What do I need?
What do I want my day to look like and how do I want to set it up?
What is most important to ME?  What is my art?
What am I concealing?
These are some of the questions that have been on my mind since I last spoke with Rachael, and are whizzing around my brain this morning -like those flying pig-on-a-string things that you screw into your ceiling and fly in a circle over and over again- as I write what is my 12th entry of this seemingly experimental blog.  

​​In my last session with Rachael, she asked me a question that has stuck with me. 
A question, she said, that surfaced for her almost immediately as we were beginning our session.

The question was (on my behalf): “Am I being honest with myself?”

​
​I would venture to guess that –knowing Rachael- if the question came up, then the answer is probably worth investigating…
…and probably…“no”.

​So what am I not being honest about?  One thing comes to mind right off the bat; I originally started writing this blog with the semi-martyred intention of being helpful to other people, which has probably kept me a wee-bit safe in terms of its content.  I want to write things that are interesting and relevant to the lives of ALL human beings, and therefore, it is possible that I sometimes forgo the words I actually want to use for fear that I might scare away a ‘potential reader’... 

​Basically, I don’t always say what I want to say because I’m afraid of what people might think of me.
(This grows more and more ludicrous the more I re-read it; to be afraid of a thought.  As if a thought can jump out at you and slash you with its giant ‘thought machete’.  As if, thought.)

Recently, I have been listening to ‘Big Magic’ by Elizabeth Gilbert; the New York Times bestselling author of ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ and some other stuff that no one really knows because she was the New York Times bestselling author of ‘Eat, Pray, Love’. 
‘Big Magic’ is one of those books that you listen to slowly, taking the time to absorb everything that you possibly can, often rewinding to make sure that you don’t miss anything.  Ms. Gilbert speaks all about the creative process, her unassuming life as a writer, and what it means to truly live a creative life.  In her writing, she confesses to choosing each of her words with scrupulous discernment, wanting them to be at their absolute best, in order to compose the most perfect sentence that she has ever written –until the next sentence- and so it goes, until she decides that the work is done and good enough, at which point she will edit no more.  Then, as all brave artist must do, she releases it out into the world, where it will be subject to criticism by anyone, everyone, or no one at all. 
She goes on to discuss that while an artist must be THAT dedicated and THAT passionate about their work, they must also be detached enough that they can throw the entire sentence/paragraph/manuscript/piece etc. away if it proves to be an ill-representation of their most burning desires. 

One of my favorite college professors used to call this approach being ‘passionately dis-passionate’, crediting the act of creation itself as essential to our evolution as human beings, regardless of what it is that we actually create.
​
Liz also speaks about intention in her book. 
Why do we do the things that we do? 
Why do artists make the particular art that they make? 
Why am I doing any of this writing, other than to fulfill a commitment that I made to Rachael and myself several months ago?

​So, why did I really start writing this blog?
To expose my own wounds before anyone else could?
Because I want to be doing something interesting and cool?
Because I want to show everyone that I am an interesting and cool person who does interesting and cool things…?
Because I want people to know that I’m a good writer so if I do indeed decide to start claiming that I AM a writer, people will not think that I’m full of shit?
So that people know that I am good at something besides performing…?
…..are we noticing a trend here? 

​Ouch.  That is honest, and it stings a little.  

​Here is Liz Gilbert’s take on the idea of making art for other people:

“PLEASE don’t make your art to help me.  Do it for you.  If it’s dark, do it to heal you.  If it’s funny, do it because YOU like to laugh at it, but please, oh PLEASE, do NOT make it to help ME.”

