On Humor – Intro (Well-timed humor’s power)

I had lunch with my father yesterday.

Have you ever been part of a conversation where one person suddenly strikes upon a deep and unpleasant truth – unpleasant because it’s the truth?

The room freezes, it seems, suspended in stillness as the false silence of truth permeates the air. False because while vocal chords cease productive movement, internal voices rage on, hustling to prepare for conflict and defense should it become necessary.

Sometimes it never does.

The last thing my father said was “I don’t give a shit.”

Then silence took over, and save for a few brief exchanges with the waiter, it maintained hold.

I kept waiting to defend my assertion, but the need never arose. He didn’t say anything, and I didn’t care to either.

At moments like these, everything in the immediate vicinity seems fucking stupid. Irrelevant. Mere trivialities.

The distinct hues of Buffalo Wild Wings décor. The practiced courtesy of waiters and waitresses. Vacuous commentator talk on the flatscreens hanging from the restaurant walls (shoutout to the Australian Open).

All bullshit in relation to your world, in relation to the gripping of a nascent truth on your conscience.

Then my father, uncharacteristically, broke the silence. He, again uncharacteristically, told a funny story. (Will is my 6-year-old brother)

So the other day Will was really mad with me. I couldn’t figure out why. Then finally he said to me, “Daddy, I had a really bad day…I told my friend my secret – I told him I peed in my pants – and he told everyone. He is a bad person. He can’t be trusted.”

Six-year-old drama is hilarious. (Sorry, Will, for immortalizing yours)

After that story, I heard a bit more, something about how a girl has a big crush on Will, and how she always wants to sit next to him in class, and how she keeps asking him if he’s Jewish…

At all of this, I laughed in spite of myself. I stopped being righteous and just let go.

The thing about humor in these kinds of situations - it doesn’t change anything.

But it softens the harshness, and sometimes pain, of unpleasant truths. It creates brief moments of joy to fill the silences.

Call it a defense mechanism, a distraction, a weakness – call it whatever the hell you want.

Humor works. It helps you keep on keeping on.

With all this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Humor, of which this is the introductory post. I guess I have a lot of room for expression in this one…

Check back in for more!

-David

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On Dance – Intro (Hip Hop w/Chio at Broadway Dance Center)

A week ago Wednesday I took my first ever dance class, at the Broadway Dance Center in NYC.

I’m pretty coordinated when it comes to sports, simply because I’ve played them (a lot of them) my whole life. But when it came to dancing, I’ve always felt just plain dumb (physically).

So, being that I want to learn to master my body as much as possible for purposes of being a good actor, I enrolled in a beginner’s Hip Hop class.

The thing about these kinds of classes is, you really need to have someone legit teaching them, or you run the risk of feeling stupid (at least that’s how it works for me).

Chio, our teacher, was bloody brilliant. She had skills, she had style, and she had a dynamite personality.

And she was one of the most genuine people I’ve ever met. Which, right away, is pretty much the first thing I look for when I try to get a sense of who someone is. I’m not very particular when it comes to this and that, but if you’re genuine, and you’re passionate, and you have the courage to trust in and be yourself, you’ve already scored mega cool points with me. But I digress.

Most of all, she loved dancing, and that showed through every second we were there. Even before class started, she was leaning in against the window to observe the previous class’ choreography, like a kid ogling ice cream flavors.

Her choreography wasn’t spectacularly dumbed down, I don’t think (can’t really say, given my zero prior experience).

Her teaching style: drill-sergeant dictatorial, but affectionately so, and in an incredibly encouraging way. Every once in a while she would make fun of us with an exaggerated caricature of an imitation to illustrate how ridiculous our moves looked sometimes, but she’d always follow with an, “It’s gonna be okay. It’s gonna be okay.”

With simple instructions (sometimes incorporating street analogies) and temporarily isolated body motions, she broke it down for us.

I’m not gonna lie, I still sucked. Majorly. Dancing is incredibly difficult for me, and I think it’s because I think too much.

I live too much up in my head.



The writer in me is constantly noticing everything around me. I pick up the vibes, the individual struggles and triumphs, the flow of the session. And so on.

But with dancing, at a certain point it’s not about intellectualizing things, or finding a rational explanation that underlies it all. That’s largely useless, in fact.

Just dance.



Trust in your body’s intelligence, your body’s smarts. Remember, we are creatures of the mind, yes, but we’re also just animals, to some degree.

