Sage Woman Chronicles

The Value of the Arts

The Duke and Isabel from a production of Measure for Measure.

“Eleanor was right. She never looked nice. She looked like art, and art wasn’t supposed to look nice; it was supposed to make you feel something.” ~ Rainbow Rowell, Eleanor & Park

“A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable, but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.” ~ George Bernard Shaw

“Arts education is a big part of building a 21st century creative mind, and I think that we have let way too many kids lose their way by not drawing in their young minds with music, dance, painting and the other various ways we can express those things we do not have words for.” ~ Heather Watts

So a couple of things are happening in Arizona and to me personally this week that I’ve been doing lots of thinking about.

First, Arizona teachers started a walk out yesterday all over the state. I support them because I was a public school teacher and I know their frustrations not only about pay, but funding for supplies, books, technology, repairs to facilities, pay for support staff and the list goes on.

One of the first things to get cut when the state government decides they need to cut education funding, is the arts. I have always opposed this, but what can one do when the mentality is that other programs, like sports, are more important.

This week my theatre workshop class was doing dress rehearsals and performances for Measure for Measure, the play I’ve been directing. One night I had a rather nasty encounter with someone who said to me, “Your play is not that important compared to other things going on in the world.” Here’s what I have to say about just how wrong that person was.

People who are involved in the performing arts learn extremely important life skills that can help solve many of the world’s problems.

Discipline. To put together any kind of performance takes many, many hours of rehearsal. Everyone involved needs to put in the work required of them or the performance suffers.

Team work. I have always contended that the performing arts teach better team work skills than sports, because the end result is a win-win situation. The performing arts must use cooperation rather than competition to create their finished product. The actors, dancers, musicians win, and so does the audience. But, as I pointed out above, if some members of the team don’t hold up their end of the bargain, the performance suffers and both the audience and performers lose. You only have to be in a bad production, recital, or concert once to learn the importance of each member fulfilling their role.

Communication skills. Any kind of work requires good communication skills, but the arts require more than just communicating ideas. The point of the performing arts is to convey emotions to an audience. We want the audience to feel something. So, the performers must learn to listen closely to each other, and react or respond accordingly. Scientists have proven that what we witness, we feel as if it were happening to us and that makes any kind of performing art extremely important. The audience gets involved emotionally and that changes them.

Self-discovery. I’ve seen my students blossom as they do their acting scenes, or put a play together. The work is not easy because they are required to get in touch with their emotions so they can convey them to an audience. That puts them in a vulnerable position. Some students resist this, but those who don’t, become more open, accepting, and less judgmental. They get a chance to see the world through the eyes of their characters. Getting a new perspective on life is always a good thing.

Self-confidence. This one is linked to self-discovery. When we try something new and scary, we have the opportunity to exercise new skills and talents that we never knew we had. My approach to teaching acting is that anyone can be a good actor. In fact, we are acting all the time. Acting is a matter of listening to your scene partner and then thinking about how you might react or respond in real life. The more you practice these skills, the more confidence you gain about using them in real world situations.

Using imagination. All arts teach this. In terms of theatre, an actor must imagine why their character is doing and saying the things they do in the play or scene. Actors have to use their imagination to fill in the blanks that the playwright left because there wasn’t enough time to give the entire background of a character. Using our imaginations leads us back to number 4, self-discovery. If we imagine why someone is doing what they’re doing, in the book we’re reading, the entertainment we’re watching, or in real life, we have a chance to become more compassionate and less judgmental.

I don’t know about you, but I’m always looking for ways to be more accepting, compassionate, and less judgmental. So, after my confrontation with that person who questioned the validity of doing a play, I went back to all the things I’ve learned doing theatre. There was something going on with her that made her act the way she did, and I should give her the benefit of my understanding. We all go a little crazy at times. Though the attack hurt for a while, I’m fine and glad that our play is, in the end, a success.

Thanks for reading, liking, and commenting. Have a fantastic weekend.

Lucinda is the author of The Space Between Time, an award finalist in the “Fiction: Fantasy” category of the 2017 Best Book Awards. It’s a historical, time-travel, magical realism, women’s novel, and is available in all ebook formats at Smashwords, or you can find the ebook at iBooks or Barnes and Noble. I you prefer a physical copy, you can find a print-on-demand version at Amazon. To join her email list, click here. She will never sell the names on her list.