​​She then goes on to discuss the phenomenon that was ‘Eat, Pray, Love’ and her utter shock at selling ten million copies of a book that she wrote, mostly, to help herself.  Never, she says, had she intended to write that book to help other people or to prove anything to anyone.  If she had, odds are high that she would not have been able to speak so freely and authentically from her own, single, individual, tender and unique heart.  Her writing was incredibly honest and vulnerable and descriptive and self-deprecating and funny and lavish and gloriously messy  And, as fate would have it, caught the eyes and ears of 10 million others just like her, walking their own paths and taking their own journeys, happy and relieved to finally find the words to describe what they were going through…even if the words belonged to someone else.
​
I like to imagine Liz Gilbert as my creative mentor, instilling in me all of the wild and brilliant gifts that she has learned while living an authentic and creatively abundant life.  As my mentor, I would ask her about my writing and my deep need to help or please others with my art.  I believe, in turn, she would say something like this:

​So, I’m changing my format.  From now on, I vow to write what is in my heart, using only the words that I want to use, saying what I need to say, readers be damned!

​Honesty with the parts of me that aren’t certain of what they want, or who I am, and honesty with the parts of me that are.
Honesty with the parts of me that know full well that I do things for recognition and acclaim…
…and validation… 
…and love…

​Honesty with the reality that I do things to be seen and heard and to feel important.  Not that there is anything wrong with any of that…if we weren’t here to be seen and heard and loved and to feel good, then what would be the point?  But who is it that I really want to be seen and heard BY?  I could easily rattle off a list of childhood scars -who can’t?- but the TRUTH and most relevant point now-a-days is: the person that I REALLY want to be seen and heard by, is me.                                              

​I want to hear myself loud enough and clear enough to know what I want and what steps to take next.  I want to connect with the part of me that is absolutely clear on how the destination feels, and simultaneously totally open to whatever the road might look like.  And I want to have the guts enough to take myself on that journey, fears be damned.

​I want to live and breathe the adventure of my life with a heart full of trust in the Universe, and in myself.  And I believe that THAT –ALL of that- is what is waiting for me on the other side of my work with Rachael. 

​These are the messages that I have been receiving loud and clear since my last session with Rachael.
Follow your own rules.  
MAKE your own rules.  
Decide what you want your life to look like, and then live it. 
And if that changes, then live it THAT way, over and over again, forever evolving and supporting the infinite expansion of your beautiful soul.

​New York has given me a lovely backdrop on which to lose myself, where there is no one counting on me, but me.  No one cares what I do, because it’s New York.  No one cares what I look like, because it’s New York.  No one cares how I dress or how I choose to move or what time I go to bed, because no one really cares. 

Except for me. 

I care.

I care how I take care of myself, and I care for myself; not because of what I think OTHER people might be thinking, but because I care what I think.
I care how I feel.

These were not sensations that were on my personal radar when I started working with Rachael.  They were more like ‘potentially achievable goals’; rewards which had to be heard-fought and won. 
Now, twelve weeks later, I care about my personal integrity.  A Lot.  I care about my relationship with myself.  I care about honoring the vows I take and the commitments I make; to both myself and others, which means that they carry more weight.  The big rocks have started to make their way back into the bucket. 

‘All change happens in an altered state’.  
​-Tony Robbins.

​I always knew that someday I was going to have to get comfortable with being really uncomfortable, knowing that everything I wanted, both then and now, has been and will always be outside of my comfort zone.  I knew that I would have to face everything that I have been afraid of, and learn to be at ease with even the deepest and most treacherous parts of myself, if I truly wanted to know my own strength. 
To know myself, I would have to walk up to the dragon, open its mouth, and enter in, with nothing more than good intentions, and an iPhone powered flash light.
So, here I am.  In the mouth of the beast, where it is hot and humid and smells like trash.

Congratulations Morgan, you have arrived.                
(I actually arrived about six months ago when my flight to La Guardia Airport touched down at 4:40 pm on February 1, and I stacked my 130 pounds of luggage onto an airport push cart and schlepped myself into a taxi, and then up a flight of stairs (just one, thank you Jesus) and into my East Harlem bungalow.)