“You and me baby ain’t nothin’ but mammals

So let’s do it like they do on the Discovery Channel.”



-Bloodhound Gang

Alright, the subject matter is a bit different, but the point is there. Actually, if you’ve seen “Shall We Dance,” you might then make this connection:

“The rumba is the vertical expression of a horizontal wish. You have to hold her, like the skin on her thigh is your reason for living. Let her go, like your heart's being ripped from your chest. Throw her back, like you're going to have your way with her right here on the dance floor. And then finish, like she's ruined you for life.”



-Jennifer Lopez as hot dance teacher Paulina

I mean, it was a pretty absurd movie, but JLo did give some pretty good advice to lawyerly Richard Gere:

“Leave it. Leave the light. Don’t say anything. And don’t think…And don’t move, unless you feel it.”



You see? Sometimes we should shut up (verbally), shut down (mentally), and just express ourselves.

I believe dance holds enormous potential for helping people overcome depression. With this in mind, I've decided to start a series of posts on Dance, of which this is the introductory post. Check back in for more in the Dance series as I explore this potential, and as I (hopefully) learn how to dance!



Status update: I went back for my 2^nd class yesterday night, and I made exponential progress.

I still suck, significantly, of course.

-David

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“The Expressive Body” – Intro

Actions speak louder than words.

-Anonymous

***

Right now, I’m reading the expressive body: physical characterization for the actor by David Alberts.

If you’ve been reading this blog up until now, you know how highly I value taking action in the struggle to overcome depression (and many other problems).

You may also remember that I’ve touched on the importance of finding a connection between physical and emotional states, and using that connection to your advantage (see my earlier post “On Forgiveness – Intro (Having the courage to forgive yourself).”

After reading the introduction to “The Expressive Body,” I’m more convinced than ever that taking action through acting training holds enormous potential for helping people overcome depression.

Stay tuned as I draw insights from this book and filter them through my “fight depression” lens. You’ll get to learn a bit (of theory, at least) about acting too!

-David

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On Perfectionism – Intro

Perfectionism is one hell of a force to reckon with.

On the one hand, it can propel you to greater and greater heights, leading you to accomplish things you never imagined you were capable of. Cross the tipping point, though, and it can drive you to hold yourself to insane, unfair, and unhealthy standards.

There is a time and place for unreasonably high standards. For instance, I would demand and expect perfection from any surgeon who was about to cut me open. Here’s a monologue I love from the movie "Malice":

Jed: The question is do I have a God complex?

Man: Dr. Kessler says yes.

Jed: Which makes me wonder if this lawyer has any idea as to the kind of grades one has to receive in college to be accepted at a top medical school. If you have the vaguest clue as to how talented someone has to be to lead a surgical team. I have an M.D. from Harvard, I am board certified in cardio-thoracic medicine and trauma surgery, I have been awarded citations from seven different medical boards in New England, and I am never, ever sick at sea. So I ask you; when someone goes into that chapel and they fall on their knees and they pray to God that their wife doesn't miscarry or that their daughter doesn't bleed to death or that their mother doesn't suffer acute neural trauma from postoperative shock, who do you think they're praying to? Now, go ahead and read your Bible, Dennis, and you go to your church, and, with any luck, you might win the annual raffle, but if you're looking for God, he was in operating room number two on November 17, and he doesn't like to be second guessed. You ask me if I have a God complex. Let me tell you something: I am God.

-Alec Baldwin as Dr. Jed Hill

In general, I highly value perfectionism when it comes to one’s work because I believe “work” is the truest expression of love. (It doesn’t need words)

But the type of perfectionism that indiscriminately manifests itself throughout one’s life – that’s deadly. The kind that beats you down to the depths of cynicism, then kicks you around in your own self-doubt - that’s unnecessary, and frankly unacceptable.

Unrelenting omnipresent perfectionism, whether directed externally towards others, or internally towards oneself, does nobody any good.

It kills relationships, for one thing, when you notice every stupid little flaw, every little human imperfection.

But most importantly, it chokes your own spirit and suffocates your vitality.

As someone with a long history of severe perfectionism, I understand pretty well how debilitating it can be to constantly feel like you fall short of expectations.

It’s entirely possible to reverse an innate tendency towards perfectionism. I know because I did it.

