THE PERPETUAL VISITOR: Sustainable Creative Living.
  • Blog
  • About Me
  • Things I Teach
  • Things I Make
    • The Book: The Perpetual Visitor
    • Wild Unfolding: and other poems
    • New Bird
    • The Podcast
    • Theatre
    • Film
    • Poetry
  • Contact
  • Blog
  • About Me
  • Things I Teach
  • Things I Make
    • The Book: The Perpetual Visitor
    • Wild Unfolding: and other poems
    • New Bird
    • The Podcast
    • Theatre
    • Film
    • Poetry
  • Contact

Creative Holiday

11/20/2014

2 Comments

 
Picture
Picture
It's that time of year again, the beautiful autumn has made her graceful exit, and Thanksgiving is next week. Before we know it, it will be the New Year. I've spent the last month or so after the show closed cooking homemade dinners, catching up with dear friends near and far, and spending a lot of quality time with my Netflix queue. It's been glorious. Still I am wondering if I want to keep taking time off from creative projects this winter season or dive into something new.

Boston winters aren't exactly conducive to going to evening auditions or taking an acting class. On the other hand, the shorter, darker days lend themselves well to working on a writing project or two from the comfort of my own apartment, in the comfort of my sweatpants. We as creatives make our own schedules and because we are in charge of where we put our energy,  it falls on us to decide if we are going to shift with the seasons and go into a lower gear for the winter months or gather our energy and begin a new endeavor.

It's always tempting when I get time off from my day job to put my creative nose to the grindstone and go into overdrive, but I will admit that if I spend all my free time during the holidays working on a project, I tend to return after the holidays feeling like I didn't get a break at all. This year, I'm thinking about how I want to set boundaries for a creative holiday.
Should I take the month of December off completely? Do I designate certain evenings and weekend days to work on creative stuff and leave the others unscheduled? I am still working out my plan, but I do know that I plan to slow down. I would love to keep working on my writing, but will not be going to any new auditions or starting anything else at the moment. Scheduling "unscheduled time" into my day is a challenge for me, but one that I am committed to this season. I want to be able to make some holiday cards, bake some treats, and watch some of my favorite seasonal movies like Once, which oddly enough has nothing to do with the holidays, but somehow evokes a winter-y sentiment for me.

So tell me, what are your strategies for plotting your creative calendar this season? Are you going full steam ahead with a new idea or deciding to take a physical and mental sabbatical?

I'd love to hear any advice you might have about staying inspired but sane!
2 Comments

Life Lesson #7: Trust

11/5/2014

2 Comments

 
Life Lesson #7: Trust

If you missed any previous posts in this series, you can find Life Lesson #1: Show Up With What You Have and Use It Well HERE, Life Lesson #2: Everyone Matters HERE, Life Lesson #3: Be Playful and Laugh at Yourself HERE,  Life Lesson #4: Give Yourself What You Need to Do Your Best HERE, Life Lesson #5: Get Comfortable With Fear HERE, and
Life Lesson #6: Be Here Now HERE.
Picture
I can remember being backstage before a performance, standing in a circle as a cast. Everyone had jitters, but one cast member voiced their nerves aloud. "I'm so nervous. What if I can't do this?"

Without missing a beat, another cast member looked at her and smiled. "You can do this. And don't forget, whatever happens out there, we got your back." I smiled in the dim light. I do theatre for so many reasons, but one of the big ones is that it has shown me time and again, that we have so many reasons to trust.

Through the theatre, I've worked with so many incredibly generous human beings who renew my faith in people. I've taught many students who started a class or play unsure of themselves and by the end,  had developed a stronger confidence in themselves and  learned to trust new friends. I've worked on enough plays myself where I feared not being able to memorize the lines, make emotional connections,  or allow myself to be vulnerable. Through the encouragement of a director and my fellow cast members, I've dug deep down to do what I thought I couldn't. Through theatre, I've learned to be my own friend and never give up on myself. 

