Sunday, June 19, 2011

God I Really Want it!

God, I really want it!
God, I hope I get it!

(Thanks Chorus Line for the desperation!)

I was reminded again this week with ongoing discussions with my husband, and with a singer I work with about that want/hope factor.

Often,  as performers,  we get frustrated with the perceived lack of work/advancement/recognition we see coming our way.  Our way of deflecting is to say "but I want it just as much as so-and-so who works all the time"  or "she's just lucky I guess".

And here is the reminder:  you can want, hope, crave, whine, cry and make excuses. This is not the point.

Do you want it badly enough is not the point.

The point is this:  have you chosen it?

You can want/desire/yearn something, but ultimately it means nothing if you do not CHOOSE it.

Choice requires a real sense of responsibility.  Choice does not allow you to deflect.  Choice can issue no blame.  Choice is action.

"You are so lucky."  Really?  Luck has nothing to do with reality. 
"The business chose me, I didn't really choose this career."  Bullshit.  It may have come to you, but you had to CHOOSE to follow through.

Want, desire and all those "feelings" can move into desperation mode so quickly.  It can cause panic.  And when one is panicked, one looks outside for the answers, and the blame.

"Why is SHE getting work and I am not, when I WANT THIS SO BADLY?"  focus: on HER.

"Why is HE so lucky and I work SO HARD and get nothing?"  focus: on HIM.

It's a fine line isn't it?

Want and desire without personal responsibility gives you an out.  It gives you an excuse if it doesn't "work out".   And if you enter with excuses only, and deflection of self, you never truly commit and you never truly CHOOSE to be where you say you want to be.

Wanting a career is one thing.  Choice is another.  Standing there, in front of a mirror and saying out loud "I CHOOSE this" is frightening, but also strengthening.

"I CHOOSE" gives you responsibility.  "I CHOOSE" gives you power.  "I CHOOSE" gives you strength.  It does not allow for excuses,  and leaves no room for "I WISH".

I wish, I want is an amateur's thought process.  I CHOOSE is a professional's necessity for success.

Ultimately, if you CHOOSE it,  you choose everything about it.  You choose the lifestyle, the consequences, the process.  You choose the decisions and the responsibility of those decisions.  There is no blame in choice.  There is just an acknowledgement of the choice, the consequence, and the ongoing momentum into another choice.


Desperation has no place in choice.  Blame has no place in choice.  What-ifs have no place in choice.

I CHOOSE this journey.  Action.  No negativity,  no blame.

God I hope I get it?  Perhaps.  After you CHOOSE it.















1 comment:

  1. I think this is my favorite post of yours yet! Sometimes it helps to whine, whine, bicker, bitch, moan, complain (the title of my most recent Bad Guitar Channel song), but at some point one does has to take the responsibility for his or her own plight. Thanks.

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