It's All the Rage pt. 4 - Sans Propos (Here & Now).

Something happened in Andrea's class this two Wednesdays past.  We were working on a simple diagnostic of our breathing and how we use the breath to communicate.  She was touching my solar plexus and looking me straight in the eye as she explained to me that I either didn't give enough breath to carry my intention to my intended target, or that I was straining to send the message; that there was no ease to my speaking.  In that moment, certain circumstances of my life, which I have recently been dealing with all came to a fine point.  I had a sort of epiphanic experience where many things suddenly became clear to me.  

I realized that there were some rather old wounds that I had thought long healed that had perhaps not mended properly; I had felt my problems had been allayed, but like a broken bone that doesn't stitch properly, I had come face-to-face with the realization that I was, intact, perhaps still not well.  As she continued on to work on my classmates, I watch, and wept with the ideas that were now swirling in my head.  I tried to set it all down to be digested here, but ended up with far too much to publish in one go.

I mentioned in my last post a degree of emotional apathy that I had discovered after much of the anger had abated.  I was in Sacramento without much desire to do much of anything with myself.  Successive failures had left me fairly devoid of the passion for reaching for anything.  I was without a focus of direction.

It should be stated openly and honestly that my ability to grasp the French language is the equal of a purblind man attempting to pluck granules of dust from the ether in a strong breeze... with tweezers.

I had come to terms with the fact that I needed to live under my parents roof again.  I was horrendously in debt without a solid job or any hopes of any great advancement in the future.  I reconnected with some old friends in my home town, while trying to figure out where to go from there.  I couldn't, however, shake this feeling that I was still a non-entity; that who I was and what I had to say and think and feel was of little import.


I had begun to write again.  I found through writing, an artistic outlet to get out a lot of things that I felt that I couldn't express in my life.  I also made the decision to go to move to NYC and give myself a fresh atmosphere to hope to encourage myself to continue to grow.  This may sound cocky, but I knew that I was going to go to Columbia.  I was driven to do it.  I knew that if I didn't get in this year that I was going to keep trying until I did.  Fortunately it was a short wait, and I honestly could't be happier to be a part of this class, at this point in time.  Something that I probably don't share with them enough, but the whole point of this series of posts was to express my inner sense of my own failure to communicate.


So I've found my direction; I am on a plotted course. I know where I want to be, even though the way to get there is often clouded.  I feel like I've rediscovered myself; burned away (almost) all of the things that don't work and have a fairly good sense of mine own strengths and weaknesses.


I know that I've found my words as well, but I am still faced with this new knowledge that my collection of... fears have found a physical expression and that, previously unbeknownst to myself, my body is sounding the bells of those fears for everyone to see, whether they recognize them consciously or not.


I need to love myself better.  This may cause some people to snicker, especially if they have seen my cocksure affectation that I put on.  Entering a room I can sometimes be counted on to ask, "All right!  Who wants to make out?" I have no problem with levity.  I express myself rather competently when I write, but when speaking and when things get important I do recognize two feelings:  


1) No one is listening.


2) No one cares and it's all rather futile.


These things can stir up that fury and that feeling of, fuck it; fuck you; fuck everything; and especially fuck you... all because it immediately takes me back to that place of feeling like a non-entity.  How's that for tension?


I had a few more sections of this that I've decided to cut.  Things that I feel help illuminate where I've picked up some of these habits, but they can always be made public in the future! I know what they are.  I've had my reflection and there's no need to return to it nightly for the sake of what might be an interesting post.  If anything, I've got a cache of wonderful titles for you in my back pocket.  It's time to return to the present.  


I write these things down, and I believe I disclaimed in part one that things might get a little emo...  I know I've had some conversations with a few people who have told me that they read the blog and joke about how they now know more about be than they probably ought.  I write these things down and give them to you as an admission of self.  I have some anger in me.  I own it.  I don't think it's all bad.  in the right place it can be incredibly healthy, but I need to give it up that which isn't.  To let go and attempt to... recenter myself; learn to trust more openly; be brave.  Not just for my "art", but for myself.


Thank you for coming on this little journey with me.


