Monday, October 13

My class met on our own today to discuss some of the issues that we've been having as of late.

The road to becoming an ensemble has been rocky for us thus far. Our group is made up of intelligent, strong-willed leaders. I love that about us, actually, but it does complicate the way we operate. We haven't yet arrived at a place where we can put our personal differences aside in order to trust and respect each other as artists.

I know that there is no quick fix for the problems that we have had with joining together as an ensemble. I knew going into today that we weren't all going to suddenly be smiling and agreeing. And we weren't.

That said, I think that it means a lot that we were willing to try. The fact that eleven people all showed up to the same place on our day off shows that we're all committed to working out our differences. We stayed for an hour and a half.

Some of the things that were said had been points of discussion before, but there was a generally open environment this time. We were respectful of each other, and allowed everyone a turn to speak. We listened and responded to the concerns that were raised. It felt more like a conversation than an argument, for which I was grateful. I only spoke a couple of times, but I said something that I've been needing to say for awhile. I don't know if it did anything to help the discussion, but it did make me feel a little bit better to get it out into the group.

It's so easy to become divisive in these sorts of conversations. It's obvious what our differences are. The challenge is to look past them in a spirit of unity.

We came up with some ideas about how to alter the structure of our Acting class to be more productive and less argumentative. We shared our thoughts on what we're trying to accomplish and ways to problem-solve. Iceman brought up wanting to work on a creative atmosphere and an artistic goal. Wifey raised the concept of "choosing to agree", quite like one would in an improv exercise. Two-Shots-Up commented that what we're working toward is bigger than all of us. Really, everyone made insightful contributions. And although I sensed frustrations at times, it stayed calm and focused throughout.

I didn't walk out with a feeling that everything was solved. What I do have is a hope that we're getting on the right track.

I don't know if things will be different now, but I've decided to go into the week with the mentality that they will. After all, if we start off tomorrow thinking that we're never going to become a proper ensemble, then we won't be. We can't poison ourselves against it with pessimism.

So here's to tomorrow.

~A~