Be still and know...

One of the things I need to learn this summer is how to be still. Montreat is so stimulating in a way I have not been stimulated in a while. Most people come for one week of conferences. I'm here for 12 weeks - some of them with multiple conferences. I've been feeling myself slipping into my usual fast-paced intense rhythm, not out of necessity or because the environment pulls me towards it, but because that's the rhythm I'm used to operating in. I get excited very easily, I love to think, and my brain starts whirring a mile a minute, and it's wonderful but also exhausting. It also leads to a "I have to figure this out right now!" attitude which adds as much stress as it does excitement. One of my first year acting teachers noted that I tend to identify with my discoveries - that is, I figure out an interest of mine and I say, "Ah! My Life makes sense, I am This!" instead of letting my discoveries absorb into my being as tools I can use that don't need to restrict me. True observation.

I like things to make sense, my brain likes exercise, and I know that how much I love to do this (and honestly how hard I mentally work) is extraordinarily useful to myself and others... but that's only dealing with one kind of thought and observation. There is another that comes from being still, from letting thoughts come and go as they will instead of grabbing onto each one. I feel like if I can learn how to do that this summer, it will help me as I go back into the fast-pace of next school year - being able to find the stillness inside of the speed, and honestly, learning how to let the stress of others roll off of me instead of absorbing it. If I can learn how to be the quiet center, but also use my brain in that very active way that I'm used to using it (which is very helpful in theatre school), it should bring more balance to ground me. And it will also help me in voice work. (Voice work is something that cannot be rushed. At all.)

And it'll help me notice other people. I am remarkably tunnel-visioned. If I've got a task to do, I do the task, and often eschew others for no particular reason. It's true that I'm rather solitary and need my alone time. It's also true that I forget that just spending time with people, not for rehearsals or meetings or class, is a good, helpful, mostly pleasant thing.

Yesterday, I spent a bit of time before worship talking to Jorge, one of the music leaders this week. He's a delightful person, Puerto Rican (with a light, gorgeous accent), and he's very, very happy in the mornings. I first really noticed him one morning when I was working keynote (at 6:45am) and he was so AWAKE (I think the only person in the room who was), joyous, and grateful. He said something to me specifically, and I can't remember what it was, but it was lovely, so I chose that I was not going to be annoyed at his bounciness when I still was basically dead to the world. Today, I ended up sitting next to him on the edge of the stage as we waited to open the doors to the auditorium, and we just chatted about life, and it was a lovely conversation - the kind of conversation I rarely let myself have.

Last night, as I was walking back up to the lodge, I heard some people playing guitar and singing a hymn (a pretty traditional one, in the vein of "Great Is Thy Faithfulness"). I assumed it was one of the youth groups staying in a house close to mine, but as I drew closer I realized that these were people on my porch. Two of my co-workers here, Amanda and Carly, with a guitar and two drums, just singing. They finished the hymn as I walked up, and asked if I wanted to join.

Honestly, normally I would decline, for no particular reason but this speed in my body that rejects things in pursuit of getting something done or accomplished. But I grabbed the other drum instead and spent the next half hour jamming with them on the porch.

There are things I want to get accomplished this summer, yes. I would like to finish the first volume of Remembrance of Things Past by Proust. But every time I start to think about progress and getting things done, my heart starts pounding in an unhealthy way that I associate with this last semester, with the stress of "You have to do this now!", and that's not useful to me. And it's because I don't know how to be still. One of my teachers sometimes tells people that they have a fast heartbeat. My heart beats very quickly, but I don't think it does that naturally. I think naturally I'm calmer. Still, I'm one of the calmer people I know externally, but not internally by any means. I think my heartbeat has sped up because I have kept spurring it on, and now I need to learn how to slow it down. Because any interesting piece of music has more than one tempo. And learning how to brake is a vital part of learning how to drive.

I think revitalizing my prayer life has a lot to do with it. There were about three years I considered myself agnostic (a very necessary period of my life that led to my choice to rejoin this faith and this church, and it is because my faith is a choice that it is so strong and virtually unshakable - when I choose, I choose hard), and during that period all the prayer habits I once had were broken. I have not been able to reinstite habitual prayer in my life. This summer, I've successfully started habitual scripture reading (which I honestly never had a habit of before), so I think that establishing prayer rituals will really help me. Taking time out of "accomplishing" to simply commune and connect with God should help slow me down.

