when to do a backbend and when to walk away.

                                                                                                                                (photo Kinga Jaczewska)





The need to take more free time and to live more mindful lives is today very present. In times when everything happens so fast, so much and so non-stop, the idea of slowing down is strongly attractive. The practices of slow breathing, slow blinking, slow chewing, slow running, slow cooking, slow talking or slow cleansing have become an ambition for many of us
but.

There are also many of us that without ever asking for it, are now stuck with their fists full of free time; many of us that are living their minds’ fullness, and are at the same time being eaten by this very mindfulness; many of us that have finally reached the moment of ‘independence’, ‘waterfall of creativity’ or the awaited ‘real life enjoyment’, are now, delicately saying, having some difficulties enjoying it.
With many parallel thoughts tangled in their heads, they are simultaneously concluding the past, considering the now and creating the future, hoping that the speed of events will no longer be so slow. Wishing, that their free time would soon be taken away from them or that somewhere on the street, in the shop, on the radio, in the horoscope or maybe in the ‘9 star Ki’ astrology, they will at least find a hint of a direction in which they should go.


Lightly exhausted from their own enthusiasm and ongoing trying, they are hesitating whether to follow the ‘be patient -let the things come to you’ sort of quote or rather the ‘don’t be reactive – be proactive!’ one-liner… Wondering whom to write to, with whom to meet and where to go to. Analysing when is the right moment to step into the crowd of other eager, potential employees or when is it better to stay out of it? When to giggle? When to, within a time of a shared but surely interrupted glass of wine, begin to recite their own cv, a headshot, two dance pictures, a motivational letter and a 5 year long development plan? When to do a backbend and when to stop and walk away?
Even when the inner discussion of pros and cons brought answers to all these questions and everything is ready for the upcoming cultural situation but for some reason they dare not to go or simply cannot attend then - BANG!Another Spaghetti of thoughts hits their heads saying: ‘Oh you are giving up!’, ‘Oh they won’t see your face!’, ‘Oh you won’t make any contacts!’ and the well-known underline ‘Oh you won’t make it!’.

We-ll... rubbish!.’ – breaks in my keyboard...

They are always questioning, answering, hoping, regretting, planning and overanalysing. Always doing it all at once, always hoping for a ‘click’ somewhere on the way. Their talent of multitasking, that is now so commonly practiced, is also known as versatility – a skill characteristic for contemporary performers... 

Or at least performers of a contemporary quarter life crisis whose competence, passion, openness, commitment or hard work doesn’t seem to meet equivalent opportunities. But then, perhaps, it is the equivalent opportunities that cannot meet every willing body and mind, because there are simply not enough of them. And so, perhaps, this is why these bodies and minds keep on desperately searching for a direction to then be able to create these equivalent opportunities themselves...


?.

I daily get amazed by this 75% water, brain of mine. Its’ capacity to store miles of my glowing as well as cloudy thoughts, together with some transparent, space taking ones, does impress me at times. At others though, it drives me crazy!
This contemplating selection just swims inside of my head confused and with no order whatsoever, it is waiting to be organised or at least divided into clearer files of: an assistant, an artist, a babysitter, a choreographer, a dancer, a daughter, a foreigner, a friend, a girlfriend, an interviewer, a maker, a performer, a researchera sister, a student, an unemployed, a writer, a yoga teacher and somewhere amongst that, the least interesting one – a human being.

And here I think, is exactly where the point might have gone missing. A point of a human being that is not necessarily definable by the career stamp. A point that lifetime is a process, which sometimes more to our likings and sometimes less, will always be a process of searching during which ‘making it’ or ‘succeeding’ can only be defined individually by every single one of us and in our own time - with no rush.
And even though I myself might be starting to understand this point, I will still be hoping that speed and direction of life will soon become much more of what me and many others wished for it to be and that many thoughts would soon untangle, shorten and tidy themselves up leaving us with some space to enjoy the very searching itself.

Now, let’s just survive the winter.






December 2015.