Getting Better At Stuff, Thoughts on Self Criticism

I've been thinking a lot about how to be better, as a person, a friend, a cast member and especially an artist. I think I deserve a pat on the back for everything I've accomplished this year. Did you notice the weight I've lost? Or the work I've put into this blog? Did you know I've been trying to better myself as a musician and find more focus for composing? Or that I've slowly started doing my own podcast? Probably you've read about all the acting I've been doing. Since Rosencratz and Guildenstern ended, I accomplished one of my goals which had been to book some more film work and I've had several roles of varying smallness in a music video, a promotional video for a friend's company, a student film and an independent feature, all of which was from being on the lookout on Craigslist and New England Film. I've been making it out to a ton of theatre. And I helped my improv troupe find our way to our first paying gigs since I've been in it with my contacts I made doing theatre, and generally have been trying to improve as an improvisor and troupe member.

So let me stop and do that pat on the back thing. *Pat pat pat*. OK now there's still more I could and should be doing. Like, I've lost about twenty pounds, alright! One of my big weight loss goals was strictly getting my BMI to a healthy place and now I've done that. How? As I said to a friend when asked that, "I don't know working out a lot and being twenty three". That is to say going to the gym regularly, in addition to the weight I've put on a noticeable but not grandiose amount of muscle, eating less and not as terribly (fewer starbucks pastries and burritos) combined with my increased metabolism did most of the work. But I'd like to lose more weight, like ten or fifteen pounds, hopefully. Since getting around 205 though, my weight has more or less flat lined. Which is partially to be expected, usually in weight loss the first twenty pounds or whatever are largely water weight and drop off pretty easily. After that it becomes more challenging. If I want to lose the rest of that weight, I've got to get serious about my exercise routine, like working out at home on days that I'm not able to make it to the gym while making a point to still get to the gym at least three times a week and really work out when I get there not just for twenty minutes and then call it a day.

And I need to be serious about what I eat. As an actor, sometimes you find yourself surrounded by food, oftentimes with nothing really to do. When I was on the set of that feature film, I was there for maybe an hour or two before they ordered like ten pizzas, more than the cast and crew was able to eat and for the rest of the day there was just a bunch of pizza in addition to the sugary sodas and everything else the people on craft services had laid out. My part of the shoot took less than an hour, but was physically incredibly exhausting and mentally draining (it was a torture scene, maybe I'll blog about it at some point later) and then I was there all day with all this food, so I just hung out and snacked on pizza and drank more regular Coke than I normally would in a week, etc.

Point being to accomplish that goal I need to become focused. To become a better blogger, I need to focus and try to write at least once a week. To be a better podcaster, I need to make sure I come prepared and always be looking for ways to be doing better work. With everything I do, I need to be prepared to do my best work and be looking for the ways I can improve it.

This can be frustrating though, because putting time and focus into improving things is difficult and it's hard to keep sight of the big picture. With this blog, am I creating any tangible, immediate benefit? No, but I'm creating a series of reference points for my future self. I'm improving as a writer. I'm developing a good habit. And I'm engaging with the local community, which is something I know people appreciate. I'm struggling with similar issues with my podcast, but I think in addition to my comedic aspirations I may be able to start finding ways towards a deeper way of contributing to Boston theatre... keep an eye out for that.

And I'll just keep trying to focus on bettering myself, and recognizing everything I accomplish, one by one, it's all about keeping that balance.

Movement Day One

Today was the first session of my movement class with the Commonwealth Apprentices, taught by Yo-el Cassell and I'm already very excited. Immediately upon arrival and the start of the class, I was thrown in to an alien but familiar world of moving through space, trying to be present with this new group of peers as they enact an already understood ritual, reacting to Yo-el's instructions, leading with different body parts and going up or down in pace or level and freezing in place when he shook his morocca, while I just listened and observed as hard as I could. Basically, this group has been together for at least a week or two and is several sessions ahead of me (and the one other newcomer) in this course, so we were essentially playing catch up. I wasn't really able to tune into what she was experiencing, but this wasn't that much of a big deal, and was kind of a fun challenge identifying each excercise and relating it back to my past work. I was focusing as hard as I could on just being loose and present in the space and with the people around me.

The other part of my focus was on my alignment. Possibly the biggest discovery I made in this past year (come to think of it, my very first year out of an academic program, now come to a close) was Alexander Technique. If you've known me for any length of time and are an observant person, you might have realized that I slouch. I've been doing this for as long as I've been aware of my own body, probably in 2nd or 3rd grade when I was first teased for my weight. And in general I was never much of an athlete, or particularly graceful or physically coordinated. But I also remember from a young age loving to dance. From the ages of 5 to 6 (before pesky body awareness issues crept up on me) I went to a hippy dippy montesori school in Berekeley California, where my father was doing his post doc at the time... And it's never something I'd put together previously, but I imagine a lot of the creative outlets I was given access to in that environment probably took part in planting the seeds of the artist I am today. Anyway, I recently discovered Alexander technique and in the process "grew" from 6' to 6'2" by extending my neck and spine, but then recently succumb to old, bad habits. So I've reoriented my focus into a more conscious practice of Alexander both in my work as an actor and my daily life, and I was really focused on it for the initial part of the class, which I think informed the next section.

After the warm up and initial exercises, I had my first really truthful moment of the class. In the final section, Yo-el spoke briefly about an American choreographer who's name ringed a bell at the time whom I've since forgotten, talked a little about points in space in relation to dance (64?) and trying to touch as many of them as possible in the manner of a free improvised dance set to music. To start us off, he did a very elegant demonstration and we passed that energy around the room, each taking a few minutes in the middle of the circle to move how we felt, touching as many points as possible. And for me, it was a very freeing and truthful moment. Yielding myself over to one impulse to move, then letting the momentum of that movement bring me into another, and so forth. Just being free. Not even thinking about the room full of strangers in any meaningful way. Purely exploring the space. It felt natural and beautiful. And I remembered feeling that way before, as a child, and during certain performance but especially during my semester studying improvisation with Tommy Derrah, which had a clearly shared philosophical underpinning in Gratowski. I made a lot of progress working in that class, but when I really had a break through on the very last session, I hit the brick wall of my poor physical shape. Since then I've been working out a lot, so that will be less of a constraint, I think. And I'm incredibly excited to see where this experience takes me in the coming weeks.