Theater Workshop

(Written in August 2008)
I want to think a little about what I didn’t get from the drama workshop.  I think I was wanting to celebrate my strength in getting as far as I have — it was the same impulse that led to the project of the Autobiography of a Shaman.  But to be able to see my strength, I also have to see the power of what I’ve been struggling with, and that’s largely invisible.  There really isn’t any way to dramatize it, to show it.  It could possibly be done in a movie, showing the world from the protagonist’s point of view — an ordinary street suddenly becomes a battlefield, cruel internalized voices are shown by ghostly characters — something like that.  Then of course the journal entries give a very clear picture of my internal world.  But within the context of the drama project, it just wasn’t possible to really tell my story.  So I put my own needs on hold and spent my energy supporting the other women and the project.  No wonder I collapsed afterward.

Talked to Kayla briefly about my disappointment with the theater project and how that might have triggered my tumble into depression.  She asked if the theater part was important in itself, or just as a vehicle for telling my story.  I realized that theater is very important to me, another big piece of my unlived live, another loss that I need to mourn.  I cried a little talking to Kayla and then again when telling Lynelle, but I think there’s still a lot of grieving to do.

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