Dehumanization in A Tale of Two Cities

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times …” ~ Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

“It’s a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done. It’s a far, far better rest I go to than I have ever known.” ~ Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

“A deep sense of love and belonging is an irreducible need of all people. We are biologically, cognitively, physically, and spiritually wired to love, to be loved, and to belong. When those needs are not met, we don’t function as we were meant to. We break. We fall apart. We numb. We ache. We hurt others. We get sick.” ~ Brené Brown

I can’t stop thinking of that interview Marie Forleo did with Brené Brown about her book Braving the Wilderness. When Brené was talking about the process by which we dehumanize other human beings, I thought of A Tale of Two Cities. There are many examples of how this process happens both in literature and in history, but the thing that Dickens does in his book is to make the process personal and devastating.

This story is so timeless that there are four film versions of it. My favorite is the 1938 version with Ronald Coleman, but every version I’ve seen is compelling.

The story takes place during the French Revolution. At the beginning of the story, Dr. Manette has been in prison for many years. He was imprisoned by aristocrats because he wouldn’t pledge to keep a secret they wanted buried. Since much of his work was with the poor of Paris, the De Farges, who had worked for Dr. Manette, try to get him released. In fact, that’s how the book begins, with Dr. Manette’s release. His wife and daughter had fled to England when he was taken, and now his grown daughter meets her father for the first time in many years. He’s a broken man.

Meanwhile, back in Paris, the De Farge’s are prominent members of the festering discontent that leads to the revolution. A single incident shows the callousness of the French aristocrats and sets the stage for the blood bath that is to follow. The Marquis St. Evrémonde, orders his coachman to speed through the poor part of the city. A child is crushed under the wheels of his carriage and he doesn’t care. Meanwhile St. Evrémonde’s nephew is packing to leave his title and his uncle behind. He can’t stand to see the way the people in his class are so callous toward the poor. And that’s the crux of the story. First the aristocrats devalue the lives of the poor, then the poor, having gained power, do the same to the aristocrats and those who work for them. Many innocent people end up dying at the guillotine.

The thing that has stuck with me since I first read the book when I was in high school was how quickly noble causes can be changed to bloody rampages. The De Farge’s have a just cause, but as they gain power they are seduced by blood lust. Their desire to right the wrongs their class has suffered turns against Dr. Manette and his family. Lucy Manette has married Charles Darnay, St. Evrémond’s nephew and the De Farge’s want to kill every last member of the family as if that would bring back the child who got trampled so many years before. It’s shocking how blind the De Farge’s and their cohorts become to the suffering they are causing.

My father used to say that wounded people, wound other people thinking it will ease their own pain. Pain, of course, is never eased by harming someone else. The only way to ease our pain is to forgive ourselves and others.

Sometimes life throws curve balls at us. Directing this play has been one of those situations for me. I have at times been sucked into the drama of situations with students, but getting upset and angry doesn’t help anything. I’ve had to take a step back and look at why I’ve drawn this into my life. The answer is, I have more guck to clear out so that I can be free of anger and blame.

It seems to me that stories like A Tale of Two Cities are examples of how tragic things can become if we fail to heal our own wounds. Trying to control things on the outside never makes us feel better. All the work must be done on the inside, in our own minds and hearts.

Thanks for reading, liking and commenting. I hope the rest of your week is lovely.

My Wilderness

“People are hard to hate close up. Move in. Speak truth to bullshit. Be civil. Hold hands. With strangers. Strong back. Soft front. Wild heart.” ~ Brené Brown, Braving the Wilderness

“The paradox is one of our most valuable spiritual possessions … only the paradox comes anywhere near to comprehending the fullness of life.” ~ Carl Jung

I’m directing a play this semester in addition to teaching two other classes. It’s my first time directing a Shakespeare play, which was a scary prospect, but the message in Measure for Measure called to me and I couldn’t stop thinking about doing it. I told Divine Oneness that if things fell into place, I’d go forward with the project. There have been many hurdles to jump over which I will not bore you with here. Let’s just say everything seemed to be falling into place. Students were excited about the play, as were other college instructors. I met a professional actor who had done the play seven times and gave me a shortened script, and there were so many other positive signs that I decided to move forward with the production.