I’m here. 
Here in New York City. 
Here in the middle of my discomfort. 
Here in the place where my instincts told me to land. 
Here, in a place where deep and profound change seems to be happening every day.  Where internal and external shifts are expanding my brain, my heart and my gut in ways that I cannot fully explain, but are 100% real. 
There seems to be lots of endings, and ever present reminders to Wait.  Rest.  Sleep.  Meditate.   Take care of yourself because the moment you know what to do, you will do it.  And then shit’s probably gonna get ca-raaaazay…

So, here we are, just a touch past the half way point. 
The metaphorical closet is starting to fill itself once again, and I have the feeling that there will be many surprise additions along the way, and while I look forward to finding out what they are, I know better now than to try and rush them.
Perhaps the biggest surprise thus far is that nothing looks the way I thought it would 3 months ago,
but for the first time in my life,
I am starting to see who I really am.
And I really like it.


On to session 7!

The Moment before:
I am starting to feel like myself again.
I have had several intense sensations of deep love in my heart, and have noticed the tiniest tinniest part of me that is looking forward to once again, some day, being in a relationship.
Today is the half way point, so I am hoping for the scales to tip a bit in favor of ‘the light at the end of the tunnel’, and I am starting to investigate life from my perspective, as in; not what I feel like I am supposed to be doing, but rather, what is inside of ME that is wanting to be born?

Very excited to speak with Rachael, certain that the Holy grail of personal truth is bound to reveal itself today -at the half way mark- I eagerly take her call.  After taking a few deep breaths together, she asks me for my intention.

In response to my intention, Rachael tells me that she is feeling compelled to ask me to ask myself the following question:

I pause.  
​In a small, silent space within me, requiring the utmost precision to enter, something resonates.  

​​I know that I am doing some things that I don’t really care to be doing to support a life that I’m not sure that I want to be living (which is suddenly quite powerful now that I’ve written it down, and I don’t mean that I don’t want to be LIVING, just that I’m not sure that my current life choices are the ones that I want to stay committed to) but beyond that, I am unclear.

“Well, what do you know to be true, today?” Rachael asks.

​I know that I feel like I am just…kind of…waiting for something to happen.   I know that I am in yet another transition.  I know that I am working a job that is making ends meet, but falls short of any substantial contributions to my heart or my bank account.  I know that I am very lucky to being living rent free (until September).  I know that  I am feeling the need to do something to fix everything that could be a potential problem, and  I continually find myself caught in the loop of trying to fix those things through the only means I know possible;
working as a waitress, a receptionist, a nanny, or an actress.

​And I am feeling like
'an adult would DO something before she ends up broke and homeless',
​and I am also feeling like that
–everything that I just rambled on about in the last paragraph-
is the Voice Of Fear speaking 
-and-
I am afraid not to listen. 

​​I know that I would like to set my day up differently; that I would like to wake up and move with ease throughout the day; to write and hike have time to do those things. 
I know –and by ‘know’ I mean ‘have started to understand recently in a very real way’- that my only real job is to take care of myself.  That if all I manage to get done on any given day is to be kind to myself, to move my body in a way that feels good, to feed and nourish myself mindfully, and to laugh and spread a little love, that that it is enough. It has to be. 

I know that the only way to share my heart in ways that serve me, myself and others is to have a heart that is full enough to share.  To have a heart that is overflowing.  And
I know that the heart cannot overflow unless it is filled to the brim, and then some.

I know that I feel like I have been working backwards for a long time; running myself over in an attempt to get ahead, trying to solve the riddles of life from the outside in.
I know that I keep thinking about Broadway.
I know that I keep thinking about making more money.
I know that some part of me is terrified to do anything else because I’ve been doing the same thing for so long and I cannot, at the moment, picture what anything else might look like.

​Rachael’s next question: “What is the most important thing to you?”  

​​Here is where I got stuck, so we did some clearing...and then a crazy thing happened...

​​After we came back from the twilight zone, we discussed the clearing:
I saw a dark and gloomy, grey funeral; it was cold and misty and very heavy.  I felt some weird dragging energy coming out of the ground.
​That quickly dissipated, and I saw myself running through the woods with a big monster chasing after me...

and then suddenly, I stopped, turned around, and poked the monster in the eyes.  
I then started chasing IT, and realized that all that the monster wanted to do, was play with me.

