I need you to survive

(This is in direct follow up to the last big post about love.)

In my studio, there is one particular word that is thrown around all the time, in every situation, from the moment you step through the doors. That word is "collaboration".

Our studio strives to train collaborative theatre artists. Theatre is a collaborative art form, one that employs many different people and many different arts. Knowing how to collaborate, understanding the benefits of collaboration, is absolutely essential. First year Directing class starts off with purely collaborative pieces, where a group with no designated "director" creates a piece together. Eventually we work up to a clearly designated director, but the emphasis on total collaboration at the beginning of the year helps us to continue to put emphasis on collaboration even when we're directing seemingly solo.

Beyond first year Directing class, PHTS is filled with constant reminders of collaboration, so many that I cannot even begin to list. After two years it has gotten to the point where I have so much history built up behind the word "collaboration" that it makes my head swim. This was not particularly helped by last semester's class called "Collaboration". It was taught by two teachers, both of whom I've taken classes with previously (albeit separately), both of whom are among the most brilliant people I know, both of whom have had a huge impact on me for which I am grateful, both of whom I would and will take more classes with in a heartbeat... and yet, this particular class made me tear my hair out more than any other. Often, I was frustrated, angry and lost. Most of our assignments involved coming together in groups and putting our ideas into conversations, which often turned into idea-wrestling-matches and I found absolutely thrilling, but by the end of the semester, pretty much all of us were bitter, angry, and burnt out, which didn't make for pleasant experiences. Many people adopted apathy towards the class, which is the least helpful starting place for collaboration. By the end of the year, I had so many viewpoints and ideas about collaboration and what it should and shouldn't be floating around in my head that nausea started brewing in my stomach whenever the word was used, and knew that I needed to spend time digesting what had happened and come to my own holistic understanding of what collaboration is. (Meaning: this class had viscerally affected me, gotten me grappling desperately with the subject matter, and therefore is one of the most valuable classes I've ever taken. Sometimes I hate admitting that.)

The value of collaboration is something I have never doubted. Indeed, it looks like for most of my life I will be straddling two worlds - the theatrical and the theological. I am of the full belief that worlds that do not talk should talk. I can see ways for that theatre can be of use to so many people. Churches, the video game industry, CEOs, to name a few.

Coming to Montreat, I have learned that collaboration is not only artistically vital, it is theologically vital.

Let's look at the Trinity, the three-in-one. God the Father, God the Son, God the Spirit. God is represented as the three-in-one partially, I believe, as a paradox to help us (not) understand. To try to unfold the mystery of God's existence. What the Trinity also does is show God as a being based on relationship - in fact, the ultimate collaborative relationship.

We are created in God's image. Therefore, we are created in the image of collaboration. We are created, in fact, to be in relationship with each other. (I will also note that the first thing we learn about God in the Bible is that God is a creator. And God, in fact, creates us with the ability to create, and invites us to join in the ever-continuing process of creation. Therefore, when God makes us in his image, he makes us as collaborative creators. OH HAY PHTS.)

There's also 1 Corinthians. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul talks about spiritual gifts, how all spiritual gifts are valid, and furthermore, that the body of Christ is like a body, and if we were all an eye, where would the hearing be? Clearly this is the collaboration scripture, but I discovered something fascinating when I sat down and read 1 Corinthians.

Right after the collaboration chapter is the love chapter. You know, the one always read at weddings, "If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal." "Love is patient; love is kind, etc." Honestly, I get tired of this chapter. Really, really tired of it. But knowing that it is next to the collaboration chapter, which ends with Paul saying, "And I will show you still a more excellent way," makes me look at this whole section, and collaboration, in a new light. Collaboration as an act of love.

Last Sunday, Dr. Claudio Carvalhaes preached about our responsibility to each other. President Obama recently spoke to the NAACP and said, "No one has written your destiny for you. Your destiny is in your hands." Claudio disagreed. He said, instead, "We are all responsible for each other's destinies." I believe that is true. Looking at my own life, I can trace how different people have affected me and changed me. And while, yes, it how I process what each person has done in my life that makes me me, there is no denying the influence of others. We all work on each other in deep ways. We impact each other. And once we realize this and take hold of it, we can choose to do it creatively or destructively.

Many of us are contented and comfortable to live in our own personal bubble. I readily admit my guilt to this, and I'm sure my college roommate, Gillian, will completely confirm it. I tend to keep my own counsel. I'll sit alone, maybe talking to one other person on a regular basis. I wrap myself in my blanket of solitude and if I'm going through something rough, I hide it until I have worked through it, generally on my own, and then I might talk about it, after it's over and done with. It makes it very difficult for someone who wants to help me to find any way in. It's not uncommon behavior, but it's not particularly helpful, either, and it hurts my voice work. Of course I hated group projects in middle and high school (wait, how did I become a theatre major?). To be honest, I don't see every interaction I have with another person as opportunity for us both to connect, share, and grow.

But that's what it is. Every time we come into contact with another person, there is the potential for that connection. And despite my anti-social solitude, I'm more grateful for the impact people have had on my life than anything else. Think: if we started to take responsibility for each interaction, if we started to truly honor each other in everything we did, how much better would daily life be? We don't do it because it can be uncomfortable and exhausting. But I wonder how much more fulfilling it is to think about interacting with others as an opportunity instead of an obligation.

I think that any relationship is a collaborative relationship. We are always affecting each other, we are always shaping each other into something new. One of the ways I've started to look at human interaction to make myself more enthusiastic about it is to think that there is always something I can learn from interacting with another person. I like learning, generally more than I like people, so this is a good way in for me. And when I count in the call to radical love, it completely opens the doors of collaboration for me.

My reframing of collaboration: collaboration is an act of creative love. Collaboration is the opportunity to come together and affect each other, and it can be towards a positive, creative realm instead of an apathetic or negative one. And every single moment of interaction can be a collaboration, if we are open to it.