Essentially, this mentor was asking me to look beyond the immediacy of the moment. By viewing life through a wider lens, he wanted me to consider whether my concerns were of the "temporary" or "life-altering" variety. If they were temporary, then my 35-year-old self may not even remember what those worries were. And if my concerns were more serious, even at the life-altering level, he wanted me to think about how my 35-year-old self would feel about how my 20-something self handled the situation.
Of course, the exercise wasn't intended to diminish how real my problems were at the time. Challenges and difficulties arise in every stage of life. What I was dealing with then wasn't any less serious just because I happened to be younger than I am now. But considering my problems with the wisdom of distance (even imagined distance) did provide some perspective that often helped guide my way forward.
2020 has presented challenges that none of us has ever experienced, and there is no telling what the coming weeks and months will bring. Related to our work together, this semester of mostly online instruction has been, in some ways, better than expected and, in other ways, more difficult than I had anticipated.
Remembering my mentor's words, it does help me to remember that, eventually, we will all look back at this time (even though I passed 35 a decade ago). Ten, fifteen, or even twenty years down the road, how do you think you will feel about the way you responded to the challenges of 2020? Will you regret missed opportunities? Will you be proud of how you faced adversity? Or will you just be glad to have survived?
This is a tough year. But imagine yourself at 35. How will you hope 2020 will have impacted you? How are you staying motivated to continue progressing and working toward a better future?
Now go practice.
I mean I'll probably be pretty f*cking happy to have survived at all. Though 2020 has indeed been a gauntlet full of a myriad of challenges and trials, I feel it was necessary for me to experience in order to be the person I am right in this moment, and that includes the artist I am. I feel it helped put things into perspective, majorly in the realm of taking a step back and realizing that: a)most things are fleeting, b)troubling times pass, it usually all works out, c)tough situations test our strength and make us resilient, d)we are so lucky to have art as an outlet to escape reality and just be present with our breath and the moment...honestly I could go through the whole alphabet. Honestly at 35, I will probably look back on 2020 and laugh..or cry...or a little of both. I think it was the major reset that I needed to reinvigorate, and crumble a little bit, and learn how to get up and put Humpty back together again.
ReplyDeleteI really do like the perspective of asking myself what my 35-year old self would be thinking. This helps me to calm down and realize that most of the things that I feel are life-threatening are much more in the moment stressors and are not worth the emotional exhaustion that they are causing. As for what my 35-year old self will think about 2020, I am unsure. It's been such a year of ups and downs, good and bad, that it's been difficult just to keep up! I certainly have learned so much about myself as a person and an artist. I've found that while I do live for human connection, solitude can be good for me to decompress while also reminding me that I can use my art for fun, rather than just schoolwork and career work. Throughout the year, I've expanded my knowledge on social justice issues and worked to acquire my own view on politics and philosophy. I don't want to necessarily say that I'm glad that this year happened the way it did, but I do have to say that I have learned and grown a lot due to the diverse challenges we've had to learn how to overcome.
ReplyDeleteBut on more right now stuff, practice is going well! I had a really great practice day today, my voice and everything felt like it was falling in line! At this point in the semester, I'm really having to fight for the motivation to work on assignments and everything, but I'm really starting to see some of the work pay off. This is what is encouraging me to continuously move forward.
As we all know, 2020 has definitely been a really difficult year. Between cancelled events and not being able to see friends, it was very easy for us to lose sense of who we were as people and what we wanted to achieve in our futures. But reading this blog post definitely has inspired me to look to the future and ask myself what my 35-year-old would think of this whole situation. I know that the pandemic will pass. It's going to pass, and right now, we have to do our best to get through it. I will be able to stand on a stage again, I will be able to hang out with friends again, and I will be able to do all the things I love to do once again. It's just a matter of time. I guess the most difficult thing to do right now is figuring out how to get through the now, and that requires adapting our lives in a way that keeps us engaged but also safe. For me, that's been getting out more to do outdoor activities and catching up on some fun reading. However, now that it is getting colder, I will have to figure out new ways to keep myself occupied and motivated, since I really don't like going out into the cold.
