Wednesday, February 25, 2015

Week 5- Training wheels off... learning to ride

Week 5

We completed the core sequence, and the physical training sequence.  As we move forward, we will be taking off the training wheels more and more.  Here's John's post about the week... add your comments and questions as well.  The conversation goes on!

We began work today with Margi doing Alexander Technique. I always enjoy this part of training because I can always feel a considerable difference in how my body feels after the work is done. Particularly with the realigning of my spine. Although it can be taxing it always makes me feel energized. Tonight we did a variety of exercises that dealt with using core strength to facilitate the moves and still be able to breath freely and without straining extra muscles not involved with moving the specific parts of the body. A great deal of them dealt with keeping our legs straight while moving them suspended in the air. It was a bit of a struggle for me because I have had difficulty putting too much weight on my tail bone, but I was able to do them with relative success and the workout made me break a sweat. Margi said that in time we would be able to do all the exercises in a half an hour's time.
George got us into our physical and imaginative space by doing some exercises with rhythm and free form movement. We did Blue Wave, Red Wave and Big X energies as well. I had particular trouble with these tonight. I didn't feel any sort of through line with my energy. I feel like I don't know what its ultimate goal is because I can't quite feel the energy coming from any of the forms, except for Blue Wave because that deals with allowing energy to flow up from the Earth out the top of my spine. It's still early in training though, and Gabe said it's good to allow myself to give into not knowing right now. Discouragement will get me nowhere. And if I never find out the deeper significance or function for it in theatrical application then I will not despair either. Acting is about picking and choosing, and Magis has already given me a great deal to use.
We ended class with work on a variety of Ceba's letters and even one of Sarra's. We were all given one line from a letter and from it we constructed our own psychological gesture from it to use in an exercise later in which we walked into the middle of the company and delivered our line to a fellow actor, they would then take the impulse as they saw fit and reacted accordingly by responding with their own line, and this was passed from actor to actor. I find psychological gestures very intriguing and helpful. Although I never really use them in a practical sense in my own work. I feel that they take up too much time to discover to be truly helpful. That's something I have come to learn a great deal of while at Magis. Patience, and being willing to spend hours on the work and not rushing through. We live in such a fast paced environment in New York City and convenience is in such high demand here that I think I expect it in all aspects of my life. I just need to give all the work more time and practice for it be more useful for me. I have time, I just need to focus it more effectively.

Although I was feeling a bit distracted during training I felt that I did my best and didn't put myself down for being unfocused at times. We all have our days.

Good beginning John, as we go more rapidly into the physical training, each individual actor has to search more and more inside to find the kind of specificity we did in the first weeks of "basics."  Yes some days will be better than others, and all days will provide information for us to get back in the groove with less prompting from the outside.  A slow method of appropriation, but the search is intensely personal and will be adjusted every day.  Good to know that it was tough to feel a through line in the energies when we go faster: how do we each adjust to find or remind ourselves that the action for one needs to be connected to the next?  How do we find the ability to feel the "jo ha kyu" ... the way that the beginning of the next wave is already present in the culmination of the previous one? Patience is definitely key... we constantly say "notice and adjust."  We often expect ourselves to be machines, but we forget that we are organic... so our progress is also organic.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

This is an excellent and honest spy-back John and a poignant reply George in terms of patience. And yes, give yourself permission to take time in processing and trust your own journey with the work.

What I found as a remarkable re-discovery is this: One wave (i.e. impulse) is there presently and as you’re completing the first, it’s our ability to allow the secondary wave (i.e. impulse) to be there (contained, radiating within) so when the initial wave/impulse is concluding the secondary picks up right where the first left off without a hitch. A seamless transition from one to the other.

This takes time to feel, acknowledge and allow a sense of ease to employ. But once you experience it, OMG does it feel fabulous!!! And effortless; ahhh- giant sigh here :-) It’s the law of thermodynamics: “Energy cannot be created or destroyed but only transferred from one form to another.”

This can be applied in all the aspects of our training not just the physical. This will become more apparent as we get more specific and introduce other aspects of the training.

So enjoy, explore, embrace the void/uncertainty and the feeling of the flow will come. I love that word “FLOW”.

You will discover your own personal unique impulses/thoughts/feelings which will make things terribly exciting for yourself. May the force be with you ;-) Enjoy the ride ;-) Peace!-Gabe :-)

Danielle Delgado said...

(Unfortunately, I missed this session due to being stuck between cities in transit ... but while being there I found that imagining the flow my breathing (recalling the video graphic Margi shared with us a couple of weeks back) resonated itself as a wave in my mind, and brought me present to myself as organic and not the machine I'd begun to feel like there in the hours-long purgatory of the airport ... which itself alleviated the many places I was holding tension. Sounds obvious, no doubt, but it was nonetheless a useful reminder of the power of the imagination in practical application! : )

George said...

Great reminder Danielle!

Unknown said...

Reading this was certainly comforting to me, as I, too have been struggling with finding a true connection to the Blue and Red Waves and X Energies. Though I have felt the connection to them previously, it has yet to be something I can consistently rely on for a strong connection to the energies inside me and in the room! It is SO easy to fall into a place of chastisement, and so far working with these waves has provided a lot of practice of fending that reflex off. Despite that struggle, the simple act of perseverance through my dissatisfaction with the waves, and pushing my body to trust itself, rather than the ability of my brain to understand it, has been immensely useful.

Anonymous said...

Tsebiyah-
I was very moved by your comment. It is SO SO easy to fall into chastisement. And yet we know that it is simply not helpful. It's easier said than done to let go of the voice that says "you're not doing it right!" But yes, the more we can just have experiences and then look back at them saying "Hmmmm That's interesting," rather than saying "That's good" or "That's bad" the better off we will be.
--Erika