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The Performance By Frater M.O. | |
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law. She wore a short black dress, a pink and white polka dot sash and made an entrance as if she owned the place. For some reason she brought a purse, a bulky, mismatching purse that would eventually sit patiently on a stool on the stage. She carelessly plopped herself down on the piano bench in front of the spotlight and joked with the audience. And after a brief sound check she flipped back her hair, which immediately fell back into her face, and began to sing. She sang with heart and conviction, with eyes closed, perhaps imagining a larger more attentive crowd. Her ability was more than adequate if not excellent. She sounded like a cross between Kate Bush, Edith Piaf, a quart of vodka and a fist full of valiums. She sang a song that would billow like ash from industrial smokestacks in a Kafka novel. Her lyrics were honest but dark and I couldn't help but think she was like the singing cigarette girl from a Woody Allen movie. I thought her dress was a little too short, her legs too thin. In my humble opinion, her melody lines meandered. Although I sat in uncomfortable high-back pew-style seats, wedged in as a fifth person in a four-person row and was unable to cross my legs, I blamed her for my discomfort. By her second song my ass fell asleep. The chatter from the dinner conversation in the next room was distracting and grew louder. The homely waitress kept blocking my view. I was stunned by all the applause after her third song finished. Well okay, she obviously took great pains cultivating what she had to say. She clearly had spent years playing music, sitting in front of a piano. She knew something about craft and harmony. She kept on playing. While I waited for her dreadful set to end, I prayed that someone would spontaneously come up and massage my ass to wake it up. I also continued to list the things wrong with her performance -- too loud, her voice shook on the third word in the last chorus. I know I heard it. Sometimes she made an odd face while singing. She was oblivious to my needs as an audience member. Neither the chatter from the dinning room nor the chatter in my head would distract her performance. After a lengthy inner diatribe about her many failings great and small, I asked myself, what was it that I really didn't like about her? Was it really the dress, the voice, the melody lines? What I didn't like about her more than anything else was not her inability to entertain but her inability to need anyone's help, especially mine. She just got up and played, making the process of being seen and putting it all out there too simple, like a damn Nike commercial! It is unlikely that she was doing her True Will that night, playing piano on a Thursday night in some small club. The notion would minimize her importance as an individual and minimize the task of understanding the higher self.*1 But I assume some part of her Will includes baring her Self to a room full of strangers or finding the Light within the billowing Dark? Giving those of us in uncomfortable high-back chairs a chance to identify with her truth or merely see beyond the bulky purse and chatter that distracts us. Her process did not deserve to be judged by me, it was meant to be viewed, to be seen. Just as the sage watches the ten thousand things rise and fall without cease.*2 The funny thing about doing my True Will is that it is my True Will. It's not for me to decide how she could perform better, write better, compose better – be better. Sometimes the hardest part of doing my True Will is the simple truth -- I'm not to fix anyone's process, except my own. A process that is mine to perfect and occasionally be seen as it serves my Will. At the end of her show, after the encore from a standing ovation, she had told her story without excuses. She performed. She picked up her clumsy purse and left the stage – as if she owned the place. In the end, I was a begrudging fan. I stood with admiration and applauded with the rest of the witnesses who watched her imperfections rise and fall without cease and considered myself fortunate for the opportunity. The art of doing True Will and nothing else requires no apologies. Nor does it need to be validated. It is accepting the eternal struggle with oneself -- to do what we were meant to do as individuals. It also means that I have to do the work and massage my own ass if I want to wake it up! Questions, comments and hate mail are strongly encouraged. By the way these thoughts do not necessarily reflect the ideals of Cor Lucis as a whole or its members... but they might. Love is the law, love under will. 1 For more on True Will see "A Taste of Will and Blueberries." 2 A favorite image from the "Tao Te Ching" by Feng and English.
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