ReplyDeletePracticing has been going really well. I think that practicing has been much better this semester, because it's a constant that I can always go back to with all this craziness going around. Right now, I am getting ready for juries, so that just means repeatedly going through my songs, fixing things as I do it, and memorizing (which has always been the hardest part for me). But I'm really excited for this jury, because it is my first 10 MINUTE jury!! Hopefully, I can make it through without dying!
I will be pretty proud just to have gotten through 2020, it's been an very difficult year with staying motivated and staying sane. I think I will come out the other end feeling more capable of taking on challenges and staying focused on things that I care about. Right now, I'm trying to stay focused on why I'm still in school and why I think it will be really important for myself that I stayed in school in the future during this time, so it does help to think about how everything I'm doing is impacting my 35 year old self. Practicing consistently and even showing up to class consistently has been a struggle but just continuing through it and trying to remind myself why I'm here and why I want to be here has been helpful and will ultimately, I think, help me stay driven in the future.
ReplyDelete-Lina Boyer
2020 has puuuurely sucked, and I think that I will always lookback on this time and be shocked that I made it through. I think that I will have been proud of how I stepped up to the plate and carried through with my education. I will look back and be amazed that I was able to salvage at least some pieces of mental health together to stay afloat amid the everchanging crisis we all faced. I know that i will have regretted not being able to do Everybody the play this year, but more just have been sad about this missed opportunity. I might feel like i missed out on making my own zoom theatre work, but i really dont think it would be worth the toll on my mental health.
ReplyDeletePractice has been hitting that mid year slump where i just am doing the bare minimums and going through the motions. I've been doing ok at not missing or skipping practices, but i do want to improve on that and try to do better where i can. I'm hoping that our new class schedule will help me feel more reinvigorated. I'm pretty excited about that, but we shall see.
-Zac Thorn
Thinking about how different things will be and how I will remember these weird and trying times is something I’ve actually done a lot recently. I feel it’s important to come to terms with things being hard in the moment but at the same time you should know that time makes things easier.
ReplyDeletePractice has been going alright, I’ve been having a hard time motivating myself to do anything at all this past week but I’ve made sure to do exercises and warmups but actually working on my music is something I need to do more. I worry that having an on off schedule will be difficult for me but I’m keeping my head up and telling myself I’ve just got to stay on top of things.
- Tate Foshay
2020 has most certainly been a crazy year and it's a good thing to be able to take a step back and look at the long term. The pandemic won't last forever and it's important to remember that there is another side. Even though I can't be on stage performing, the work I put in now will pay off eventually. I've definitely been having a harder time staying motivated with practicing lately but I want to make sure that I start this week off strong!
ReplyDeleteI’ve always been worried about the future. It wasn’t until just last year I decided that I truly wanted to do musical theatre, and everyday I thank that I did. One thing that at age 18, I know that 2020 has done for me, is that I chose the University of Utah. If it wasn’t for quarantine, I wouldn’t have actually taken time to look and research into this program, I would have gone straight to the University of Illinois. This year has been tough for all of us. It’s a year that forced us to grow up faster and change our lives dramatically in such a short amount of time. In the future, when I’m thinking about our time during the pandemic, I would feel pretty content with how I handled it. There are times where I do believe I could have worked harder, but I’m still able to be kept motivated to work. I want 2020 to teach me to be patient. I’ve always been an impatient learner and I want to change that. The way that I’m staying motivated, is that I just imagine my life in NYC once I start living there, and how great it’ll be, and all I need to do to get there, is work extra hard the next 4 years.
ReplyDeleteI think down the road I will thank myself for what did happen and also what didn’t happen. I find it kind of funny, but I think I have developed more as an individual in the past nine months than I ever have. What I mean by that is I think I’m really coming into my own as a man. I think that’s going to be my biggest take away when I’m 35 looking back at 2020 and thinking of this crazy pandemic. Of course I wish things could be normal, but also I don’t think I’d be who I am today without the circumstances. And frankly, I very much like the person who I am now
ReplyDeleteJosh W
This year has forced me to develop. Never have I had so much time to reflect on my thoughts and feelings, and never have I been forced to sit with myself without using eternal business as a coping mechanism. This has both opened my mind to a heightened sense of self awareness as well as terrible anxiety. When I am 35, I will probably view this year as a "reset".