There's a million ways I continually learn trust through the theatre, here's just my top ten:


1.  Trust: that in a digital age, a stage play can still sell out performances
2. Trust: that complete strangers can approach you post performance and tell you how special the play was for them
3. Trust: that there are countless strangers in the world that are just an audition away from becoming kindred spirits
4. Trust: that there are ups and down to every process, but in the end, things come out just fine
5. Trust: that most of your fears about things going wrong are usually just your imagination running away with you
6. Trust: that telling a story cannot only delight an audience, but change the way they think about the world
7. Trust: that human beings are capable of so much more beauty and compassion than we give them credit for
8. Trust: that the world, despite appearances, can be a warm and welcoming place
9. Trust: that new ideas are always around the bend and that we can always change and grow if we want to
10. Trust: that no matter what happens, the show must/can/will go on---and in the end, it's spectacular.

A play is such a wonderful microcosm for the way the world can be: collaborative, full of inspiration, a place to gather as a community and dream about the kind of world we want to live in. All the lessons we learn inside the walls of a theatre then give us the tools we need to work on this vision of the world.
Picture
Please accept my heartfelt gratitude for tuning into this little series and the rest of my blog experiment.  Wishing you a wonderful week! As always feel free to leave a comment or drop me a line!
2 Comments

All the World's a Stage: Life Lesson #6

11/2/2014

3 Comments

 
Life Lesson #6: Be Here Now

If you missed any previous posts in this series, you can find Life Lesson #1: Show Up With What You Have and Use It Well HERE, Life Lesson #2: Everyone Matters HERE, Life Lesson #3: Be Playful and Laugh at Yourself HERE,  Life Lesson #4: Give Yourself What You Need to Do Your Best HERE, and Life Lesson #5: Get Comfortable With Fear HERE.
Picture
When I'm onstage, it's one of the only times in my day where I'm completely in the moment. If I think about my grocery list, what I need to get done at work the following morning, or even what my lines in the next scene are, I will lose my place and come tumbling out of that wonderful space where everything just is. I have to continually focus on what I am saying in this moment, what my scene partners are saying at this moment, and if I do that, usually the rest will take care of itself just fine. In my opinion, if you are worried about a performance, that's the single most important thing that you can focus on: just being here now, in this room with these people, really listening to what they are saying and really responding back to them. It sounds simple and feels so impossible at the same time. But you have control over it and the more you practice, the better you get.

There are so many benefits from being present. I can recall single moments onstage with more clarity than I can remember some years of my life. I need to learn to apply being present to my daily life so that I can soak in all the people and things around me. I have been building up a meditation practice, and that helps. I've got a long way to go, but the tiny slivers of peace and presence I've experienced by trying to just "be here now" have convinced me it's a path I want to keep journeying on.

I wish you a Sunday in which you relish each moment, whatever you are doing. Close this blog post, put down your phone, and just be in the space where you are, with whomever is there, even if it's just you. Really watch your child as she or he draws a picture, see your cat sleeping in the patch of sunlight on the floor, and taste the food you are eating. If you're binging on Netflix, relish each moment of that too. Don't feel guilty while you do it, or try to pay bills online, or fold laundry at the same time. Just be absorbed by whatever it is that you are doing.  If you need help with getting started, ask yourself what is it that you do that completely draws you in, an activity where you seem to lose track of time and of self-consciousness? Try to do something like that as often as you can, and let the focus and presence you have while doing a beloved activity bleed into other activites that you don't love. 

Each moment in our life is singular and we can't relive any of them again. But if we learn to be more present, we will be able to let these experiences really permeate our scattered, over-scheduled selves, and their vividness will not fade. In that way, we can keep them forever because they will become part of our selves.  

Be here now. 

A little Sunday listening--George Harrison's "Be Here Now".
Wrapping up the blog series tomorrow with the final post Life Lesson #7: Trust. Happy Sunday!
3 Comments

All the World's a Stage: Life Lesson #5

11/1/2014

4 Comments

 
Life Lesson #5: Get Comfortable With Fear

I
f you missed any previous posts in this series, you can find Life Lesson #1: Show Up With What You Have and Use It Well HERE, Life Lesson #2: Everyone Matters HERE, Life Lesson #3: Be Playful and Laugh at Yourself HERE, and Life Lesson #4: Give Yourself What You Need to Do Your Best HERE. 
Picture
No matter how many times I've acted in a play, I still experience intense fear before every performance. Anyone who assumes actors don't feel fear is dead wrong. My fear is heart-pounding, cold sweat, light-headed, tingling fear that hijacks my whole body. I silently stand in the dark, paralyzed with my fears of forgetting lines, messing up blocking, or shaking too badly to be able to continue with the play.  Being onstage is essentially like being emotionally naked in front of a large group of people. You are vulnerable and there is nowhere to hide. 