Not only do I no longer seek the elusive and all-consuming illusion of perfection, I strongly embrace my imperfection. I see imperfection as something very human, and because of that, something very beautiful.

This shift in my perception has manifested itself in all areas of my life, from the way I relate to others, to the way I motivate myself, even to something like the way I read.

These days when I read, I (mostly, depending on the situation) stop trying to read for anal perfection, and instead read for inspiration. I read fast, efficient, and in large quantities, and I trust that if something is truly important to me, it will burn itself into my conscience for drawing upon later. The result is that I am often unable to hold “intellectual” discussions on many topics, but I am able to actively use what I do remember.

Which is fantastic by me. I’d rather own one idea to the point that I can use it in many different situations than be able to recite entire novels.

I’ve even learned to identify the feeling of imperfection, if that’s legit to say. This is somewhat hard to explain, but sometimes I’ll be walking in the street, and suddenly I’ll realize just how incomplete I am, how utterly unprepared I am for the things I want to do. And I’ve realized I actually tremendously enjoy that sensation now. It keeps my mind sharp and alert for opportunities to “remedy” my imperfections – to learn.

All this being said, I continue to struggle with perfectionism. People tell me I am incapable of relaxing. I definitely belong to the “kick-your-own-butt” school of thought, and I constantly feel I’m not doing as much as I could be doing.

Even writing the entries of this blog can be a pain in the butt for me sometimes, as I try to strike the balance b/w quality and expediency. I’m aware that there’s a certain finality that is born once you hit “Publish” on Wordpress, but I try to not to psych myself out.

With all this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Perfectionism, of which this is the introductory post, where I will share my thoughts and stories on perfectionism.

Check back in as I continue to search for my personal sweet spot b/w perfectionism and (in)sanity.

-David

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Considerations of a Nomad

Among my friends, the joke is occasionally made that I am “homeless.”

Technically, this isn’t true – I do officially have a permanent residence, and if it were absolutely necessary, I could probably stay there for as long as I needed. But for a combination of strong personal and logistical reasons, I live a nomadic lifestyle, shuttling between friends’ places in MA, NJ, and soon NY.

I write on this topic today because being nomadic often involves being alone/lonely (2 separate but intertwined states), and because it often involves a feeling of misfit, of feeling like you’re the outsider – all of which are highly relevant to someone struggling with depression. Lastly, I write on this because it is a current issue in my life.

Living on the move definitely comes with its share of logistical difficulties. Luggage-wise, you must stay lean because there’s simply no room for excess. Commuting can be wearisome, as you battle road fatigue and what seems like dangerously too many incompetent drivers. Travel food is horrendous, but sometimes a cinnamon melt and medium OJ from McDonald’s are the only things that will keep you going. In general, I sometimes get the feeling I’m shaving years off of my life, but then I remember I’m young and therefore invincible. Well, at least for a few more years…

Really, though, none of this is all that bad. The nature of the human spirit is such that, given strong enough motivations plus sheer necessity, it will rise admirably to meet most challenges.

What is more difficult to deal with, at least for me, is the feeling that you just don’t belong anywhere.

Now, I happen to be someone who doesn’t get particularly attached to the places I live in. I grew up in a lot of different neighborhoods, and for a host of reasons, I guess I often never really even felt comfortable in my own home. Sleeping regularly on couches/futons doesn’t bother me in the slightest, and to some extent I even like them for their informality.

Really, it’s not the physical environment that affects me most. It’s something far more important.

When you live in one place for an extended period of time, that place becomes a part of you. It’s woven into so many of your memories because memory is so heavily tied to location. If you have roommates/friends you’re living with, the time you spend together day in and day out creates a common understanding between you all, an understanding that manifests itself in the conversations you share, the jokes you exchange, the language you use, the references you make, even just the way you treat each other.

It’s really in the small moments, and over an extended period of time, that you really get to know someone.

Being a nomad makes this damn near impossible. You miss so many moments, small and big (and everything in between) and you constantly get the feeling you’re just dropping in on other people’s lives for a few days, before taking off once again to do the same thing w/another group of people.

Most devastatingly of all, it makes it hard for you to be a good friend, or at least a consistent friend. And consistency really may be at the core of friendship. At the end of the day, it’s the people who you go through shit with, and who go through shit with you, that count as your friends. Being a nomad significantly precludes this. Sometimes you can feel your very sanity being threatened by a constant nagging “outsider-looking-in” feeling.

