beauty, expansion, abundance, receptivity
Connection.
But don’t I need to know how?
Gotcha!
There’s the rub, the catch, the habit.
Habit—the tingling hold the body and mind uses against me as it forces me to do more of the same—in an attempt to keep me safe, in control and disconnected from the world and myself.

H is for Habit-the holding pattern of life.

As an Alexander Teacher I often talk about habits. Our physical habits are what interfere with our body’s natural design of movement—our inherent ability to move with ease, grace and joy.

People study the Alexander Technique to learn how to free their body of pain, or remove the physical tension that blocks emotional expression.

Anyone can learn how to direct into freedom. But if your habits have you handcuffed, all the direction in the world will only provide you with a surface layer of ease and a temporary fix.

In order to truly destroy your physical and emotional blocks you must uncover the underlying habit. I’ve mentioned this before…

Your habit is your habit no matter what activity you engage in.

Exorcising a habit is a process. The first step: acknowledge the habit’s existence. Until you recognize the pattern that has you handcuffed or blocked freedom is impossible, because you can’t release something that doesn’t exist. How we release the habit is a topic for another post.

Today’s challenge is to discover the habit hijacking your creativity, emotional depth and physical ease.

This is not a mind game. The habit is something you feel physically and emotionally. It does manifest intellectually, but the only way to truly identify it is to feel the habit from within. The discovery you make will be your own. There is no right or wrong answer. Your habit is yours alone. You must own it before you are able to move on.

Be patient. Habits are strong, tricky and wear many disguises. Give yourself time to uncover the culprit. There is no deadline, only a journey. Are you willing to launch yours?

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.

We are our backs.

We have no front.

Our backs are the structure through which our personality is seen.

When we’re in our backs, fully supported, we are free to explore our emotional landscape, free to share this landscape with the world—unapologetically.  We are able to show our vulnerability because we are fully ourselves.

This is true because we have no front. Our fronts have been molded by society and our desire to please others. Our fronts also feed our ego—not who we are. Who we are lies inside the structure we were born with and the façade we have created to protect ourselves.

When we talk about being in our back we must discuss structure. Structure means our skeleton. Our bones keep us from being a blob of mush on the floor. Our bones are soft in infancy, but as we grow they strengthen and by the time we’ve reached the toddling twos we are able to discover what it is like to be vertical in the world.

A child’s ability to be upright is glorious to behold. The skeleton is in balance and as a result there is no muscular tension.  Balanced and open to the world a child’s emotions and their feelings are accessible and honest. Children are who they are without reservation. They are able to move from one emotion to another in seconds. A performer’s dream.

Unfortunately, as children grow they lose tract of their wholeness. Other people become more important than themselves. They not only lose sight of who they are, they physically become unbalanced.

The main ingredient of our skeleton is the spine. The weight of our spine is where we are grounded. All our limbs, which sprout from the spine, are extensions of the spine’s mobility. We understand that our spine is our back, but so is everything else.

We are our backs because what is our front?

The face? Nope. The skull rests on top of the cervical spine. The spine is our back. What about the sternum and ribs in the front of our body? Nope. The sternum is attached to the ribs, which rap back around our heart and lungs and attach to the spine—our back. Our pelvis, which protects or holds our sexual organs like a bowl, is connected to the sacrum—the tail of our spine or back.

But our legs lead us forward, right? Not exactly. They do create movement, but they don’t lead. When we are in balance our head leads, our body follows and our legs are underneath our pelvis, which attaches to the sacrum. Back. Our arms are connected to the clavicle, which attaches to the sternum, which connects to the back. Our arms also link to the latissimus dorsi, one of the huge muscles of the back that goes all the way down to our sacrum. More back.

Physically we are our backs. Our front is our personality—our laughter, tears and creativity. When we’re in our backs, we have the support to share our personality freely with others.

And then, oh, how much easier it is to slip into another character. Because when we are open in this way every emotion imaginable is at our beckon call.

Or we might say, it is only when we are in our backs that we are truly present.

Like backstory, right? When we leave the history—the material that shapes the character—behind we, as performers and writers, are able to allow the character to respond in the moment.

So the next time you find yourself struggling with the core of the scene ask yourself: Am I present? Am I allowing myself to be supported by my back and opening myself to the world? Or am I out of balance, unconnected?

If so, take a moment. Breathe. Allow yourself to feel the strength of your back and allow the tension in your face and your whole body to fall away. Breathe. Discover the ease of yourself in the moment. Then imagine your character in your mind’s eye. Slip into their body and ask them to reveal their objective and emotional landscape to you. Once revealed open your mouth to speak or let your fingers fly across the keyboard.

Thanks for reading and being the presence I need to discover what I must to move onward and upward.