Never Enough

So, I was just watching a really cool interview with Neil Patrick Harris and he was talking about all the rejection involved with acting. He basically described the Los Angeles lifestyle as a culture of rejection. If you get the callback, you don't get the job. If you get the job, they end up recasting it. If you get the pilot, it doesn't take. If you have a series, you don't get the Emmy. If you are nominated for an Emmy, you don't get invited to Madonna's after-party. The list of rejection goes on and on.
     I thought this was an awesome description of acting (and a reality check that many actors I know need to have). I realized that this kind of rejection is really just a part of any life, especially if you are pursuing extraordinary things. When you are doing great things, there will always be the nay-sayers, the people who don't like you, the detractors.
     In my case, I feel like I do get overwhelmed by the nastiness (hello- just look at the title of my blog, and I suppose it is fairly obvious that I can get stuck in my own head with this stuff). But, it has to happen when you are pursuing excellence. All of the mediocre, lazy, scared, stupid and ignorant people do start to come out of the woodwork when you begin to do something awesome and have some measure of success. They have to- you are upsetting their comfort zone, and your excellence is forcing them to face their own inadequecies and insecurities.
     My life may be the theatre, but I have a real side-love for psychology (so much so that I actually got a Psychology Degree). One thing that I learned in studying psychology is that people will do almost anything to avoid feeling anxious. When you are being awesome, and therefore forcing someone else to face the fact that what they are doing may not be so awesome, you are causing them anxiety and stress. Rather than just feeling the anxiety or changing circumstances to change the cause of the anxiety, it is a lot easier to lash out at the so-called "reason" (or person) causing that anxiety.
     Just because you have detractors does not mean you aren't doing the right thing. In some cases, you may just be onto the most awesome thing you could be doing.

Best Laid Plans

I am fairly inflexible. I like things to go my way (I know most people do). I think that I am more inflexible than most. It makes me a good director- I know what I want and I don't settle for less. It's also extremely stressful since nothing ever goes perfectly in the theatre.
    Tonight was the dress rehearsal for our kid's classes. Very exciting, let me tell you! 50 kids running around changing sets, changing costumes and generally freaking out. In retrospect, it was really hilarious. We had it all mapped out and planned. The kids just didn't seem to get on board with that plan (at least, not as quickly as I would have liked). I was running around like a complete crazy person. I know that part of the problem was that the kids were just feeding off of my crazy energy. Mistake number one.
    Mistake number two was when I forgot that all actors loose their minds a little bit when putting on costumes, but put costumes and microphones on a 1st grader, and it is pandemonium. I forgot too what a big deal doing a show is for a kid. I do shows about 3 weekends a month, and usually am always working on the next one. But for a seven-year-old, this is a Broadway production with lights and costumes and makeup. I hope that I never get too jaded to see a recital through the eyes of a 1st grader.
    So, it didn't run as smoothly as I had hoped. I'll make some new plans, organize things in a different way, calm down for the performance. It will be fine (it usually is). But I think I'm growing. At least it's not the end of the world when things don't go exactly as planned. It's progress.

Urgent World

I pretty much suck today. I have also been sucking for the past six weeks. I get into this trap where I'm so bogged down with a bunch of urgent little crap that I don't do anything that's important.The worst part about living in "urgent world" is that it makes me a first-class bitch. It makes me tired and stressed out, and most of all, I know I am not doing the things that would actually help me to accomplish my goals. That wonderful potion equals a person that you should stay away from.
    But tomorrow will be a better day. I can choose to get out of urgent world. Tomorrow I choose to, and to focus on what's important- being positive, loving my husband, being kind to those around me, and doing some things on my to do list that actually help me accomplish my long-term goals. I think I will start my day free from urgent world by waking up and having some gratitude that I was given a tomorrow to try again.