​After that picture played out, I started to think about a potential opportunity to take a huge pay increase at my day job, in exchange –basically- for my soul.  I thought about all the cool things that I would be able to do with the money; all the other dreams I have had that could be fulfilled on a great big salary, and then I realized that I was thinking.  What I was hearing was not coming from my heart, but rather, it was chatter from my head, which –as Rachael pointed out- is an incredibly important part of being able to hear your personal truth; discerning between the heart and the head.

My brain was saying to me: 
​‘Money is a real thing! 
​You should respect the impulse to make more of it if that KEEPS coming up for you’.​

​
​My heart however quickly informed me that ‘serving my artistry’ (which costs me nothing) is what I long to do the most.  It also feels like the reason that I am organizing and boxing up all of my shit; because I’m realizing how little I actually need in order to do what it is that I actually want to do.  

​Granted, money is a real thing; a necessity to eat and pay the bills, but I feel like I am starting to cut my attachments to of all the extra things; things that I once felt were an essential part of whatever it was that I was letting define me, and now only seem to cloud my vision. 

​​If I am light and mobile and ready to fly, then all I’m waiting for is a great big NUDGE from the Universe in the right direction.
And the more stuff I get rid of –the more space I clear- the further and faster I can fly.  
In fact, right now, the idea of having only what I can carry on my back feels incredibly moving. 
After all, we are all that we have. 
All that extra shit is nice, but we can’t take it with us when we go.

​
​We can, however, take quality; the quality of our experiences here on this earth, the quality of our love and laughter, the quality of who we become as human beings.  
The quality and depth of my relationships is what sustains me now, more than the quantity.
(And WAY more than it has for the better part of my days.)
The quality of my work feels more important to me than its breadth.    
And conveniently, quality doesn’t ask for much, other than time and attention.

So, if I everything that I truly need in my life adds up to not much,
then I don’t need to make much,
and if I don’t need to make much,
then that opens up a lot of doors.
 

​My day job is not soul satisfying, but it pays enough and I get to spend a LOT of my time working on my writing (which is precisely what I am doing right now).  It forces me to go to bed early, which forces me to prioritize myself, which means that I am finally getting to spend a lot of time alone, reading and meditating, which is something that I have been wanting for years.  Because I go to sleep early, I can wakeup and exercise first thing in the morning when I have the energy, and not dread it all day.  Because the days are very similar in style, I am able to pay attention to the shifts that are happening inside of me.  Shifts in awareness that are helping me to see that; 3 months ago, when I first realized that I REALLY like to write and thought that I might want to get some kind of publishing or editorial job –but had ZERO experience- the Universe still managed to give me one.  I have written this entire blog post while sitting at my computer, at my desk, at my day job... where I get paid to sit at my computer at my desk…and write.  

​I get to write, and I’m getting paid.
I am a paid, writer.
We’re getting closer.
Cool :-)

​And while the big picture has yet to fully come into focus, I can see how I am continuing to receive what I ask for.  As Rachael reminded me, the Universe delivers –gently- only what we can digest and assimilate, each piece leading us closer to home. 

​My prayer to the Cosmos:
May I be blessed in my full life,
to 
love with a full heart, 
laugh with a full belly, 
and live my fullest potential.
And,
may I be SO full,
that I cannot help
but spill over
into the cups of those around me,
should they wish for fullness as well.
​

Until next time...

I have had almost three weeks to write this post, and I am writing it today -the morning prior to my 6th session with Rachael- and technically, I am late (I aim to write a piece every week).  I could have tried to write this piece a week ago, or even two weeks ago, having thought a lot about the various changes and events that have transpired in that time frame, but it was not until yesterday that it was actually ready to be written.

​​It would seem that: 

With patience and presence, it is effortless.  When I try to rush it, I end up modifying my work for days, until I am left with a finished product that is 180 degrees different from where it started and has taken me three times longer than necessary to complete.

Conveniently, this has also become a swell metaphor for life;
with intention and patience, the right thing will show up at the right time.

