What they give

I've mentioned this somewhere or to someone I think. The most important thing I learned in the physical theatre (and singing) classes I've taken is the permission to go big and fail. I can't always do it, maybe I can hardly do it at all, but there is a shift in perception in me. I didn't realize I had been holding my breath waiting for permission to be able to fail. Somehow I had learned I had to be perfect, and so I held back (oh, hell, from EVERYTHING) because I wasn't "perfect" and wasn't "good enough." Does that make sense? It's hard to explain. I had kinda' forgotten about it until just now when I was writing an assignment for my clown instructor. I know it's possible in other classes, but it was never explicit, and here, in these classes, it is, and it's expected. It's life-changing, you know. It's one thing to hear it, and quite another to believe it, to begin to be able to live it.

Just got a notice from the library that Art and Fear is now available, talk about good timing.

(And now that the swelling has gone down, I can see all the individual bite marks, there are 6 or 7, all from the same individual, all in the crook of my elbow. That yellow jacket got me pretty good.)