This play was no exception, I felt all these things each night before I went on. But I did have a moment on opening night when I was able to recognize how familiar this fear was. I'd felt it at dozens of performances in the past and suddenly realized that I would feel it at dozen of performances in the future. It was like an old, if unwanted, friend. I'd been reading Pema Chodron's book When Things Fall Apart, which explores a Buddhist perspective on accepting and dealing with the coming and going of hard times, anxiety, fear, and sorrow. Chodron tells us that in life, it's not a matter of if things will fall apart or become difficult, but when. Fear is a natural human emotion that has been felt since the beginning of civilization, and isn't going away. She suggests that the solution is not to banish fear, but to get familiar with it. One phrase she suggests is "Welcome, fear."

Remembering this (and still shaking), I feebly whispered "Welcome, fear." I waited and wished for magic. It didn't make my stomach knot go away or heart pound any less, but it was a tiny bit comforting somehow. I have to get comfortable with fear, it's going to show up at every performance. It's not about making fear disappear (in fact when I try to do this, it just gets worse).  It's about acknowledging the fear, looking it right in the face, and then going onstage anyway. Once I'm out there, the fear doesn't go away, but it's not the loudest voice in my head anymore. 

Choose Your Battles
We have a choice in these moments of fear: to go onward even if we are afraid, or to choose not to do whatever it was we were planning to do. There's no right or wrong answer, and every day we make decisions that represent moving forward with fear, or turning back because of fear. Maybe the point is not to do every task you set out to do, but to just notice when you are willing to march onward and when you're not able to.  I've noticed for myself, if I really love doing something, I'll be willing to do it even if I am afraid, whereas if it's something I'm not as passionate about, I'm not willing to do it. 

I am willing to perform even though it scares the daylights out of me every time, because for me, it's the most powerful way I've experienced of expressing myself and telling a story. I am not willing to go hand-gliding (yet) because the fear I feel is stronger than the desire I have to try it. I'm open for that to change, but so far, I haven't been able to go forward with it. I think that's ok, it's a process.


Picture
My dream of hand-gliding is not yet a reality--my fear still outweighs my curiosity.
When you do do something despite feeling afraid, there is such a delicious thrill that comes with it. To dare to move onward even with fear is to be brave and opens up doors that were previously closed. As Lucy Maud Montgomery (the author of the beloved Anne of Green Gables series) said, 
"It was not an easy ascent, but even in the struggle at its hardest, there was a delight and a zest known only to those who aspire to the heights."
Some of the best things I've ever experienced started off with paralyzing fear. As a kid, I remember wanting so badly to go on the roller coaster at the amusement park one summer and yet not seeing how I would ever be able to even get in line because I was so anxious. My Uncle Bill smiled down at me and said "It is a little scary. But everything fun usually is. Come on!" 

He was right. I rode the roller coaster half a dozen times with him that day, hanging on to the safety bar for dear life, but screaming out of fright and happiness at the same time. 

How do you talk to your fear? What is fear holding you back from right now?


Come back tomorrow for Life Lesson #6: Be Here Now.
4 Comments

    Author

    My name is Melissa and I'm an actor, playwright, author, filmmaker, and teaching artist who wants to help you discover, cultivate, and care for your creativity. 
     
    What does being creative mean to you?

    How do you play every day?

    This is a space for taking a break, a breath,  and finding ways to flex our imagination and find the joy where we can. 

    ​No one is going to present us with a ready made creative life--we have  to step up and gift it to ourselves. I'm so glad you're here.

    Categories

    All
    Artist Dates
    Creative Recharge
    Creative Risks
    Motivation Monday
    Persistence
    Play
    Success
    Theatre
    Tiny Tips For Creativity
    Whole Artist
    Writing

    Archives

    August 2023
    July 2023
    December 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    August 2022
    March 2022
    January 2022
    November 2021
    August 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    August 2020
    July 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013

    Want to get blog posts delivered right to your inbox? Sign up to receive The Perpetual Visitor below and never miss creative conversation!

    Enter your email address:

    Delivered by FeedBurner

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.