​I am pretty sure that this is something that I have always known to be true. 
Right along with the awareness that patience is a virtue –which- I have yet to fully cultivate.
​
​Regardless, I am very sure that –patient or not- all life works in cycles; 

​
Throughout the course of a human life in particular, I believe the cycle to be something like this:

​I have watched this cycle play out time and time again, but the recent increase in my personal understanding of its importance is completely based in and upon my work with Rachael.  Thanks to her, and whether I like it or not, I can no longer deny that there IS a divine order to everything in the Universe.  It is as if the scales have tipped juuuuust enough in favor of trust (a repeated reminder from Rachael), and the belief that life is going to turn out better than I could have ever imagined on my own.  

​Over the weekend, I finished reading the book ‘Wild’ by Cheryl Strayed; a personal account of her 100 day, 1100 mile hike along the PCT (Pacific Crest Trail) in an attempt to heal the ‘giant hole in her heart’ brought on by the untimely death of her beloved mother.  It was (and is) an incredibly moving tale of personal triumph, unwavering intention, trusting your instincts, and the incredible depth that we possess as human beings for both utter despair and gratitude.  Admittedly, I had to spend half of my reading energy, trying to ignore the impulse to sell everything I own, ditch my life, and run off to the woods for 100 days…my ego assuring me that THAT is certain to solve all of my problems.  

It was the sudden stream of thoughts that followed which came as a surprise.  At some point in my reading, I suddenly stopped, looked up, and thought to myself (as loud as a person can think):

​Allow me to explain:

For starters, I believe that the significance of Cheryl’s choice was in the decision to dive into an adventure with little knowledge of what she would find, and no instigating force other than a feeling telling her that it was what she needed to do.  Granted, she had lost her mother and her life was in shambles, but the choice to hike the PCT was really just that; a choice.  And she made it because something inside of her was telling her to do it; to engage with this great big ‘thing’ looming in the distance, knowing that the only way to get to the other side was by going through the middle.

So, she did.  And ​just like Frank, she did it her way; with more crap than she needed, less crap than she ACTUALLY needed, and a lot of help from a lot of strangers who showed her a lot of love in a lot of ways that she had never before experienced.  She did her best to plan, and her best to overcome the many, MANY hiccups along her journey that she could never have planned for.  She lost the trail, got lost ON the trail, got sidetracked by inclement weather, faced death, dehydration and various other obstacles, lost most of her toenails, hiked for miles in shoes made out of duct tape, and lived to tell the tale.  

Perhaps more importantly, at the end of her journey, she was no longer:

The woman with the giant hole in her heart. 
She filled it. 
​She knew it was there, she knew how to fix it, and that is what she did.

 And that is what happened; 
She got full.​

​Several years ago, led by a feeling telling me that it was what I needed to do, I made the choice to move to St. Louis.  I was not suffering the loss of a loved one (thank God), and it certainly was not hiking with bears and rattlesnakes and popping off black toe nails, but it scared me none-the-less.  Figuring out how to survive in a brand new city, moving in with a man I had never spent more than 5 days at a time with, and moving to a town where I had no friends, no family and no notion of how to get anywhere frequently reduced me to the trembling fits of a five year old that lost his or her parent at the grocery store.  

​However, day by day and gig by gig, I managed to figure it out.  I met people, who encouraged me to meet other people.  I networked.  I auditioned.  I got lost…a lot.  I worked for $10 an hour, on my hands and knees, re-finishing a bar top for a restaurant that was in business for less than 8 weeks.  I borrowed $400 from my parents so that I could buy a crappy green Chevy Cavalier for $800 with no air conditioning and an exhaust pipe that was held up by a wire coat hanger.  Her name was Polly; the little green monster, she lasted me almost a year, and I cried as I watched her get towed away to her final resting place. 