We’re a week from our first performance and during the last few rehearsals everything has begun to fall apart. Last night I was so discouraged I cried all the way home and cried while telling Barry about all the obstacles that have been cropping up, ranging from college events that have kicked us out of our performance space two nights during our last week of rehearsals, to students who have to work when we’re supposed to be polishing the play. I was so distraught that I didn’t sleep well.

This morning I’m still feeling discouraged, which is not like me at all. But, yesterday I watched an episode of MarieTV that popped up on my YouTube feed when I opened it to access my meditation video. Marie Forleo is one of my favorite young women leaders. She supports women entrepreneurs. The video was from a few months ago when she was interviewing Brené Brown about her new book Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone. Brené Brown is another one of my favorite women authors and teachers. I’ve read almost all of her books and had recently finished Wilderness. She studies the effects of shame and how vulnerability can help us live an authentic life. Marie brought up something that also touched me when I read the book.

Brené writes that if we are going to be authentic, we have to be careful how we talk to and about other people. If we are going to respond to people calling us, or the people we support, names by engaging in name calling in return, then we are perpetuating negativity. We’re contributing to the dehumanization process. We are making our fellow human beings, something not worthy of respect. If we want a loving, peaceful world, we need to stop demonizing the people who have different political, religious, or moral views than we do. Often our first reaction to being attacked is to attack back, to give evil for evil. Doing that is not going to make the world a better place in which to live. Maybe, giving love, for evil is what Jesus meant when he said to turn the other cheek.

So what does this have to do with what’s happening in my life right now. Well, I certainly would like to, (and I have) yell and curse, when the latest bombshell goes off exploding my plans for the play. I haven’t done it in front of the students until last night’s rehearsal. One of my students said, “I can’t believe you haven’t done that before now.” I realized that I have been stuffing my feelings and trying to protect my students. That’s not good for me or them. So, I’ve decided that I’m going to tell them that I cried all the way home because I failed to convey to them how important it is to be there for each other. That each member of our production is important and that we owe ourselves and the audience the very best performance we can give.

And one other thing occurred to me. I’ve been living a kind of double life these last nine years. I’ve been trying to balance teaching, which includes directing, with my writing life. I’m taking this experience as a sign that maybe I should give up teaching theatre all together and concentrate on writing. I have very much regretted that I have had so little time to work on my novel this semester. I need to go spend some time with myself and Divine Oneness in the wilderness and see what my next steps should be.

Thanks for reading, liking and commenting. I appreciate it very much.

Taking Stock

“Have you ever stopped for a moment and looked at yourself through the eyes of the ultimate observer?” ~ Ramtha, What the Bleep do We (K)now!?

“No one is dumb who is curious. The people who don’t ask questions remain clueless throughout their lives.” ~ Neal deGrasse Tyson

“If we lose love and self respect for each other, this is how we finally die.” ~ Maya Angelou

I’m one of those people who is always asking questions, always seeking deeper meaning from outside and inside myself. I guess I’m a perpetual student. I come by it naturally, I learned it from my father. He wanted to know everything there was to know and so do I. I understand that won’t be possible while I’m alive in this physical body. Though, I’m pretty certain that once I pass into the next dimension, I’ll be immersed in the true reality.

Having written that, I want to stop a moment and take stock of what I’ve learned so far. I’ll be turning sixty-five at the end of this month so it seems like a great time for reflection.

I started this blog five years ago to be an electronic journal. I’ve been keeping one since I was twenty-four years old. I do still hand write in a paper journal occasionally, but I like the speed at which my ideas come out onto the screen as I type. That led me to create Sage Woman Chronicles. It’s my way of taking my ideas and experiences out and examining them.

A life long passion of mine has been to understand the relationship between Divine Oneness and human beings. That’s what led me to study religion in college, then theatre, then to become a teacher, to travel, to read extensively, to write. And it all started when, at eight years old, I felt the presence of Divine Oneness on the day I was confirmed. That connection has rarely been broken. When it was I was the one who broke it.

