No One Is Alone...Truly...

As artists we need our alone time to regenerate, to explore, to study, to gestate …

We don’t need to be alone even if the journey is an individual one.

Developing a team and a community - is crucial to the health and well being of the performing artist, no matter the pursuit.

Who is part of your team?

Who is your community? Your tribe?

I admit, I prefer my own company and my circle is small. It always has been.

We are complex and intriguing creatures, aren’t we? So many of us are people pleasers, nurturers, empaths, extroverted-introverts, often needing space, needing solitude, yet needing validation; often not trusting easily, but will give our power away without realizing…

The complexities are deep. It can create a false sense of isolationism instead of keeping us safe. Alone can be fine if you are needing to regenerate and reboot, but isolation can be devastating and not healthy. It can breed that dreaded imposter syndrome, it can allow those voices (you know the ones) to get louder and make you second guess every decision you’ve ever made, it can create a breeding ground for delusion….

So, what to do?

Your community is crucial. This doesn’t need to be 500 of your closest friends. (!) Some of that community will be within the business you pursue, some of it, not. Knowing who is where and why is important to keep straight.

Just like the rest of your life, your community doesn’t need to be all or nothing.

Your team, doesn’t need to be all or nothing.

Just because someone else has 8 professionals on what they call their “team”, doesn’t mean you need that too. You need, what you need, when you need it. Figuring out those details is up to you.

No comparisons. No excuses. No narratives and scripts that have no business in your lexicon.

Just you.

So, YOU as a human, as a creative, as a “fill in the blank” - what do YOU need?

What makes you feel grounded, fully YOU.

Working out? Therapy? Sunday brunch? Going for a walk? Putting on your headphones? Taking a cooking class?

Make a list that you associate with. They can be daily things (meditation?), they can be infrequent things that are still very important (travel?).

Now, work into the business of you? What do you need? How often do you need it? Who represents that in your world? Is it their expertise? Whose expertise do you need?

A voice teacher you trust to help you discover what your voice can do and how it develop; a coach (or two or three) that can help you realize musical and dramatic development; an acting teacher that you can work with; a dance teacher/movement class that offers what you need in your journey; An ENT; A massage therapist or body work specialist?

Who else and what else comes to mind?

Are these professionals part of your team and then can they be part of your community?

Some of them will definitely fulfill both.

The word that I think is compatible for both your team and your community is: TRUST.

As someone who has never trusted easily, but works to create trust, this is a big one for me.

Do you feel safe?

Do you feel seen?

Do you feel engaged?

Do you feel like an individual that has value in their presence and within their expertise?

When these people are in place, at all levels of professional and personal, your world has stability, even if you feel like it’s spinning!

Remember, you don’t HAVE to do anything. You simply CAN do something to create this team that you may need and want, or need to focus in on.

Every relationship you delve into and form in an action that you create. The stronger the framework, the more trust you can instill and the more you can feel like yourself there. This opens the doors to more and more possibility in all aspects of your craft, your humanness, your journey, the business of you and artist of you.

Take a minute to see how rich you are or could be by claiming the team that supports you and the community that you have chosen to be a part of, or are just beginning to explore being a part of.

Does your team need re-working? Is your community strong enough? gentle enough? flexible enough? trustworthy enough?

Do you need to reset your goals, re-evaluate your temperate in order to engage more fully?

A moment to reflect in true solitude can calm down the voices that don’t need to be so loud, so the voices that need to be there can enter your sphere in a new way!

No one is alone…