​I remember literally shaking the first time I accepted a gig as a choreographer.  My heart racing as I taught 45 unsuspecting high school students an entire musical’s worth of choreography that I had made up in my kitchen. 
Learning to call myself a choreographer was almost as scary as actually being a choreographer, and the same thing happened when I became a director, a voice teacher, a gainfully employed professional actress, a studio owner, a manager, a consultant, and the list goes on…
When I broke up with my boyfriend and had no idea where I was going to live…                                               
When I moved back in with my parents for 8 months so I could ‘help them’, knowing deep in my heart that it was the other way around…
And all of the other endeavors I undertook that pushed me FAR beyond my comfort zone.
In each and every one of those moments, I would have been SO much more comfortable on a trail, in the middle of nowhere, with every single thing I owned strapped to my back…but I wasn’t.  I was with my fear and I was smack dab in the middle of it. 

​When I decided, in the face of my biggest and baddest dragons, to move back to New York City…
I stood with my fear. 

Leaving New York in search of something I couldn’t quite name, and then returning to New York led by the same feeling that took me away in the first place which means I probably have NO clue what I’m in for;
THAT scares the shit out of me. 

Feeling like the ground is shifting beneath my feet and I don’t know if something incredible is coming up or if I am going to fall in…
that feels scary as heeeeeeeell.

​Why the fear has been there -or even the fact that is has- is of little importance to me now.  What IS important to me is the realization that all the while, while I have FEARED my fear, and been AFRAID that it might stop me from doing any number of things –that it might, literally, kill me- it hasn’t.  I could always feel it, threatening to tornado my ass with every new choice or unknown outcome, but that’s all it ever was; a threat.  It never destroyed me.  It never even stopped me.

​​Now, I am back in New York, where it all began. Back in New York,
after spending several years gathering bits and pieces of myself along my journey (step 1),
then, promptly forgetting most of them as soon as I got here (step 2),
​only to re-discover –hopefully- all of those things that I forgot that I knew…with the intention of not forgetting them again.  (…step 3.) 

​Scratch that…I LOVE to hike.  I love to be in nature…in the open air… enjoying the scenery and the wildlife -be it the top of a snow capped mountain, or the top of a really large hill that overlooks the Hudson River and the West side Highway (see above)- I still love it.

How I forgot this, I have no idea.
​
It’s probably because there aren’t a lot of mountains in NYC… but I’ll be damned if they don’t do their best.  And while I’m not sure when my next BIG hike will be –I am currently fantasizing about hiking the Grand Canyon at New Years- I have chosen to train regardless; to put heavy weights in my backpack, and hike the treadmill.  To find the hilliest parts of Manhattan, and run them over and over again.  Not because I know I will be somewhere with mountains any time soon, and not because it’s the most tolerable form of exercise I can muster,
but because I remembered that it’s what I do.  I hike.  I climb shit.  It’s part of my soul.

​​And I am working with Rachael, which leads me to believe that I am headed out on a NEW journey.
I don’t know exactly what it will look like, but if the last couple of years are any indication, I would venture to say that it will be nothing like I planned, and everything that I don’t even know that I need.
​
It feels so very good to remember.

​Doesn’t it?

The moment before:
THIS IS NOT WHAT I’M SUPPOSED TO BE DOING THIS IS NOT WHAT I’M SUPPOSED TO BE DOING THIS IS NOT WHAT I’M SUPPOSED TO BE DOING!! 
I am NOT where I am supposed to be and this is NOT what I am supposed to be doing!

I am terrified that I have missed the mark and screwed everything up somehow.

And yet, in true Gemini fashion, I also find myself wondering:
What changes inside of me if I change that thought to;
‘I am exactly where I am supposed to be.’?
​

It is frequently the case that at the beginning of my sessions with Rachael, I am uncertain of my intention, either because I haven’t thought much about it until she asks, or because I have SO many ideas dripping from my neurons that I cannot pick just one.
Not this time.