You might be surprised to know that one of the ways I reconnect with the Divine is by reading and watching movies and TV. I’m picky about what I watch. A healthy dose of PBS, Natgeo, the Science and Learning channels are part of my viewing fare. But I’m also always on the lookout for good story telling in a variety of genres. It may seem odd that I seek spiritual enlightenment from those sources, because we think of them as pure entertainment. Some people use entertainment as a drug to numb their stress, or pain. But I don’t think that’s true for everyone.

Here’s one small piece of evidence to support my premise. Every week I listen to a podcast titled “What Do I Read Next” hosted by Anne Bogel. Her format is to have one guest on and they talk books. At one point she asks the guest to talk about three books they love and one they hate. This is a version of what many of them say about the book they hate, “I just didn’t connect with it.” Many of the guests talk about how they read to get a new perspective on life, or to learn something about a different culture or country. Reading isn’t just entertainment to them, though it’s that too, but it’s a way to expand and grow. At the end, Anne recommends three books for them to read and she always wants to hear back about what they thought of the books she recommends. She and the guest have made a connection.

To me, art is a profound attempt by the artist to make a connection with their audience. I teach theatre classes. One thing I’ve noticed about my students, especially those who take acting because they need a fine art credit, is that they are surprised to learn that theatre is all about the examination of human behavior. It teaches methods for getting to motivations, why people do what they do. And that’s a skill we can use in all aspects of life. Because that’s true, plays, movies, and episodic TV shows can do the same thing. And now that I’m a novelist, I find that the fiction writer must show the character’s thoughts and feelings so their readers get a glimpse into their motivations and hopefully gain a deeper understanding.

This semester I’m directing the Shakespeare play Measure for Measure. It’s not one of his more well known plays but what happens in the play is so contemporary. The main event that the play revolves around an incident of severe sexual harassment. One of my students said, “This play is so full of unanswered questions.” And I agreed with him. As I examined the script, I came to understand that Angelo, the abuser, has cut himself off from other people by cultivating an image of the pure, faultless human being, while all the time seething underneath with self-doubts, suppressed passions, and dark emotions that he doesn’t want to face. The Duke of Vienna goes undercover into the city for reasons which are not clear, and leaves Angelo in charge of cleaning up the moral degradation that has occurred throughout the city. The first thing Angelo does is arrest one of the most prominent citizens for getting his fiancé pregnant. His downfall begins when the man’s sister comes to beg for her brother’s life. Angelo is smitten with her and offers to save her brother if she will “give me love.”

I’ve seen two versions of this play. Both directors chose to take a dark view of Angelo and people like him. I found something different in the play. At the end, the character Mariana, who was abandoned by Angelo, says, “They say, best men are moulded out of faults;/ And, for the most, become much more the better/For being a little bad: so may my husband.” It’s this idea that we have chosen to emphasize in our production. We all make mistakes and if we learn from them we can become more understanding, less judgmental, and more loving. Measure for Measure, and all of Shakespeare, have layers upon layers of themes for us to examine. All good literature and movies do. They are a doorway into the human soul and that’s what I find fascinating about them.

As I was writing this post, it went in a little bit different direction than I was originally intending. That’s okay, I’ve got another post on Saturday, when I may write more about the connections between seemingly disparate media that I’ve been making lately. I’ll leave you with this quote from my A Course in Miracles lesson for today. It struck me as profoundly comforting and perhaps it’s an idea that you need too. “Try to remember when there was a time, perhaps a minute, maybe even less when nothing came to interrupt your peace; when you were certain you were loved and safe. Then try to picture what it would be like to have that moment be extended to the end of time and to eternity.” Maybe that’s what we seek when we pray, meditate, read, watch content, talk to our friends and family, to find those moments of profound peace and extend them for as long as we can.

Thanks for reading, liking and commenting. I appreciate it very much. I hope you have moments of peace today.

Shōgun

“How beautiful life is and how sad! How fleeting, with no past and no future, only a limitless now.” ~ James Clavell, Shōgun

“First the priests arrive. Then the conquistadores.” ~ James Clavell, Shōgun

“it’s a saying they have, that a man has a false heart in his mouth for the world to see, another in his breast to show to his special friends and family, and the real one, the secret one, which is never known to anyone except to himself alone, hidden only God knows.” ~ James Clavell, Shōgun

Shōgun is a story of clashing cultures. It takes place in the early 17th century Japan.