I also think humbling myself has a lot to do with it. I mentioned before that I have friends who've started a theater company doing a residency in Nebraska this summer. I've seen a lot of their publicity stuff going up, and it's worked on my stomach in weird ways, because I know that I could very easily have gone. And as honestly glad I am that I'm not, because the thought of doing a show this summer makes me sick no matter how much I love the people, there's a part of me saying, "Why aren't you DOING something like this? Why aren't you getting out there, why aren't you furthering your career, why aren't you flexing your muscles as a working theatre artist?" I got an e-mail about my postmodernism entry that made me think, "Why am I not going and making this happen and making art that is absolutely NOT postmodern right now?" And my response to myself in all of these questions is, "Because I'm not ready."

This answer is generally frowned upon in the circles I travel in. I frown upon it. Because you'll never be ready. Because if you ever think you're ready, it's probably because you aren't being honest with yourself which doesn't make for good art. Because when Jesus called people, he did not allow them to "be ready" to go. It was then or never. There are SO MANY REASONS "I'm not ready," is not an acceptable answer, but honestly, it is the answer for me right now. Intellectually, I'm there, and I always have been. My mind is always raring to go. I'm always ready for some mental sparring. But my heart still needs to rediscover its natural beat. God has work still to be done within me before he sends me out into the world. And that is humbling. And I know that when I am working in the world, God still will be working in me and that is also humbling. It takes a lot in me to admit that I'm not ready. I want to do it all. And that is probably why I feel God's hand holding me back right now. That, and so I can fully physically learn that I will be working in more of this world than the theatre part. That spending my time here is just as, if not more valuable than doing a show or studying theatre abroad. Which I intellectually know and I wouldn't trade this for the world, but my body still hasn't fully gotten the message. I'm still slipping into habits.

So, in the spirit of letting things happen, not overanalyzing everything (however fun and exciting and discovery-filled it may be), and living life instead of always deatching from it and observing it, here are some random things I've done lately that have been fun:

I've had extraordinary amounts of fun working lights this past week. My favorite moments were the impressive light show I did to "MMMBop" before the Talent show, and the TWO MINUTE SLOW MANUAL FADE of the house lights from full to 1/4. People couldn't even see the lights change, it was so slow. Oh yes.

I have the best schedule this week - working worship for week 2 of this Youth conference. Worship happens in the evening. Score. Also, this is one of the best preachers I've heard at a Youth conference. He preached a sermon about humility which guarded against that annoying self-righteousness that often happens to youth when they come back from a conference like this. Basically, he said, "If you're fired up, you have to be humble. You have to take what you're doing seriously," and used the murder of a Lutheran abortion doctor that happened on Pentecost as an example of someone who was fired up without humility.

During the Talent show, I was nicknamed "Art School". It's sticking, too, largely thanks to conversations like this:

Eric (referring to the power points with song lyrics on them, during "Open The Eyes of My Heart"): I like how each song has a different background.
Me: It's an artistic representation of the inner meaning of each song.
Eric: So this one is... blue and black splotchy?
Me: Actually, it's about the feeling of your eyes opening for the first time. See, if you turn your head to the side, it's like blinking.
Jim: Alright, Art School.
Me: Hey, if there's one thing you learn in Art School, its how to justify anything.

I wrote and turned in my three play proposals for next semester at PHTS. (Because I'll be directing a show next semester. Can't believe I'm about to be a third year.) I'm pretty positive I'll get my first choice, or else my acting teacher from last year might go on a rampage, but all three are great plays and I'd be excited about directing any of them.

They're singing Mark Miller's "Welcome" at one of the Youth conference worship services. When I told my mother this, she said, "Oh good! It's getting to the Presbyterians!" I'm tempted to sing the alto part on headset (headsets are how we talk to each other during the service - there are headsets in the green room, at various places in the auditorium, at the follow spots, in the booth - so one of the planning team can sit in the front row of the audience and tell us in the booth what mics to turn on. It's also fun to random comments during services.)

Last night, after the hymn jam session on the porch, I ended up teaching a bit of African Dance. Because African Dance is pretty interesting to people who didn't spend every Thursday of their first year taking an 8:30am African Dance class. (We were all required to take African Dance our first year. It's one of the stranger features of my studio.) It was kind of awesome.

There was an electric violin used last week. I melted a bit.

I love Proust.