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I’m in a mood.
When you’re doing a scene time dilates. The five minutes I feel on the stage is more like one in the audience’s mind. Heightened awareness, mental acceleration from being in a tricky spot, all that stuff.
Sort of like time flying when you’re having fun.
We look up once and it’s March. We look up again and it’s May.
And from this comes a basic moral principle. Time is the most valuable thing a person has. It can be squandered. It can be managed. It can be stolen.
This is why, to pick one moral stance out of many, it is vital that we end the immoral drug war. The incarceration, the theft of time, from individuals who have harmed no one, so many non-violent offenders, is sickening to think about to those with a conscience and the will to perceive well.
If I believed there was another eternal life waiting for me I could waste all the time I wanted here in this life. I could allow others’ time to be wasted as well. If I believed I was subject to reincarnation the same would hold true.
That I do not believe these things makes me a more moral person. That I understand we only have so much time and then we are well and truly finished makes me examine my use of time more closely. It also allows me to think more compassionately about how other’s time is used.
The awareness that death is final brings with it the question of how I can help others escape wage-slavery. This, too, is a moral issue. Who wishes to be chained to a job which does not bring fulfillment? Which pays so little that one or two additional jobs must be found to fill the gap between what we need to survive and what we have right now? How evil: for an employer to look his employees and think, how little can I get away with paying these people? Evil, yes, because thinking like that steals time from those who are most responsible for the success of a given enterprise and without whom the boss’s business would not exist.
Stealing time is the greatest sin of all. That is, it is if you don’t believe in an afterlife. If you think there’s another life waiting, this one is pretty expendable. “Wait on the Lord,” “God’s timing” and all that. Adds up to a lot of unrecoverable time.
I looked at my blog today and saw it had been a little over a month since I last posted anything. I’ve been busy, doing stuff, hence time dilated and I failed to perceive it’s passing as well as I might have.
Time. We get it vicerally. It flows in one direction. We are carried along in it without prejudice or care. What we do while in the flow is our choice.
My students come to me asking, “How do I make an A in your class?”
“Turn in your homework, completed and accurate, on time,” I reply.
The students, exasperated, say, “Yes, we know about homework, but how do we make an A?”
An overweight man comes to his personal trainer asking, “How do I lose the weight?”
The trainer replies, “Exercise and watch what you eat.”
The overweight man, exasperated, says, “Yes, I know about nutrition and exercise, but how do I lose the weight?”
The actress comes to her coach asking, “How do I become an excellent actress?”
The coach replies, “Train your voice, your body and your imagination.”
The actress, exasperated, says, “Yes, I know about the exercises, but how do I become an excellent actress?”
The lesser comes to the greater asking, “How do I succeed?”
The greater replies, “Do the work.”
The lesser, exasperated, says, “Yes, I know about the work, but how do I succeed without doing it?”
An actor knows that the best way to convince an audience that he is doing a thing is to actually do it. No pretending. No discussion necessary. Just do the action. A salesperson knows that the sales come if you just approach a solid number of people. You don’t focus on the sales, you focus on the approaching.
Focus on the result and one gets frustrated. Focus on the action and one gets results.
Epictetus said, “First, say what you want to be. Then, do what you must do.”
I want to be a full time writer and theatre artist. The steps will take some time to complete.
What do you want to be? What to do you need to do? Are you ready to do it? What’s it gonna take?
And, um, when are you getting started? Or have you already?
Show any fear… Hesitate for a second… And they will tear you to pieces.
Principles of Improvisation: Doubt Kills
One of the signs of true fearlessness is the lack of fear of being wrong. This isn’t the same thing as denying being wrong. It’s not being afraid of that.
I’m rehearsing a play right now. Some of the cast are amateurs.
Nothing wrong with that, but the behavior is so predictable. When something an amateur performer does isn’t working and the director points this out, they whine. They defend. “Well, here’s this list of reasons why what happened wasn’t my fault and so I really didn’t fail and wasn’t wrong.”
Sound familiar? This is the language of fear.
In all of life we will have moments when we fail. We’ll have done something wrong. We won’t necessarily know at the time. Life is like that director, telling us, after we try something, whether it worked.
We step out. We make a decision. We give something a try. Maybe it works or maybe it doesn’t, but a true leader will always step out free of doubt. Never let them see you sweat. That fearlessness will occasionally lead to screwing something up. Perhaps amazingly badly, if we’re not prepared with the right knowledge.
But it will also lead us toward our dreams. The only other option is to succumb to the fear and doubt. Hesitating with each step. Missing chances. Inspiring distrust within others 
who see that we do not trust ourselves. Why trust a leader who does not know his own mind?
Take the steps confidently, doubt free. If you have to, fake it till you make it.
You’ve been there, right? When have you stepped out and done something confidently, perhaps when others might have been hesitant? How’d it work out?
Talk to you later.
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