The mini-series came out in 1980 with production values that were very high. It was the era of the big budget retellings of best selling and classic books. The cinematography of these mini-series was spectacular, the stories compelling as well as educational. Richard Chamberlain was the king of a succession of them. Every few months, audiences got to travel to exotic places, and learn something about different cultures and/or time periods. One of my favorites of this golden age the mini-series was the story of John Blackthorne played to perfection, in my estimation, by Chamberlain. The series also uses the talents of many famous and accomplished Japanese actors, the great Toshirō Mifune among them. You may have seen him in Seven Samurai, which was the inspiration for the western, The Magnificent Seven.

The kinds of stories that attract me the most are ones in which the main character goes on an awakening journey. The character of Blackthorne is based on the historical figure Sir William Adams, who surprisingly, even to this day has a neighborhood somewhere in Japan, named after him.

In the fictional story, Blackthorne is the English Pilot-Major of the Dutch ship Erasmus. It’s the first Dutch ship to breach the secrets of the Straits of Magellan. They have pirated Spanish navigational charts, which can get them killed if that’s discovered. Their goal is to get to Asia to take part in plundering the previously unknown lands that have made the Spanish and Portuguese so wealthy. It’s a dangerous mission, not only crossing so much ocean, but if and when they reach “The Japans”, they have no idea if they will be able to get around the Portuguese to negotiate with the inhabitants.

Unfortunately, they are shipwrecked on the the Japanese coast. Many crew members are killed, and their Captain-General is gravely ill. Blackthorne must become their spokesperson. But the Portuguese priests have a foothold and Blackthorne is protestant. He does not trust the Catholic priests to translate his words accurately. This complicates matters, as does the fact that the Japanese are not interested in the rivalries of these intruders. Even though the Portuguese have a foothold, it is a precarious one. After some painful lessons Blackthorne must endure about what the Japanese consider polite behavior, he is tentatively taken under the wing of the powerful, Lord Toranaga.

Both the book and the series do a great job of juxtaposing the European cultures with the Japanese. Each group have fundamentally different ways of viewing the world. This is even true for the Portuguese and Blackthorne. But what makes him different from all the other Europeans is that he’s willing to not only learn about Japanese culture and customs but he begins to embrace their way of life.

After months of separation, he is reunited with his shipmates and how much his world view has changed becomes painfully apparent to them both. He can barely stand to be near them. He’s become used to bathing every day, while his European associates stand by their fear of bathing as unhealthy. Blackthorne’s palate has changed as well, he can no longer tolerate the food and drink he used to enjoy, and he finds that his life philosophy has also been substantially changed. For one thing, each person in Japanese society has a specific purpose. For the most part, the Japanese people don’t question this. To play one’s role is to support one’s family honor, and the honor of their Lord. Doing something for individual gain is a foreign concept to the Japanese. Lord Toranaga may be in a power struggle with Lord Ishido, but he is not doing it for personal gain, at least not on the surface. He’s struggling to protect the Emperor, who is just a child, from the unscrupulous Ishido. And that is a much more noble purpose than the power struggle between the Portuguese and Dutch.

Shōgun is one of only a very few books I have read more than once. There is something I find appealing about the Japanese philosophy: There is only now, to give one’s life for others is the highest gift one can give, and to be content with one’s place in the grand scheme of things makes life simpler. It’s not that the Japanese characters don’t suffer, they do. Some are even ambitious for personal power. And to our Western way of thinking, some of their interactions were barbaric. But I love the fact that we get a chance to compare the Eastern and Western way of operating in the world. In the end the Western drive for conquest and riches is much less appealing than the harmony in all things sought by the Japanese characters. At least I found it so.

In the last few decades, we Westerners have begun to embrace many Eastern spiritual practices. I think this is a good thing since their goal is to achieve inner peace. I know I can use a lot more peace and much less hectic rushing around in my own life. Watching and reading Shōgun was my introduction to Eastern philosophy leading me to read the Tao Te Ching, and other such books. In my case, James Clavell, a writer of fiction, wove such a compelling story that I researched his source material and began a new tangent of spiritual exploration. I hope to be as accomplished a writer one day and influence some reader’s thinking in such a profound way.

Thanks for reading, liking and commenting. Have a restful weekend.