​​This time, I knew exactly what I wanted. 
“I want to know what I want and where I want to be doing it.” 
​
BAM.  ‘Nuff said.  Enough dicking around and pattering between this heart’s desire and that soul’s calling.  I have been oscillating back and forth between ideas quicker than a high speed fan in the summer heat of New York City.  I have moved so frequently for the past 5 years, that I am concerned that I don’t know how to do anything else…kind of like a hamster stuck in a broken wheel; she knows it’s broken but she isn’t sure what else to do and she is scared that if she gets off, that little fat kid who likes to pick her up and squeeze her, is going to want to pick her up again.  

As we worked, Rachael shared with me her story of making several moves over the course of several years; a time span in which she allowed herself to make a choice and then re-evaluate based on what felt right –without judgement- and included booking a Broadway show while living in California.  She shared with me her knowingness that she was not quite ready to stay in one place, until she was.  And when she was ready, she knew it.
She described this time in her life as ‘picking up little bits and pieces of herself along the way’…an idea that really resonated with me.  As we discussed those bits and pieces, along with her eventual realization that she was totally where she was supposed to be and her immediate willingness to stop living like a nomad, I began to feel hopeful.  I began to connect with a deeper place inside of myself that is still not completely certain of why or how long I am meant to be in New York, but that I will know for sure when it is time to make my next move, and what that will mean.  

​ “Why did you move to New York” Rachael asked me. 

“I had an instinct, I think” I tell her.  “I spent all of last summer with people telling me all kinds of kinds of nice things about me.  (I’m easily moved by flattery) I heard this little voice say “I think it’s time to move back to NY” and I just knew - or at least felt like- that was what I needed to do. And I thought ‘I’m gonna’ go back, go to a couple auditions, I’ll book my show, do my show, have the experience, lay it to rest, and then I can leave and move on to what I really want to do’”

“Which is what?” she asked.

“Something to do with being a humanitarian; some kind of problem solving and people-something...writing. Working with people and helping them feel better.”

“How has acting prepared you to do something like that?”

​ACTING  HAS  TAUGHT/ALLOWED  ME  TO:
-              Throw myself into scary situations non-stop.
-              Adapt quickly to different situations.
-              Study humanity by studying characters.
-              Study and work with people.
-              Learn and regurgitate information instantaneously.
-              Teach others.
-              Study my own humanity.
-              Get in touch with my own junk (which allows me to be less afraid of other people’s junk).
-         Not have any fear of standing in front of thousands of people on stage and saying “hey, how is everybody doing??” That’s a scenario I find very exhilarating.

​But I really want that Broadway paycheck…

​
​And I want to do something that feels cool and is FUN and has the ability to connect me with a LOT of people. 

And I want to be fulfilled.

​As we rode the high of my seemingly unhindered channeling of personal truth,
Rachael asked me what I DO want.

“I want to share MY story and MY journey in a way that empowers others to do the same thing because I believe that that is truly the path to universal healing and the self-inflicted shame epidemic.”

Woah, cool.

“And I see now how that could lead me all over the place and into all sorts of different arenas to do my work.”

Also cool.
Traveling and sharing my story, that sounds cool. 
Doing it in a manner that allows other people to do the same…that sounds fulfilling. 

​I’m certain it would be very exhilarating to perform on a Broadway stage. 
I am certain that at the moment, when I think about being committed to a show 8 times a week for nine month, it feels cold, fat and heavy.
I’m certain that I am scared to write about my wavering feelings because I believe that I am giving my words more power by writing them down and more power still by sharing them. 
Maybe it’s less about the dream and more about how I associate with it. 
​How much power I give it and how big I make it. 
​
Maybe the dream is trying to play itself out, and I am too busy judging it to notice.​

​Maybe I just don’t know yet.
​

​What I do know is this: there is space inside me now where there wasn’t before.  I am having moments of peace and calm -unlike anything I have previously experienced- in each day, and they are profound no matter how long they last. 
I know that I want to help a lot of people to feel heard and hopeful and taken care of, the way that Rachael makes me feel helped and heard and taken care of.  I want to do that.  I want to connect with people and feel tremendous joy and gratitude for each day. 
And I want to be really well paid, so that I no longer need to split my energy. 
And I want to travel.