What Inspires Me Today - April 28, 2023

Trust in the Unkown

Last night I was giving my Intro1 Improv class their end-of-term evaluations.  I both love and loathe evaluation day. I loathe it because it is so time & energy consuming - and for the teachers, it's not as actively "fun" as a usual class. BUT... I love it because we get to talk about the work, how it impacts us and what it means to us.

In one of the evaluations, we started discussing the idea of being vulnerable.  Now, this is INTRO 1 - improvisers first 8 weeks of improv instruction. This is when the nuts and bolts of Yes Anding, Listening, and breaking through our internal editors.  It's rare that we get too deep into a vulnerability discussion.  However, this discussion got me thinking and inspired me in a new way.

Twenty or so years of improvising and teaching and here we are... yet another Intro 1 class turns on a lightbulb.  That alone is enough for a note of inspiration.

When you're improvising, you have to put a good amount of trust in your scene partner... that they will have your back, they won't deny the reality you've created and they will support you and your decisions on stage.  As we were talking through that it occurred to me that as improvisers we are also putting a tremendous amount of trust in the UNKNOWN.

This puts new improvisers, and I'd say seasoned ones too, in a place of vulnerability. We don't know what is going to happen next. But here we are, together in this place, supporting each other and taking a step into that unknown to see what will happen.  

This might be an underlying reason so many people have a tremendous fear of improvising.  We don't really know what's going to happen. You have to trust in the unknown and find out.

This idea plays out in our lives, our relationships, and our work as well.

We have projects, and opportunities, and work that may or may not have a clear outcome... or we know what we want the outcome to be, but the path isn't so clear.  We have to trust in the unknown all the time. 

In improv, we have our scene partners to help us find the way together.

In our work, we have our colleagues, in relationships our friends and spouses, and of course we have ourselves.  And while it feels trite... to survive the unknown, we have to put a lot of trust in ourselves as well.

First Things: In the Now

This morning I'm really thinking about the importance of what lies before us... of the now.

This idea has really been impressed on me lately as I've been teaching my improv classes. In any acting situation, the actor always strives to be "In the moment" with his scene partners and with herself. When an improviser is focused in the moment, nothing goes by in a scene without it being picked up, examined and devoured.

The best improvisers do this by habit. On stage they LIVE in the now. Your character is tying his/her shoes and misses tying the shoelace - "watch out, you're going to trip over that." A character sneezes - "You have a cold, Damn - I knew it stay away from me!" Not only are they in the moment, they are there with the strongest of emotional choices and imperatives.

This moment that has just happened is the most important thing in the world RIGHT NOW and we need to take action on it before we DIE.

A little dramatic, but the point is there.  Don't miss those moments.

And so it is with life. We live our best lives when we are present in the moment - when we don't gloss over someone's emotionally tinted comment, when we listen with our ears, our mind, and our heart, and when we react to the thing that just happened and deal with it before we move on.  Sometimes that means making tough decisions, or halting something else, or waiting for another opportunity. But we have to live in this moment because that is where our lives, our memories, our world is built.

Butterflies

So I have butterflies today.

I have a call back tonight for Go Comedy Improv Theatre. Folks tell me I had a great first audition. I am trying to just relax and not think about it, which is what I did on Saturday for the initial audition. That seemed to work well, Anyone who knows me, however, knows that I am not one to just leave something alone without analyzing it to death.

Butterflies before an audition though are good. They keep us on our toes, give us energy, and I think are a good reminder that we haven't lost our sensitivity to the fact that we CAN fail. By that I mean that confidence is necessary, but attitude and expectation is not. I believe I'm a good improviser. I believe as well that I'm in this with a lot of very talented improvisers, FABULOUS improvisers in fact, of whom I consider it a priviledge to be holidng company.

I will be, and truly am, excited for everyone who makes it to the final cut, who has the chance to bring a home for improvisation back to the Detroit area. This is a moment to again create a fostering environment for creativity, to open up the sandbox and begin to play. Finding this gift nearly 10 years ago (Good Lord!...) was truly a life-changing experience. This is a great time for Detroit's improv community, and I couldn't be more excited.