"Prayer is not asking. It is a longing of the soul. It is daily admission of one's weakness. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than words without a heart."
-Mohandas Gandhi


I relinquish.  I want to be with you... here... now.


-Nix

It's All the Rage pt. 3 - Welcome to the Corps.

Something happened in Andrea's class this past Wednesday.  We were working on a simple diagnostic of our breathing and how we use the breath to communicate.  She was touching my solar plexus and looking me straight in the eye as she explained to me that I either didn't give enough breath to carry my intention to my intended target, or that I was straining to send the message; that there was no ease to my speaking.  In that moment, certain circumstances of my life, which I have recently been dealing with all came to a fine point.  I had a sort of epiphanic experience where many things suddenly became clear to me.  

I realized that there were some rather old wounds that I had thought long healed that had perhaps not mended properly; I had felt my problems had been allayed, but like a broken bone that doesn't stitch properly, I had come face-to-face with the realization that I was, intact, perhaps still not well.  As she continued on to work on my classmates, I watch, and wept with the ideas that were now swirling in my head.  I tried to set it all down to be digested here, but ended up with far too much to publish in one go. 

After the loss of my best friend, after the denial was over with; after the walls, pre-existing, had been fortified, I had armed them with some deadly scorpions.

Batman...  Superman.

This is typically the end of the superhero conversation when it comes to DC's stable of icons.  I remember back in undergrad, I would joke around with my classmates and future roommates in Hollywood, Joe Gillette and Peter Weidman about it.  Joe was a Batman guy; Pete preferred Supes.

Me?

I was always a Green Lantern guy.

I still think that there's something about a guy that can overcome anything through sheer force of will.  I was, initially, incredibly excited and, eventually, head-shakingly disappointed in this last Summer's big-screen treatment.  What I'm getting at, is if you're now judging my value as a human being based on Ryan Reynolds in a neon green mo-cap suit... well, I guess that's you're right, but go read the comic and tell me it's not pretty legit.

So you've got this guy who's powered by his own drive to get shit done.  Then back in 2007, Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver went nuts and started creating lanterns of all sorts of colors...

I'm coming to a point here, I promise.

... begining with the introduction of the Red Lantern Corps. which is powered by rage, and not just any kind of rage, but blind, I-can't-see-straight rage.

A part of this whole make-believe lore is that once you're a member, you're sort of a member for life; your heart stops pumping blood instead pumps corrosive acid rage that is often vomited out of the mouth.  Pretty intense.  The rage keeps these guys going.

I discovered in myself that, after the denial of all that I had felt that I had lost was over, that I had become a very angry person; short-tempered; very quick to anger.  It was all a defense mechanism.  I was caustic in my dealings with people.  I was in a place where I felt like nobody cared about anything outside of themselves; everyone was merely working for their own selfish advantage and that there was no need to play nice with people.  I felt like I had spent so much time giving myself to people and things that didn't work out that it was time to work on myself, and fuck anybody that got in the way of that.

My words were my corrosive acid vomit.  Anybody that I felt came close to stepping on my feelings got an earful of belligerent word-hate from me.  It didn't inspire too many people to want to hang out with me very much.  I didn't give a shit because I felt they weren't worth the time.

It can happen to the best of us...

What was especially confusing, I'm sure, for people was that it all came with a suddenness that probably made me look quite mad; crazed.  It all stemmed from this overwhelming sense that I was superbly unimportant to anyone.  That I was a non-entity, which was the cause of my initial slide into my depression in college.  I was in a trench that I couldn't dig my way out of.  The only answer seemed to be to shout in despair, hoping that someone would see me.  I was an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

By the by, super-angry outbursts, it turns out, don't really get you anywhere.  In fact, I discovered, when you lose your temper, usually it ends up doing nothing but reinforcing your argumentative opponents point that they are trying to make.

I got a handle on myself after time, but would still occasionally find myself from time to time being enraged over the injustice of how I felt like I was treated by people (or how others were treated by people).   I had a hard time keeping my mouth shut.  I grew increasingly distrusting of people and slid into a sort of emotional apathy.  I felt that feelings weren't important, my own or other people's.  Facts were facts, work was work, and emotions were there to muddle things up.  Life, in retrospect, was pretty joyless.  I eventually, for the most part, came out of that as well.  I got really productive, put myself back in to my artistic pursuits, applied for a month long master-class, met some wonderful new people, and started the process of using the work to get over everything.

