Arts
To Change The World We Must Focus on The Change and Not The World I had a conversation today with a woman I have become friends with on instagram. She sent me some claps over a Marianne Williamson post I put up about her running for President. I really like this Instagram woman. She posts lovely, honest things, and she is generous and authentic in her messages to me. Being that she is African American I thought she may want to know that Reparations are a part of Marianne’s platform. She did not know and was very surprised. It’s not for me to get into the details of that conversation because it was private. I will say that I think it’s about time, and that for the US to pay reparations to Japan and not to its own citizens is just some next-level bull. The point I want to discuss here is how our conversation relates to the mental, spiritual and emotional exhaustion we all feel in any given moment when we look beyond just managing our own day to day lives toward getting involved in changing the world. What is it that makes someone believe they can change the world? What type of upbringing makes a Nelson Mandela, a Ruth Bader Ginsburg or a Marianne Williamson? Whatever type it is, I’m pretty sure I didn’t have it… who am I to think I can change things enough in ‘Hollywood’ so women will still be considered viable after 40, or even to stop hair care companies from pimping toxic chemicals that seep into our skin month after month so we can pretend we are cheating death, and remaining our perky, f*ckable selves? I want to change all of that, but it feels too big for me. My Instagram friend said she is not going to get involved in the process of the democratic nomination, or maybe even the Presidency until it’s time to vote because she doesn’t have the energy. Which I translated to mean that her heart is fucking broken and she’s not ready to date again. I get it, except I’m worried that the country needs all the card carrying democrats it can get to vote in the democratic nomination so they are invested in the person they are going to throw up against the unconscious crew that are currently in office. I am Canadian, it is easier for me to yell and scream because, while the betrayal exists for me, it does not cut as deeply because this is not my country. We have problems of our own — we just happen to be on the pendulum as it is swinging left, but it’ll go back — so we are not immune to this disease of unconconscious capitalism. But, still, I get it. I have been on a pendulum swinging myself. Spending more and more time in the house because this part Wolverine part skunk look is something to behold, and I don’t always have the energy to stand tall with it. I told her I will speak on her behalf until she feels ready because in this moment I feel tall. That was at about 6PM. It’s now 10:30 PM and I just had an Instagram melt down because I had to go out and pick up my food from across the street and face the world with my skunk streaks, and no Valentine’s date, and a make-up-less-face (I wore lipstick, obviously). I’m tired just thinking about it. It was exhausting, not because anyone gave a shit, but because I did. I was walking out like a googlie-eyed monster hissing and waving my claws at people lest they look at me funny, or worse, look right through me. Someone did and bumped into me. It was tragic. The interesting part of aging is that the world does not care that I am becoming invisible. They are not even the ones trying to shove me in the box. It is me doing all the shoving and all the judging. I feel like a dog that has been trained to stand next to a pole with a chain, and now, even though the chain is off, I’m still standing next to that pole. Sitting in my own excrement waiting for my master to come and rub my belly. My Mom always used to tell me when I’m on the verge of a meltdown to H.A.L.T. — check if I am Hungry, Angry, Lonely, or Tired. If I am any of those things I should not try to make any decisions, (or post on social media). At 10:30 PM I was ALL of those things so I felt like it was a great decision to indulge the little monsters and cry away on my cell phone in bad lighting. My friend (one I’ve met face to face) called me shortly after my double posts. When I saw him calling I picked it up and said “I’m Ok.” He started to laugh. We both laughed for a bit, and then I explained to him why I am doing this on social media. He didn’t ask, but I needed to explain it to myself because I was having some post post regret. So here’s what I told him: Social media is a snake eating its own tail. It has us all in a Pavlovian cycle of responding when the bell rings, each time it rings we are fed a like, a heart, a message, some love. Once we receive that like, heart, message, love, we try to re-create the thing we received the like, heart, message, love for in the first place. The problem is — that is impossible. Yesterday, I looked at my Instagram ‘insights’ I NEVER do this. I did it because I am planning to release a podcast along with these articles and experimented with running an ad to see how that works as I plan to use ads to get the message out to potential listeners. I have had a significant (600%) increase in my instagram activity since I started going gray (after I lost the first 200 followers — those who have stayed are more engaged). Who cares. Well, apparently I do because I started posting pretty pictures of myself again. Which should be ok, but it caused a flare up in my ego. Like an addict who had one shot of gin and now needs to drink a whole bottle. What I explained to my thoughtful, concerned friend is that social media has heightened, and blown my relationship with my own image waaaaay out of proportion. It has literally trained me to take half-naked, edited and filtered photos of myself to the point where I am no longer clear as to what I actually look like — the same way Pavlov trained dogs to salivate at the sound of a bell. That is why I am using social media to have my meltdowns. It