Stolen Identity

The weirdest thing just happened. The custodians at the high school we use for performances just asked us why they didn't know about the show we had last Saturday. We were really confused because we didn't have a show last Saturday. They said that we had called the police to call a security guard to let us in the building. The security guard left a note saying he had let Jason (my husband) and our theatre company in.
    Fast forward to today. When we get to the auditorium to work on our upcoming production, the lights are moved around, people have obviously been in the tech booth, the audience area is trashed, and there is breakaway glass (the kind of prop glass you use when you're breaking bottles over people's heads onstage) EVERYWHERE. It was really strange. Obviously some kind of theatrical production had taken place over the weekend, only nobody knew who.
    Finally, someone who stopped by on Saturday remembered seeing a couple of church vans out front. Sure enough, when checking this church's website, they have a play performance scheduled for Saturday at this high school. Nobody even questioned this group, because for some reason they assumed they were us and should be in the building (For those who are curious, the church didn't steal or destroy anything- they just left quite a bit of a mess).
    When we were first hearing about this, my heart dropped as I thought of all the safety and security concerns if there were people out there impersonating us. They could destroy our reputation, get us kicked out of our space and cause a lot of problems for us. Now, I don't want this to turn into a preachy-type blog (Oh, come on! You know what I'm talking about- brief story that ties to an object lesson for the day.), but this particular instance got me thinking about the whole stolen identity thing. I think we all steal from each other when we say crap about one another. The gossip thing steals people's true identities and makes them into something they are not. I know- I've had my real identity stolen by gossip a lot.
    Don't feel sorry for me. I am a pretty jerky identity stealer. I can ruin a reputation pretty thoroughly. Let's not steal identities. Most of us do enough stupid things to ruin our reputations on our own without the help of others.

Letting Go

I didn't blog on Friday or Saturday, but I'm not feeling the need to beat myself up over this. In the past, my guilt and feeling of failure would have been enormous, and most likely I would have given up and not come back to the blog (or any other goal) for several months. It's good progress to actually begin to let go of things, move on and pursue my goals.
    I don't claim to be an expert in letting go. I recently had to find a way to deal with (and let go of) something I had absolutely no control over. There is a summer theatrical production in my town that's been around for over 50 years. This program puts on a musical each summer with high school and college students (it is aptly called, "The Summer Musical"). I am an alumni (alumnus?) of this program, and many of my favorite memories of being onstage are with this program.
    The past 20-30 years, the program has been directed by the same team- a team who were also my high school choir and drama teachers, and general mentors and people and learned a lot from in my life. They are local legends and have affected thousands of young lives.
    Here is the kicker- they are retiring after this summer. It would be a dream come true for me to direct this program, a program that affected my life so much. I assumed my husband and I would be some of the next people in line to direct this program; we have the credentials, and we already successfully resuscitated the dying Jr. Summer Musical program. However, apparently, the current directors (people I consider mentors) have chosen their successors, and it is definitely not us.
    It was a real blow when I found out. I was in an indefinable funk for days, and had numerous, circular, vicious, gossipy conversations about the subject with anyone who would listen. Why didn't they choose me? Why was I not good enough? Another person who doesn't like me?! The internal conflict went on and on (and fairly melodramatically, to be honest).
    After some necessary time for processing this information, I began the process of letting go. I will probably never know the exact reasons why I wasn't chosen. I would also like to hang onto my fond memories of my own experience with the Summer Musical. And I finally had a turning point when I realized, whoever takes this program over, one of two things will happen: 1. The new program will be awesome and wildly successful or 2. The new program will fail miserably. Either way, it's ok. If the Summer Musical is awesome, then that just helps all the arts in our community and trains good actors to work with us, as well as giving our kids a quality opportunity. If it fails, then maybe I will have the chance to step in and help out (and then again, maybe I would be overlooked). But why worry about what I can't control?
    On a more important front, why wish for anyone to fail? I hope that the Summer Musical is wildly successful, and the kids involved with it in the future have as much fun as I did. I let it go. And it really helped to know that the Summer Musical road is not a road I am meant to walk down at this time. However, I fully believe that although that path is closed, there is something else amazing, something I can't even picture, around the bend instead.