The fact is, it’s not just nomads who experience these difficulties. I imagine a LOT of people find it difficult to really connect with others, people who don’t have a strong sense of home. There’s a reason they talk of the “loneliness epidemic” these days. For instance, when I worked briefly in the ER as an EMT-B trainee, I heard stories about how some people would come in just to have someone to talk to.

To combat some of these difficulties, one thing I like to do is to try to find bits and pieces of “home” wherever I happen to be. All this takes is a bit of observation.

Let me give you an example.

A few weeks ago I was sick with a mean chronic cough. I was sitting in the Brandeis dining hall, hacking away, when Yen, the Chinese woman who mans the front desk, walked over and offered me a mint. When I declined, Yen expressed her concern for me, then offered to make me some hot water with honey.

Now, I don’t actually know if honey water is a “thing” in the US. I know people put honey in their tea, but putting honey in plain hot water is something I’ve only ever seen one other person in the US do – my father.

But people in China do it all the time, at least in my family. One way my grandmother shows affection for me is by offering me honey water, often in a tone of voice that suggests that if I don’t take it, one or the both of us will immediately drop dead (it always seems she’d be heartbroken if I were to decline).

When Yen offered me that glass of honey water, it took me home, first to my early youth, and then to China, which of all the places in the world I think of most as home.

You see how powerful memory can be, and how you can use it to find bits and pieces of home wherever you find yourself?

Ultimately, this amounts to nothing more than recognizing the universality of individual experience, and that regardless of outer trappings, we’re all pretty much the same when it comes to the basics. Even idiosyncrasies often share a common denominator.

When you really come to this conclusion and believe it, the world seems like much less of a barren place, much less hostile, much less indifferent.

And you feel less alone. Even if you’re constantly uprooting yourself and can’t let yourself develop emotional attachments to places/people.

Lastly, before I cut out, I would like to take the time to thank the guys in Ziv 129-304 for taking the risk to house me for the past few months. It’s a hell of a lot to ask to put up with a random stranger for an extended period of time, but you guys have made me feel incredibly welcome.

So Andy, Benjy, Evan, Sean, Steve, and Toly – whether or not shit goes down in the future, just know that I really appreciate, beyond words, everything you guys have done for me.

Thanks.

-David

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On Action – Checking in with your body and letting go

Check in with your body.

***

We live too much up in our heads. So check in with your body every once in a while. Here’s (one way) how:

***

When it comes to breathing exercises, every acting studio ever will (supposedly) start you out on the floor. Why? Because you don’t have to do shit when you’re on the floor, except be there. And stay awake, of course.

I recommend a beautiful hardwood floor, and white walls and ceiling to help w/the imaginative process, but it’s not really that important. Any floor will do.

Now, normally when we breathe, we breathe w/our chests, simply because it’s immediately available. Chest breath is easy to draw. But it’s shallow. That’s why you always hear that spiel (from choir directors, band teachers, etc) about breathing from the diaphragm, from the belly. You should really be able to feel your belly expand when you breathe in.

And it’s true – breathing from the diaphragm is immensely more powerful, and just plain better for you. And guess what? Babies do it naturally. (And a lot of the time they’re a lot wiser than us older people)

But to get back on track: You’re on the floor, supine (that’s back to the floor, facing upwards towards the ceiling). Now, what you’re trying to do is,

Surrender to the floor.



That’s right, surrender. Give up on trying to control everything, on trying to control your body. Release your tension. Let go.

And first, just pay attention. Try to locate spots of tension, where you feel tight and tense and anally controlling. Feel your breath moving in and through and out of your body.

Each breath that you draw from the room – that breath is yours. You own it.

Think about that.

Each breath really belongs to you. So give it a personality, in your mind. Imagine your breath as having character to it. Give it a color if you want. Do whatever you need to do accomplish this.

As you feel each breath traveling through your body, imagine it cleansing you of tension. Imagine this very specifically. Breathing from your diaphragm, feel and imagine it rising up to fill your chest cavity, all the way up to your shoulders and beyond.

As you slowly exhale, feel your breath course through each part of you body. Feel it run through individual muscles. Feel it run through your right bicep, down your right forearm, all the way to your fingertips in your right hand, and beyond. Feel it do the same for the left side of your body.

