You feel unmotivated, underwhelmed, disappointed with yourself, your life – uninspired.
It’s that time of the month again.
The actor’s period.
Yep. It’s the cyclicality to artistry.
I’m there now. A friend of mine was there last week. Someone will be there next week.
Some of us match up.
I’ve been grappling with this weird hunchback that appears every so often, the result of feeling like I’m in the dumps. I am on my actor’s period, where I feel like I am not doing anything with my “career”. I am brooding, moody, and my patience is short.
I was thinking about how I can’t continue this blog.
I don’t have anything really to show for. How can I share with people what I don’t have much “to show for”? I’m uninspiring.
I’m uninspired.
I feel so uninspired because I’m assessing and comparing “it” to others. I can’t see physical proof. No instant gratification. There’s no right or wrong answer. Only feelings. A strong magnetism to tell story, shared by artists of all mediums.
This thing artists do, is almost tangible. It’s translated physically, but is birthed and sourced from within. It’s not something that can be truly measured. Measuring it almost takes away from its invaluability – changes it, makes it less beautiful, cheaper. When is it incredible?
When you feel it.
Passion is invoked.
I know I feel it. Deep within me. It burns. It’s cold. It’s a paradox that works and kills, and creates the most wonderful and beautiful every-things. Yeah. Right? Is it truly explicable?
And I think that is when you know, that no matter what, this wild thing that drives you crazy – that excites you, turns you on, frightens you, challenges you, pushes you, angers you, and makes you extremely happy – is totally worth it. Because it feels right in every single way possible. In every single, heightened sense.
And then I realize that’s all that matters when it comes to inspiration. It’s inspiration in the fact that I have something to work towards. To look forward to. To wake up to. And to fall asleep and dream about.
It’s a lucid dream. A waking reality.
And it’s because it’s there in every aspect and moment of your and my life. It’s a beautiful burden.
To feel so immensely.
I want to absorb the world, people around me, strangers, their lives, their fears, their secrets, their spines.
And I want to share what I feel with the world. Tell stories.
To inspire.
So the actor’s period is not so bad; it’s a test. A reminder. Of how bad you want your future. Because it hurts. It bothers you. And you know that you need to push through it, and kick its ass one more time.
So I know that it’s okay I’m at a job interview instead of at an audition.
It’s okay that I’m signing a contract for some position at a job that isn’t for me to be working six weeks with Christopher Nolan on some fantastical ride where reality meets reality.
Yet.
Yeah.
It’s okay that you have to put on your game face, and serve that table full of people who left their manners at home along with their generosity.
Because that’s a million stories right there to share.
Because we’re working towards something that likes to play hard to get.
It wants the lifers. It wants messy. Not perfection.
Which is what my biggest lesson is. I am the biggest perfectionist. I am really hard on myself.
But often it’s the mess that is beautiful.
Because real life is messy. You and I are messy.
And I’m starting to let that be okay.
However, I’m gonna make sure its the most hard-worked-for-messy.
Because I do believe that your work will show for itself. In messiness; it’s when we give ourselves to the character, to the story, to art. Not the other way around.
When you try to control it, or don’t put in your work, you get the character, the story, the art, to give itself to you.
But we are vehicles for life.
And therefore, we have to allow ourselves to become enveloped within the art. When you give yourself to the character, to the story – the right questions come, and the right answers come.
And I realized they’re not perfect. They’re real.
And that is a beautiful mess.
And that is inspiring.
So when you hit your actor’s period – your artist’s period – don’t worry. It’ll pass, you’ll learn something new, and you’ll walk out of it with your head held higher, chuckling to yourself about your juxtaposing state when you walked into it.
Swim through it.
Go to others who share an understanding of the pain of art, of the soul… and the beauty of it. The other side.
Your friends. Those you look up to, aspire to be. Authors. A passage by Rumi popped up serendipitously on my screen this evening.
FEAR
Everyone can see how they have polished the mirror of the self, which is done with the longings we’re given.
Not everyone wants to be king!
There are different roles and many choices within each.
Troubles come. One person packs up and leaves. Another stays and deepens in a love for being human.
In battle, one runs fearing for his life. Another, just as scared, turns and fights more fiercely.
– Rumi
Ask your future self to help you get up out of the pothole. To fight, and to stay passionate. The future leader within yourself. C’mon, I know you can do it. You know exactly what to say to those who are on their actor’s period. So be there for yourself.
The actor’s period is an opportunity to strengthen yourself. To strengthen your craft.
Well I better get going.
I got things to be strengthening.
Cheers.
Merry Christmas, from a regular scrooge, I’m a fucking Rudolph during Christmas time.
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