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July 26

Solving Problems with Love 

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I learned to act from a man by the name of Ed Kaye-Martin. I once asked him why he quit acting and became a teacher. He said, "Jeff, I was a good actor. But I knew I could be a brilliant teacher." He was.

He said many great things that have stayed with me. All of what he said was about acting and only acting. Acting trumped everything in his book, including having a life that worked. If being a great actor meant not being able to have a relationship, then so be it. But in spite of himself, a few of the things he said were applicable to life as well as to acting, which indeed should not be surprising given that acting is but a presentation of life.

Here's one:

There is no problem that can be solved alone.

All of acting is about putting one's attention on one's acting partner, finding life in the other. Great advice for acting. If we're not putting our attention on our partner, inevitably we're putting it in our speculation. We're growing the problem rather than the solution. When we enter a scene, we know what our problem is already. It lives in us. It doesn't need our attention. So then we put all of our attention on our partner and, through the course of the scene, the problem gets worked out, one way or the other.

How might this translate to life?

Perhaps we could say that the overarching problem in life is a failure to love. Usually we see what we're missing, we're seeing what it is someone else is not giving us, be it love or attention, support, a raise, a look of kindness. What if we were to stop looking at what we're not getting, and put our attention on our partner/co-worker/boss and love them. In spite of themselves. In spite of ourselves. In spite of every reason we can come up with to keep ourselves from it. We don't even have to let them know we're doing it. Just love them. And see if we can do it so fully that they change, soften, open up. Find one thing in them, just for today, that is lovable, and love. And watch it expand.

Today I will love someone more than I think I can.