Head Games

There were times when I was directing at One Life to Live that I felt off-balance much of the time. Much as I loved the process of working through scenes with the actors and crew, the seemingly constant uncertainty about when I would direct again (and whether I had any control over that) ate at me. I wanted the extra responsibility, the steeper learning curve, and the extra money, but there were times when the head games involved with whether I would continue to do this made me wonder if the step up was a good thing.

It is remarkably easy to let ourselves get caught up in the head games of life. We spend hours of the time that could be productive replaying things that are not. Instead of using our energy to do, we use our energy to wonder, and to second-guess our choices. There will likely always be more going on than we can see, and therefore, plenty of reason to wonder. But I am trying, little by little, to second guess a little less, to use my head a little more, so that the head games can't control it. Head games didn't make me a better director, but they didn't unravel my directing either. When we take charge of how we let head games affect us, we gain the control to keep the games where they belong--either in the work, to make us laugh, or in our creative heads, to make us play better. Because we can't really be on our best game when we're too busy handling head games.