I joke around from time to time, if I'm having a rough day: the classic codified status update on Facebook: Red Lantern (to which people who know... Jeff Martin... will respond "RAGERAGERAGERAGERAGE")

I was still in a space where I was pretty withdrawn from people, but the work became the only thing that was important.  I started finding my satisfaction in being trying to be really good at what I could do (acting; writing; teaching; tending bar; helping other people).  Work became my drive.  It kept me going.

Despite my the work that I was engaged in, even after the anger had abated, I felt as if, other than my actions, I had nothing else that I could contribute...

By the way, and this is just for the record, I've consulted my inner-child and he's still pretty staunch Kyle Rayner fan.  Jordan destroyed the universe, and that makes him a chump, retcon or no.

And regarding the Batman vs. Superman argument, it should be pretty obvious where my loyalties lie, especially when this kind of ridiculous shit happens.  #overpowered

"Whoever has provoked man to rage against him has gained a party in his favor, too."

- Friedrich Nietzsche 

Do Not Go Gentle

-R

It's All the Rage pt. 2 - These Ramparts.

Something happened in Andrea's class this past Wednesday.  We were working on a simple diagnostic of our breathing and how we use the breath to communicate.  She was touching my solar plexus and looking me straight in the eye as she explained to me that I either didn't give enough breath to carry my intention to my intended target, or that I was straining to send the message; that there was no ease to my speaking.  In that moment, certain circumstances of my life, which I have recently been dealing with all came to a fine point.  I had a sort of epiphanic experience where many things suddenly became clear to me.  

I realized that there were some rather old wounds that I had thought long healed that had perhaps not mended properly; I had felt my problems had been allayed, but like a broken bone that doesn't stitch properly, I had come face-to-face with the realization that I was, intact, perhaps still not well.  As she continued on to work on my classmates, I watch, and wept with the ideas that were now swirling in my head.  I tried to set it all down to be digested here, but ended up with far too much to publish in one go.   

When I was at CSUF, I remember Zack Kraus telling me that a graduate acting program was a place to learn as much about yourself as you would about acting.  Kraus was right.  You can add it to the list of things at which he excels (which includes a discerning, educated palate for whiskey and cheese).


I've had a lot of trouble writing this down.  I find myself going back and editing things for content, which is something that I'm not used to doing.  I feel fairly adept at setting down my thought single sitting, but recording my feelings... labeling them as mine where people will read them is, apparently, a different story.


I finally got a chance to have my trialogue performed (which I believe I may have mentioned in the Honeybadger post, but will explain in a companion post) in Kristin's class on Friday.  The trialogue turned out to be revealing.  Even though I was repaired for it after witnessing other people's pieces performed, I still felt it hard to speak about myself and what my piece revealed about me to my classmates.  I felt especially reluctant to share with people how I felt about my dragon.  How in touch I felt with the sensations that I feel from what I am about to share here.

My family was broken pretty early in my life.  My father made the choice to not want to be a part of the family that he helped create and left after my mother gave up on trying to change him.  She went to work to support me and I didn't get to spend much time with her because she spent much of her time trying to support me on her own.  When I was growing up, in my teenage years, I did have some contact with my father after not seeing him for a while.  I would spend Summers out in Arizona with him and his side of the family.  It was explained to me, by him one Summer, that I was an unplanned pregnancy and that that situation was the beginning of the end for their marriage.  I didn't take that well.  It took some time to figure out that despite being the catalyst for many arguments, that it wasn't really MY fault that that rift had grown between them.  I still have some issues there.


Fast-forward.


If you've been keeping up to date on this blog, you may be familiar with the fact that I have some intimacy issues.  Much of that... wait a second, disclaimer:


I apologize if any of this gets a bit emo, but I figure that this is where I figure much of this comes from, and in the interest of telling this story and getting to part three, I have to go through here.  This is the part that's hard to post.