Feel it flow through your lower body. If you truly breathe from your diaphragm, you should be able to feel it in your pelvic floor. You can actually feel it in your crotch. Feel it caress your hip sockets as it passes through, softening the very bones it touches. Feel it run through your quads, your calves, your ankles, all the way to your feet. And beyond.

***

Do you see what I’m getting at? There are so many directions you can go with this, but the important thing is to find what works for you.

***

Imagine it freely. Experience it exquisitely.



Check in with your body.

Let go.



-David

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On This Blog – Update (Oscar Wilde week)

Recently a reader (shoutout to my friend Steven) commented,

“Quick question. You keep saying that you’re starting a series on X (details, acting, etc.). But you rarely explicitly ever do.”

To address this and other concerns of my own, I’d like to give you guys a brief update and share w/you some of my “behind-the-scenes” thoughts on the blog:

1 MYRIAD CATEGORIES

I’m serially starting new categories to lay the framework for the future. I won’t always have time to write longer intro posts, but I have a HUGE backlog of posts I’ve jotted down notes for w/in the existing categories, and I should be able to knock them out pretty quickly. In general, starting new categories helps me orient my thinking, so I can filter my experiences relevantly, and for the long run. This thing’s not going away anytime soon.

2 SCREW THE CATEGORIES, I DON’T LIKE THEM ALL THAT MUCH ANYWAY

That being said, while categories have their uses, I’m increasingly feeling the limitations they impose. The fact is, everyone organizes information differently based on their own life experiences and preferences, and they make connections in their mind accordingly.

3 RENEGADE POSTS

With this in mind, expect to soon see a lot of “uncategorized” posts – material that will still be relevant, but that doesn’t necessarily fit tidily under labels. And when I say relevant, I don’t mean boring. There’s going to be a lot of stuff that may be “out there” (but still relevant), simply because I love free-form thinking and drawing from disparate sources for inspiration.

Who says you need to exclusively study depression/XYZ to best understand depression/XYZ? Hell, I’d say that’s a terrible way to go about it, and a terrible way to go through life. Realize that a lot of what I’m trying to do is to get you to think more creatively, to imagine. Break free from stale thinking!

4 SHORTER POSTS – SNAPSHOTS

Very soon you won’t have to slog through my verbosity to pick up insights. Partly because of emerging time constraints, and partly because I think it’s better, soon many future posts will just be snapshots of life as I live it, and I won’t be so despotic about framing those snapshots in a certain way.

The fact is, things are complex, and I’m no authority on anything.

“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.”

-Oscar Wilde

So I’ll put down what I think is valuable raw material, filtered slightly through the lens of my (rapidly evolving) worldview. Then you can piece together the snapshots and draw your own conclusions. I hate dogma anyway.

5 READER RESPONSES

I owe two – I haven’t forgotten, just give me more time! Sorry!

6 READER (YOU GUYS!) INTERACTION

We’re working on it, give us a month (likely less) and it’ll be there.

7 OSCAR WILDE

I’ve chosen my first monologue for acting class from Oscar Wilde’s work. I’m utterly not suited to play Oscar Wilde, and all the authorities say it’s a bad move to choose like this, but I dig his stuff and think it’ll be a great experience for me as an actor, even if I mangle it horribly (it’s incredibly hard to find good monologues for Asians anyway). Plus, I think his forward-thinking ideas hold enormous potential for helping those who struggle with depression.

So, I’ll be immersing myself in Oscar Wilde this week, and you can pretty definitely expect to see that trickle into this blog.

And that’s what’s up for now, blog-wise.

-David

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On Details – A change of perspective (NY Penn Station)

NY Penn station can be a pretty busy place. Passing through, it’s easy to dismiss it as just a crowded train station, especially if you’re in a rush to be somewhere.

But there’s a lot more going on.

***

This past weekend, I took shelter at Penn Station for a few hours while waiting for my acting classes to start. My first move was to chill at the Tim Horton’s/Nathan’s food area, where they have seats and tables. After 2 hours of reading and writing there, they kicked me out for not having purchased anything.

Here’s something I did to pass the time that you might like to try (it doesn’t necessarily have to be at Penn Station – that’s not the point).

***

TRY sitting on the floor in “the circle” area, back leaned against one of the pillars, and just sit there and pay attention for a half hour or so.

Your perspective changes.

And because of that, you notice a lot of cool things.