ReplyDeleteOverall,I don't feel like I am getting the education or the year that I wanted. It feels like all this incredible momentum I had last year has come to a dead halt.
That being said, I have a feeling that my 35 year old self will thank me for getting a degree and for sticking with my class. But another thing COVID has taught me is how to be flexible-now I know that you can't guarantee much in this world (and that's not an inherently bad thing.)So, in other words, I will stick to this and persevere. But if it doesn't work, it isn't the end of the world. I will simply have to find a new way to pursue my ambitions. Thank you so SO much, Brian!
Abby D
I always look back at what I do. Mostly I look back and worry about what I did, was it right, did I mess something up or say something I shouldn't have? Most of these fears are baseless, but there are a few that I do worry about. These are things I know are coming up, and that I'm concerned with because they may alter my future. So as I'm making a decision I think of how I will be impacted in the future. I don't think about these decisions as if I am 35, but generally. I don't know where I'll be when I'm 35, let alone 25. Even with that, I am pushing forward with things that, though I have doubts now, will be good for me. 2020 has been insane, no way around that. I don't know if 2020 itself has altered my plans for when I'm 35. My plans have changed in 2020, but I don't think it's because of this year.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that was mentioned to me was that, even though 2020 has been historic, tumultuous, and life-altering, it isn't the worse year that has happened in the last 80 years. Even if you look at the past decade it isn't the worst, think of the 1960s; 3 political leaders assassinated, the world on brink of nuclear war, and a war halfway across the world. While this doesn't make the current situation any better, it does give me a little hope that if we made it through that, then this year, which has been one of the worst of our lives, will come and go and things will (hopefully) get better.
- Will
Seeing myself older i think i will look back and see that year was not just a waste. don't get me wrong, this year has not been kind but i have not been seeing it as a waste. i see it as a test to make sure that we a know that life is not going to be easy. we need to know that life has lots of challenges and we need to be ready. It's been very hard to be motivated because there isn't someone by you to tell you if you are doing it all correctly.
ReplyDeleteAlex Fish
I'm the kind of person who doesn't know where the future will take me. I roll with the punches and am way too much of an optimist for any kind of negativity to stop any current plans. I see myself at 35, hopefully in love, doing what I love. Thats about it. I don't know where I'll be physically or even what I will be doing. I hope its performing but if not thats okay too. I never try to plan for the furutre becasue I often go way off track and too stressed about how everything in my life isn't going exactly as planned. About 10 months ago I just stopped planning and I let what happens happen within moderation. It has helped releive a lot of stress. 2020 has impacted me but mostly just with difficulty. I didn't enjoy quarantine and now we are in a sort of perma quaratine that really makes it hard for extroverts like me. If anything 2020 has taught me who I can trust and who I can lean on for support.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that anybody could have predicted the insanity of 2020. There is a lot of chaos in our day, but I have found that life has an incredible way of carrying on. Even though online classes are not ideal, I am grateful for the technology that 2020 has enabled us with. If this were to have happened fifteen years ago, things might not be so simple. I think that it is important to remember all of the good things that we have, especially during times where everything seems to be going so wrong. It is easy to get caught up in all of the negatives, but taking time to remember the good things is so important for our mental and physical well being. I think that 35 year old me would be pleases with how my 21 year old self handled the mess of 2020.
ReplyDeleteEven if we couldn't have predicted this year, we have all been laying groundwork for our ability to stay alive during a pandemic. I wish I had developed more self-reliance before, so I wouldn't be so stuck now. I have been practicing singing a lot, but I haven't felt like I've seen much progress. I've been helped by my monologues teacher a lot in improving my ability to let go and trust myself, and that has been helpful.
ReplyDeleteI hope by the time I am 35 I have my life together a little more than I do now. I hope 2020 has taught me to role with the punches and make the best out of tough situations. I think this year will follow us for a while but I hope eventually things get too normal. At 35 I hope I will still be as motivated as I am today even if it is with different goals. I know with each stage of life comes new challenges and I think by 35 the things I find important now will not be as important.
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