Much of that has to do with rejection.  There's some rejection that I feel from my father on a certain level.  I don't ruminate on it often, but it's been so long a part of me that it feels like it's a part of my social DNA.  I was also in a relationship with a wonderful person for six and a half years.  It didn't end well.  That, in fact, might be a severe understatement.


I was not doing well for a while.  Our relationship had been great, but it balanced on a precarious fulcrum.  I was dealing with some depression in my senior year at CSUF.  I was seeing a counselor to talk to about a lot of things, and my relationship was suffering for what would be later referred to as my weakness in not being able to carry the ball.  After graduation, I moved to Hollywood with two of my classmates to start my career in "the industry"  She had taken a semester off, which had put her a year behind, so she remained in Fullerton (about an hour away) to finish school.  We broke up for about two months after she told me how unhappy she was. I begged her to reconsider and she took me back for a few more months.  I completely gave myself up in trying to make her happy, but ultimately, it wasn't meant to be.  Retrospect.  I had gone back to Sacramento to fulfill a promise that I had made to a very dear friend and mentor of mine.  I was working a job there; she realized she like life much better without me in it and made the cut.  We went through periods of talking and not talking.  She graduated and went on tour.  She made sure to stay in contact with me after we broke up, after all we had been each other's best friend for six years, it was hard for both of us to let go of that.


After my obligation in Sacramento was complete, I had trouble finding a job in the post-2008 recession.  I was in this confused limbo, trying to figure out where my life was going to go and failure after failure after failure led me in to a pretty intense depression.  I was suicidal.  I was terrified of that and what that meant.  Things didn't work out according to plan, and for me, who was always in control; always had a plan; always had a direction.  That was a lot to cope with.


I mentioned that we went through spells of speaking and not speaking.  She had, that Christmas, lost her grandparents and called me to share the sad news.  She needed comfort and turned to me.  It gave me some purpose for a while, having someone to look after.  It got my mind off of me, but eventually the subject of became up and how I was doing.  Some things are better left unsaid.  I knew where I was headed, and since she was there during the beginning of my unhappy decent, I felt like I could turn to her for a bit of solace.  She told me she didn't care if I lived or died; I wasn't her responsibility.


The rest of the story... I don't care to share here.

The point of all of this is that these are two of the larger examples of the foundations of the walls that I have built around myself.  The cornerstones are fear of exposing my feelings to the people that I care about and the possibility of repudiation.  My greatest fear is being rejected; of being left behind.  I've recently controlled it by not becoming involved more than that which feels safe.


I'm fully aware that I'm not the only person who has ever had these fears, but I'd be lying to you if the thought of going back to that place of vulnerability, that place of being in someone's hands, didn't frighten me.


"Have you ever been in love?  Horrible, isn't it?  It makes you so vulnerable.  It opens up your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up.  You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different than any other stupid person, wanders in to your stupid life... You give them a piece of you.  They didn't ask for it.  They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore.  Love takes hostages.  It get;s inside of you.  IT eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so a simple phrase like, "Maybe we should just be friends.", turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart.  It hurts.  Not just in the imagination.  Not just in the mind.  It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain.  I hate love."

- Neil Gaiman, from The Sandman

I once freaked out because someone tried to pour my catsup.

-R

It's All the Rage pt. 1 - Shamanism.

Something happened in Andrea's class this past Wednesday.  We were working on a simple diagnostic of our breathing and how we use the breath to communicate.  She was touching my solar plexus and looking me straight in the eye as she explained to me that I either didn't give enough breath to carry my intention to my intended target, or that I was straining to send the message; that there was no ease to my speaking.  In that moment, certain circumstances of my life, which I have recently been dealing with all came to a fine point.  I had a sort of epiphanic experience where many things suddenly became clear to me.  


I realized that there were some rather old wounds that I had thought long healed that had perhaps not mended properly; I had felt my problems had been allayed, but like a broken bone that doesn't stitch properly, I had come face-to-face with the realization that I was, intact, perhaps still not well.  As she continued on to work on my classmates, I watch, and wept with the ideas that were now swirling in my head.  I tried to set it all down to be digested here, but ended up with far too much to publish in one go.  This is the beginning:


Many, many years ago, perhaps about a decade ago I was fortunate enough to come into contact with something that really changed my life.


