Thursday, October 4, 2012

A Political Rant

Well, it has been 10 months since my last post.  How strange, I completely forgot to participate in that aspect of my creative flow.

But it wasn't for laziness!  So much has been unfolding this year and it's been wonderful.  I have tangibly been following and living my dream of being a great actress!  I am taking an amazing Meisner Technique acting class and it has changed my life.

As I have grown as an actor, I have deepened my appreciation for the Human Essence.  More accurately, I have come to be more at peace with my own humanness.  It is beautiful and intricate and strange.  Sometimes it feels awful, and I love it.  Sometimes it feels fantastic, and I love it.

I have also noticed that, while my compassion has increased, so has my blunt refusal to see anyone as a victim.  I see a lot of people (including myself) who become trapped in invisible mental prisons.  But these prisons are our own creations.  And they are as easily destroyed as we choose.

One of the major mental prisons that we have collectively bought into is our dissatisfaction with our country, state, town, home.  I live in the United States, and our election date is approaching in a month. Politics as usual shines a light on our divisiveness and opposition.  It says "Here is why we are better than them, and why we should be controlling your future."  But there are a number of inherent untruths in this kind of statement.  First of all, we are all humans.  So who is "them?"  Those horrible others who also breathe and eat and sleep?  Those terrible creatures that hope and fear and cry and love?  Those nasty, despicable things that have the audacity to desire a world in which they and their families can be happy and secure?  You see, it does not matter what "side of the fence" you are on.  Whether you are a democrat, republican, libertarian, rastafarian, francophile, transvestite, fashionista, or any number of categories in which you may place yourself.  You are a human.  You and I have the same basic needs and desires.

Now the forms those desires may take are going to be different.  Always.  That's what makes each of us unique.  I want to walk along the Seine wearing a flapper dress, pumps, and elbow-length gloves, smoking a cigarette in a long filter.  I want to make love while free-falling from an airplane (with parachutes available, of course).  I want to drink ayhuasca with a shaman in Peru.  You may be completely repulsed by these ideas of what I find delightful.  But you have the inherent ability and opportunity to create whatever you like in this world.

One of my friends recently made a disparaging post on facebook about my hometown, saying it either sucks the life out of you, or causes you to put on blinders in order to not drown in the "negativity."  A lot of my friends liked it and commented with their agreement, that this town is indeed a hellhole filled with horrible people.  But the truth that nobody seemed to see is that each of them has that same view of this town.  Each of them is participating in the "negativity" that they claim to hate so much.

This is an important point that I am making here, so listen up.  We cannot change the way things are if we continue to participate in the behavior and attitude that has created the way things are in the first place.  Living in despair at the "horrendous" state of things does nothing but cause you, the individual, to suffer.  And it is no wonder you are suffering when you look out at millions of people around you who are looking around and seeing millions of people suffering.  Do you see?  Changing your view, changing the way you choose to see wherever you are, is the most important thing you can do.  As a revolutionary, this is your task.

It has to start with you.  There is no one else.  You cannot control "them" (whoever "they" are) and you cannot change all of that "out there."  But you can choose to see this place as one of potential.  You can choose to see these people as potential geniuses, full of lovable qualities that they are just dying to share.  Literally.  Every person you see who is miserable and aging and grumpy and full of suffering is only that way because they have, through the course of life, decided that they have nothing to offer.  And every person who has decided that has lied to themselves in the worst way.  Because not one thing exists in this universe without having something to offer.  And no offering is too small.  Even if it is simply looking beautiful.  Even if it is writing a very long and wordy blog post that maybe a few people will read.  Even if it is smiling as you serve people coffee.  Every act that comes from your desire to share yourself with the world is beneficial, in ways you may never know.  But it is vitally important to remember this.  Because as soon as you decide your inner world is not worth sharing, you have begun to die a little bit.

I'm really thankful to anyone who is reading this.  I hope you are taking the baby steps towards your deepest dreams and desires.  I know I am, and writing this has strengthened my spirit in that endeavor.

Thank you.

Phoenix

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