A Happy New Year Wrapped in an Actor's Nightmare: Thoughts on How to be True to Yourself

By Rahti Gorfien

So I dreamt I was at a contest…the Manhattan Monologue Slam in NYC, and I didn’t have my piece memorized.  Now mind you, I’m not doing things for free these days.  Granted, if you win this thing its a hundred dollars, but that possible outcome wouldn’t be enough of a motivation for me at this point. But I digress into self-argument. I had nothing prepared and wasn’t going to do it…until an old friend from my acting life kept prodding me to.  I was almost up and wasn’t ready, so he talked me into moving my name down the list.  I walked onstage between acts, and did that.  Put myself dead last (interesting choice of words), went off to a quite corner and started cramming…still, the thing was moving faster than expected, I was almost up, and having done half-baked things before and suffered the shame, I let it pass.  I didn’t respond to my name.  I don’t know what they thought: that I’d fallen asleep, not been listening or some other school girl-like behavior that would have gotten me pilloried in my youth.  And I didn’t care.  Or at least part of me didn’t.  I chose not to try and prove anything.  My friend was disappointed and didn’t quite understand.  But he’s a working actor who never stopped being a working actor.  He’s always felt entitled to that, known how to market himself, and if I play the feminist card I’d say wasn’t subject to out-of-control female exigencies like motherhood (even though he has a son) like I have.  At least not to my knowledge.  And furthermore… it was just a dream. 

So what’s my point?  Something about knowing my limits, knowing when I’m ready and when I’m not, and being honest with myself first, before upholding some self-perceived image of who Rahti is in the eyes of others.  I yam what I yam, as Popeye says.  And I gotta start from there.   

And so, Happy New Year, my friends.  My message this first month of the new decade is, start from where you are.  Make a fearless assessment of that, with out judgment or acrimony.  Next, make a list of your 6 top priorities in life, and compare that list to how you’re really spending your time.  Then realign yourself for the year.  Don’t feel you have to do it alone: Pick up the phone; call a friend and do it together. Call me, for that matter. Check those 6 things regularly and don’t let them slip off the map.   

My suggested motto for 2010: Love yourself, and keep it simple.   

Rahti Gorfien, of Creative Calling Coaching, is a Life Coach and Park Slope mom, specializing in mothers with universal and yet unique challenges to succeed both personally as mothers and professionally in their chosen vocations. She is also a regular contributor to Momasphere. Contact her to schedule a consultation and find out whether her coaching can help you reclaim your creative calling!