I was free-floating outside of high school, working a job and more than a little upset at the then-recently changed standards for acceptance into university.  I had only applied to two colleges my senior year at Casa Roble:  UC Davis and UC San Diego.  At the time I was finishing high school I was interested in pursuing psychology as a major and, confident in myself, only thought to apply to the two schools.  I got into neither and thus started my journey through the wonderful adventure that was community college.  Everything happens for a reason; I was instructed in both the arts of disappointment and humility.  I was also introduced to ideas of traditional religion, which would be something that would forever alter my outlook on faith.  In my studies, at the time, I found that many traditional peoples practiced religions that had striking similarities in their make-up.  Almost all of these belief systems had a shaman or a kahuna or a medicine-man or a witch-doctor, a person who could channel spiritual energies for the purpose of healing the bodies, minds and souls of the people under his or her care.


During this time, I was fortunate to discover some people who had dabbled in what might be called the mystic arts.  They can be particularly hard to find because, as it has been explained to me, one can rarely find a person with shamanistic ability by merely asking around.  True Shamans will never proclaim their prowess to people-at-large because it is seen by the spirits as a form of pride and an insult to the greater powers beyond.  Tricky stuff. I was learned in the beginning practices of taking spirit journeys and the ability to begin to communicate with animal spirits and achieving a more fluid transfer into an astral state.  

"Sanctified by their initiatory experiences and furnished with their spirit guardians, the shaman alone among human beings is able to consciously travel into the spiritual worlds as cosmic explorers."

-Dr. Hank Wesselman

I was intrigued at the time by the relation, as it seemed to me, to modern day psychology; holistic healing and practices like hypnotism.  At the time there was a continuing growth in the idea of the mind's ability to help heal the body, positive thinking; breathing; spatial awareness; biorhythmic connection... that sort of thing.  And as I became involved in the theater again I remember learning how a tribe's medicine-(wo)man was also a keeper of oral lore and would often be turned to for stories.  I started thinking about the role of the story-teller; the actor as a spiritual healer.  It was then that I first started to form my personal opinions of the importance of theater in our society.  The stories that can be told have the power to inspire thoughts; discussions; revolutions but also have the power to heal the souls of the people that witness them.  I feel certain that you, reader, have had at least a few of these experiences watching a television show or a film or a play... perhaps a piece of music that communicates something that eases the soul of trouble.  The theater has the potential to transform into the hospice of the weathered soul.  This possibility, this aspiration is what keeps me coming back to work in this medium.  I didn't take the path of the medical student; I'll never be a doctor of medicine.  My ability to treat the wounds of the body will always be rather limited, but if I could help people to find a way to nurse the wounds that we cannot see, I could consider my life worthily lived.

A kahuna once shared with me a story that I, in turn, shared with my acting class in my final year at CSUF and I now share with you:


The kahunas of Hawaii teach that a soul is like a bowl, a wide-mothed vessel, that contains the light of the human spirit.  Every event in a person's life has the ability to shape them and also can leave a stone deposited in the bowl.  If left unchecked, these events can leave so many stones in the bowl that the light has trouble being seen, for the bowl will brim with stones leaving the light covered.  This is why it is important to frequently cleanse the soul.  One must strive to pluck the stones from the bowl so that the light is not covered or worse, extinguished (which is soul death).


Shamans, being practitioners of soul-care, are supposed to be finely attuned to themselves as well; for how can someone weighted down with stones ever hope to help an other person to liberate themselves from their burdens?  Much like shamans, I suspect that in order for an actor to be able to channel what is necessary to tell stories that could possibly heal the hearts of the audience, (s)he too must, at the very least, be aware of his or her own struggles in order to be that pure medium.


I realized that, in me, some of the old hurts had left their mark on me physically and were impeding me from communicating effectively.  A spate of awareness took me by surprise and I realized my bowl may yet be full of stones I thought long discarded, and the light that I saw might be a diminished light that my own eyes had simply grown accustomed to.  Wednesday began the examination of the landscape of my own heart and mind. 


"Let us be silent, that we may hear the whispers of the gods."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson

What follows is still to come.

-R