Been thinking a lot lately about my inversion practices in yoga class and how they relate to my life as a whole. The headstand, the hand stand, forearm stand, tripod handstand...I always feel like I'm right at the point where I could leave the support of having the wall behind me when I kick up and actually practice them in the middle of the room. But then I start to settle in to the safety of the wall as a support and a backup and I'll spend months not advancing at all with any one particular pose. For example, I may have gotten to where I can balance for a few seconds in a handstand but, without the wall there behind me, I can't come up without risking toppling over on my way up. In headstand I've grasped and put into practice the concept of using my core strength to lift myself up versus using momentum from kicking up but lately, though I can get up, I haven't been able to stay up for very long for fear of, once again, toppling over. Either way, with any of the poses, I always hit a wall. And I don't advance until I sit back and examine what I need to do to get to the next level.
As with music and voice over, I feel as though I get to one point and can't get any further until I fully examine the nature of my obstacles. Regrouping and examining my methods and their results is key at these points.
Having this insight from yoga is great, too, because I can apply what that practice teaches me across the board. Which is this: I find that, in yoga class, and lately, especially with headstand, it's most effective for me to not feel bad if I have to come out of the pose for fear of losing my balance. I just allow myself to make several attempts at it before accepting that I've tried hard enough for today, no matter how far I've gotten. I also avoid looking around the room at the damn yogi rock stars that are up and balancing the whole time. It's not about competition. Even if the voice over and music stuff can be at times, it's still helpful to import this line of thinking into that arena. After all, I have to acknowledge with both that I can only do so much and that there are only so many hours in a day. The important thing is that I try and I'm not idle. If I try something and it doesn't work, I keep going and I try the next thing. And when I've had enough: rest in child's pose.
That having been said, I am definitely making strides with both but there's never an uninterrupted stream of progress. I must always contend with obstacles. Trying not to let this discourage me is the trick.
And the amazing thing is that, with both areas of my life, I will often pass a milestone in a very noticeable way. That feeling of weightlessness when you can balance in handstand even for a second equates with that amazing feeling when someone hears my music or my voice and likes what they hear enough to hire me and I realize that the hard work has paid off to some degree. It's that "hey, wait. Maybe I can do this." feeling that's so amazing. And it really does feel like, despite all of the slips and falls and awkward landings, I can balance, at least a little.
So I should keep it going, right? I started this blog sitting at Barbès and typing on my phone while listening to Slavic Soul Party. It's a Tuesday night which means it's my Friday and I wanted to cut loose a little so I headed over there after dinner with my girlfriend in the Village. Work at NY1 has been hectic and I'm really feeling the weight of all the balls I have up in the air right now (At the moment, I'm looking for legal help with the contract from the licensing agency and have several emails out to talent agents and production companies with my voice over demos attached.) and occasionally, it gets a little frustrating waiting for them to land. Though, I'm happy right now that I have lots of work, even if not the paid kind, just yet. I'm finishing a ton of pieces to send off to this licensing agency once I finish looking over the contract and am satisfied. I'm doing some pro bono work for a friend who was helping produce a short PSA and needs music. I'm also auditioning for voice over stuff on an almost daily basis. On top of it all, I got a little bit of a nice pay off from all the hard work I've already done this year when a director I worked with sent me a link to the finished film that I scored. I'm a little unsure about posting it just yet because it was a password protected link but PM me if you wish to hear/see it. It's a 13 minute Sci-fi short titled, "The Feed." You may have heard me talk about it a good bit back in April, May and June if you read this blog at all.
Now, I'm afraid it's time for me to go to sleep for a change. Wish me luck with all of the above, headstands and handstands notwithstanding.
As with music and voice over, I feel as though I get to one point and can't get any further until I fully examine the nature of my obstacles. Regrouping and examining my methods and their results is key at these points.
Having this insight from yoga is great, too, because I can apply what that practice teaches me across the board. Which is this: I find that, in yoga class, and lately, especially with headstand, it's most effective for me to not feel bad if I have to come out of the pose for fear of losing my balance. I just allow myself to make several attempts at it before accepting that I've tried hard enough for today, no matter how far I've gotten. I also avoid looking around the room at the damn yogi rock stars that are up and balancing the whole time. It's not about competition. Even if the voice over and music stuff can be at times, it's still helpful to import this line of thinking into that arena. After all, I have to acknowledge with both that I can only do so much and that there are only so many hours in a day. The important thing is that I try and I'm not idle. If I try something and it doesn't work, I keep going and I try the next thing. And when I've had enough: rest in child's pose.
That having been said, I am definitely making strides with both but there's never an uninterrupted stream of progress. I must always contend with obstacles. Trying not to let this discourage me is the trick.
And the amazing thing is that, with both areas of my life, I will often pass a milestone in a very noticeable way. That feeling of weightlessness when you can balance in handstand even for a second equates with that amazing feeling when someone hears my music or my voice and likes what they hear enough to hire me and I realize that the hard work has paid off to some degree. It's that "hey, wait. Maybe I can do this." feeling that's so amazing. And it really does feel like, despite all of the slips and falls and awkward landings, I can balance, at least a little.
So I should keep it going, right? I started this blog sitting at Barbès and typing on my phone while listening to Slavic Soul Party. It's a Tuesday night which means it's my Friday and I wanted to cut loose a little so I headed over there after dinner with my girlfriend in the Village. Work at NY1 has been hectic and I'm really feeling the weight of all the balls I have up in the air right now (At the moment, I'm looking for legal help with the contract from the licensing agency and have several emails out to talent agents and production companies with my voice over demos attached.) and occasionally, it gets a little frustrating waiting for them to land. Though, I'm happy right now that I have lots of work, even if not the paid kind, just yet. I'm finishing a ton of pieces to send off to this licensing agency once I finish looking over the contract and am satisfied. I'm doing some pro bono work for a friend who was helping produce a short PSA and needs music. I'm also auditioning for voice over stuff on an almost daily basis. On top of it all, I got a little bit of a nice pay off from all the hard work I've already done this year when a director I worked with sent me a link to the finished film that I scored. I'm a little unsure about posting it just yet because it was a password protected link but PM me if you wish to hear/see it. It's a 13 minute Sci-fi short titled, "The Feed." You may have heard me talk about it a good bit back in April, May and June if you read this blog at all.
Now, I'm afraid it's time for me to go to sleep for a change. Wish me luck with all of the above, headstands and handstands notwithstanding.
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