On Growth

Before the world stopped, I was about to make a change in my life. Walking forth into the space separating the controlled schedule of an undergraduate theatre program from the larger, more unknown, unsupervised world of being a professional actor/writer/general creative. I knew, at the time, that I was going to have to work hard to make a name for myself. There would be trials, tribulations, and failures all in the service of becoming a better actor/writer/general creative. While I was ready for this challenge, I was a bit unclear what it was going to look like day-to-day. This, looking back, was a bit of a petty concern. Though at the time, in the age of innocence, those worries were as serious as a heart attack. Because, then, I was feeling unprepared for what lay ahead. Four years of education at a reputable drama school should have been adequate preparation for my chosen career path, or at least that’s what I was told over and over. How skilled my class was, the promise we showed. It was repeated that, if we could just see what the real world was like, we could understand our place within it. Over and over, I would wonder if that was true. Just how many other potential-soaked cherubs have been told that in rooms just like this one? Only so many stars can crowd the sky before each begins to look the same.

But then, overnight, those thoughts were drowned out in the news that we’re all sick of hearing. “We thought it would be only two weeks” and all that rot. Moving around and finding work waiting tables as my college career vaporized in front of me, a question kept rattling around in my mind, how do we grow? What are the ways in which we learn from our own lives and move forward? I had always held the belief that growth happens when you least expect it, or at least when you’re not looking. On the other hand, I would hear that true positive change happens when a concerted effort is put into practice. Maybe that’s just it, I was thinking at the time, growth is a thing you rehearse, like acting. Emphasis on consistency and in-the-moment focus are the keys to developing as a person.

This, I felt, was suspect. For, even though I’ve not had the most varied of life stories, I have met enough people to know that growth can be a choice, but often we are forced to change in rather unpleasant situations. Death of a loved one, divorce, disease, or debt. Each can bring their own remorseful catalysts, sad agents of positive progress. But this is not necessarily the case, nor does it need to be. Life’s problems are too heavy a burden to suggest that growth must be achieved in the end. Grief and sadness are often just that, not containing lessons for us to reap. I believe that this applies not only for personal disasters but for collective ones as well, need I mention COVID again. While people certainly can grow from quarantine, I think it’s unwise to assume that everyone has or that they indeed must.

At the heart of my musings is this, I want to grow but don’t want to force it. All my life, and certainly in the pursuit of my acting degree, I have been instructed to change. As a result, it has been necessary for me to demonstrate, and more often fabricate, proof of my own improvement for the sake of others. Not to say that I remained the same throughout the course of my education. There were ways in which I grew that were certainly positive but were, at the same time, unexpected and often lopsided. In many respects, I had felt prepared for the world, but in others, I knew that the skills I possessed were incomplete. Are they complete now? Ehhhhhhhh, no. The course of my life has changed and what I thought I needed to work on stands on the other side of the world from what I find filling my days. However, just because my growth is incomplete does not mean that I am. My mismatched talents, rough edges, and tender confidences add to who I have become and inform the person I still wish to be.