"When we get out of the glass bottle of our ego and when we escape like the squirrels in the cage of our personality and get into the forest again, we shall shiver with cold and fright. But things will happen to us so that we don't know ourselves. Cool, un-lying life will rush in."
D.H. Lawrence
Yesterday marked a shift for me regarding something that I've always wanted (but never been brave enough) to do.. which is to take time off, away from theatre to travel.
Alike almost everyone who works in the industry.. since deciding to be a Movement Director, its been an endless (sometimes relentless), but INCREDIBLE passion-filled hike towards opportunities, productions, new meetings and connecting with new collaborators. It really took a while for it to sink in that I actually was a movement director (instead of just pretending to be one) let alone finally being able to fully sustain myself from teaching and directing movement, so the thought of taking any time out of the race up till now has felt so daunting and I haven't trusted myself to be able to cope with the break until recently..
Wanderlust is not a bug I have ever caught.. I've seen a few friends pack up their bags (usually adorned with travel towels, blow up pillows, sleep masks and litres of mosquito-bite cream) and leave to begin their adventure across the world and I've always looked at them with intense admiration whilst also thinking 'hmm.. not for me though'. To be honest, it really hasn't been.. for a long time I've been very career driven. I went straight from one degree to the next, on to shows and lecturing and I really haven't stopped since.. but this year things have somewhat changed. My one track career mind is slowly making room for the hunger of knowledge, experience, challenges, love and new friendships and there's this little tick-tock-timer ticking away at me like never before..
If not now.... when?
So.. Eventually settling on Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia + Singapore and completing the trip with a visit to New Zealand I hope to do just that for 9 weeks in the New Year of 2019.
Its not the right time.. It's never going to be the right time is it?
But I'm gonna do it.
There is a desire in me growing and yearning to learn more about the cultural, religious and societal movement languages of somewhere that isn't here in the UK and I'm hearing more and more about South East Asia's opportunities to connect with music, theatre, dance, puppetry and martial arts. But really I'm just as excited to get amongst their other ways of living.. to be saturated with non-western culture and to simply live another person's routine.
Im excited..
Im devastated that I won't work for two months (Get over yourself Tash!)
and I'm terrified.. but one way or the other.. Its happening. Better start planning.