Taking A Stand

The battle is not yet over.

Yet the war is already won.

So put your swords down.

Let His will be done.

First off, I am sick of all my anxiety. Why so anxious, Kat? Well I'll tell ya!

Today's worry comes from our sponsor: Christian Acting... to play demoralizing roles or not?

I have decided to take a stand on the situation, because there is nothing so demoralizing as becoming victim to your own fears and anxieties.

Taking it one role at a time, I will carefully and faithfully abide by five things:

1) Follow the red light, yellow light, or green light from the Holy Spirit.

2) Analyze the role and see if I can connect to her/him? :P to play the role effectively and realistically.

3) Look at the overarching message of the script. Does the character have a meaningful impact or is she just a fun-zie role?

4)Does this character's actions make me feel uncomfortable? Why? Is it worth taking the role?

5) If the role is worth taking, separate my life from my character's.

If I don't feel comfortable with a role, I simply won't do it.

You cannot connect with characters you simply do not connect to. Leave that role for someone who can.

Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses.

It is impossible for me to play EVERY single role.

Knowing that, I need to give myself some grace and play roles that play up my strengths.

This came about from last night's game night.

We were playing Charades, and I couldn't get them to guess "Lust" (although they got really close), not because I couldn't play it, but because I didn't want to play it. So I tried other ways to make them guess the word without performing something physically compromising. But guess what? The timer ran out... without them guessing the word. I felt like such a failure because I failed to perform something that comes pretty naturally to everyone as human beings.

"Seriously?" I thought to myself, "What's my deal?! Have I really become this conservative, or protected, or over-analytical? What the heck?!?!?!? I'm an actor, and yet I can't do lust??"

It slowly ate at me the rest of the night. After performing for.. oh... you know... my whole entire life, my inability stunned me. I've never been so guarded before.

I realized that I needed to separate myself from the game, because c'mon! It's JUST a game.

But for me it wasn't. It was an exercise of creativity.

Overthinkin' it YET again. I'm just trying to be shrewd, but anxiety is not good and is not right to feel, at least not at this level.

So it is not up to me to decide what sort of roles I will take. God knows me more than any human ever could. He knows what I am capable of, and will find places for me to play and perform to my heart's content where I feel comfortable and not compromising.

My goal, it is written

"Be a light on a stand"

So I will not be afraid,

But let you take my hand.