is literally the Cure and the Cause of my Blues (there is a killer song by Fish Go Deep by that name BTW check it out). If I post my blues, and my weeping in bad lighting on the very space that rewards me only for glamour shots I am telling Pavlov to shove his bell up his ass and biting the hand that feeds me. Of course the next phase of the cycle is to receive all the likes, hearts, messages and love BECAUSE of my blues, and then we get to start again — the blues become the new half naked photo. But I can’t help but hope that by being conscious of this snake eating its tail loop that I will somehow be able to break free from it. I don’t think it’s about me not using social media because the videos, and stories and photos other women have shared helped me to make this decision to perform this radical act of self love that is growing out my gray hair. I do think it is imperative that I break this cycle of addictive behaviour in myself. My addiction to external validation and drama. Which brings me back to my Instagram friend. I understand where she is coming from. She’s tired. We’re all tired. When I think about the world, and what an uphill climb this is — this being my having the audacity to age in the entertainment industry and not try to hide it, and expect to still be afforded the opportunity to make my living doing what I have spent years of dedicated study and tens of thousands of dollars doing — it feels like a mountain range surrounded by a moat full of alligators, a barbed wire fence, hungry mountain lions and an easily penetrable border-wall that I can fly over in a plane…(at least one thing can be overcome). Now, I don’t believe that focusing on the change means we can ignore the world. It is important to be informed. We have been asleep for too long, and that is why the f*ckety-f*cks are having their way with us at the moment, but we will make change happen, just like millions of men and women throughout the course of history have stood up in the face of oppression, and faced their own role in that oppression and taken responsibility for their roles in that oppression — and even made reparations for their roles in that oppression, no,I do not think we ignore the world. But there is a point when, if I stare at that world for too long, and if I do it unconsciously, it starts to mesmerize, and to tell me what it is, and what it will always be, and when the entertainment world tells me what it is — you won’t work as an actor, you’ll look ten years older, you’ll be invisible etc., I start to believe it because I am at the effect of the world instead of affecting it. I am only focusing on THE WORLD. So — it is at that point that I must switch my perspective and focus on the CHANGE. Preferably pre-meltdown, but hey, no one here is an enlightened master (as Marianne often says). It is not going to help me or anyone else if I run around accusing the world of ignoring me. Of seeking out all of the insidious behaviours of those in the entertainment industry and beyond and trying to call them all out on them. What will help me is to hold space for those people who are facing their own fears about aging and know that I too suffer from the same disease. I am just on the road to recovery, and they haven’t yet decided to walk through the fire. Who can blame them? They’re tired. I’m tired too, but I know that on the other side of this fire is peace. I know it because I’ve walked through other fires, and each time it gets easier and even funnier because I have a little more humility. I think it may be a long road, but I’m willing to walk it, because I believe I can change my experience of the world by taking ownership of my perspective of it. I said that to my phone-call friend tonight too. I have two choices — walk through the fire — face my face, and everything else, as it ages, or stuff myself with my addiction to the belief I have some control over what is inevitably going to happen in my life (aging, death, taxes). Like I can stave off aging if I just keep dying my hair. I can’t choose the unconscious path unless I cover it with alcohol or drugs, or sex, or botox, or Instagram…wait, what? It would be soooo nice though to be unconscious, but we no longer have the luxury of that given the current state of the world. So I’ve chosen to walk through the fire. I’ve chosen it for myself as an act of love. And I know that love will spread because my choice will inspire the other men and women to face their faces, and love their hair, and that it will be a little bit easier for them because love spreads faster than fire. To answer my earlier question about how someone becomes a world changer I have to come back to Marianne (hero-worship much?)… Twice today Marianne Williamson’s paragraph from her book A Return to Love (life changer guys, seriously, read it or listen to it free here) has been mentioned to me so I will quote it here for you: (goes to find link…) — — — funny, as I was looking for the ‘who am I to be brilliant’ quote, I found this other quote from the book instead: “It takes courage…to endure the sharp pains of self discovery rather than choose to take the dull pain of unconsciousness that would last the rest of our lives.” Courage. I have that. So do you for reading this post. So does my instagram friend because she sent me the claps. So does my phone friend because he called me at midnight (it takes balls to call y’all). Every time you do something that makes you uncomfortable you make that courage-muscle stronger. Everytime I post unflattering images of myself I make that courage-muscle stronger. And someday I’m going to be so strong that not even Instagram can affect my sense of self, and I will be so strong that I can lift others simply by holding space for them to shine their light onto the room, and to see them for their beautiful, authentic selves, the way I want to be seen. That’s the person I aspire to be: A world-changer. Because Courage eradicates tired. That’s the change. Be the change. Much Love.