First off, everything seems grander. Especially if you’re in “the circle.” There’s something about the circular walls and ceiling that already immediately impresses, and having your butt on the floor only heightens that sense of grandiosity – you notice just how high the ceiling is from the floor, and how much space there is, and how tiny you are.

Watch as people pass by. Observe the remarkable variety of commuter, of body types, of movement styles, of auras. Watch the juxtapositions between the individuals that comprise this variety. I watched a midget clutching a paper bag walk by a tall guy wheeling a suitcase – because of my angle from the ground, he appeared nearly twice as tall as her! It was weird.

Try closing your eyes in weariness. Let your other senses kick in. Listen to the footsteps go by, and to the sounds of bustle that surround you, occasionally interspersed with ETA announcements. Notice how different types of luggage wheels produce different qualities of sound – some roll more smoothly, others with a more sandy gritty grainy quality, from friction. The same for footsteps – notice different walking rhythms, and different contact sounds from different footwear.

Listen to the variety of languages, to the street language, the curses, the coughs, the sickness, the phone conversations, the shooting of the breeze between the Krispy Kreme employees at your back, the starting and stopping of blenders crushing ice at Planet Smoothies, like a dull street drill in the background. Take in the scents – occasional whiffs of cologne, or the sometimes foul odor of the homeless.

Observe the weary around you – the homeless people catching some shut-eye, or tired commuters taking a nap. Three laborers were passed out right next to me, and I noticed how they all assumed very different positions for their nap. One was on his back, legs spread eagle in a V, and head resting on a sand-colored tote bag. Another slept on his side, head (baseball cap still on) on his backpack, arms and legs carefully layered on top of one another – a much neater and tidier form of public repose. The third slept on this side too, but much more sloppily – legs tangled together, as if seeking warmth and touch from each other, and his head facing the wall, as if to block out the rest of the world.

***

It really is a whole world of it’s own, New York Penn Station.

And I’ve only described one tiny fraction of it for you today. Try describing some for yourself.

Warning: When you get up, you may get a head rush.

***

Pay attention to the world that surrounds you. Fill in the details.

Find joy in doing so.



-David

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On Education – Intro (Tutoring Sean at Calvert House)

Today I would like to share with you an important memory of mine. It’s a memory that inspired me, gave me hope, and showed me what was possible. And it’s a memory that really gets to the heart of our social venture.

***

When I was still a student at the University of Chicago, one of my extracurriculars was tutoring Chicago youth. One of the organizations I tutored with was Calvert House, the Catholic Center at UofC. Once a week, for two hours in the morning, a small group of students (including myself) would tutor a group of “less-privileged” kids, ranging from elementary school to high school students.

“My” first kid was Aaron, a 7-year-old who was addicted to wrestling, violence, and naughtiness, and had quite a limited attention span. I tried my best, but I didn’t manage to connect with him. “Tutoring” him really sort of became just “babysitting” him.

Which is fine. I think a large part of the purpose of places like Calvert House is just to provide a safe and encouraging environment, several times a week, for kids who might normally not have such an environment.

In general, I noticed that many of the tutor-tutee relationships operated this way – more like hangout buddies or “Big Brother/Big Sister” type relationships, where kindness and camaraderie were placed as top priority.

***

For a large portion of my life, I operated under the same assumptions, believing that sheer kindness was the best way to help someone. For instance, as co-captain of my high school ultimate team, I remember on “running days” when we’d run a 3-mile loop along Dempsey St, I’d sometimes run at the back of the pack, with the “stragglers,” to try to pace them and offer them kind words of encouragement.

Then one day I read The Prophet by Khalil Gibran, one of my all-time favorite books. And this quote from the chapter “Good and Evil” struck me as remarkably true:

You are good when you walk to your goal firmly and with bold steps.

Yet you are not evil when you go thither limping.

Even those who limp go not backward.

But you who are strong and swift, see that you do not limp before the lame, deeming it kindness.

You are good in countless ways, and you are not evil when you are not good,

You are only loitering and sluggard.

Pity that the stags cannot teach swiftness to the turtles.

In your longing for your giant self lies your goodness: and that longing is in all of you.

But in some of you that longing is a torrent rushing with might to the sea, carrying the secrets of the hillsides and the songs of the forest.

And in others it is a flat stream that loses itself in angles and bends and lingers before it reaches the shore.

But let not him who longs much say to him who longs little, "Wherefore are you slow and halting?"

For the truly good ask not the naked, "Where is your garment?" nor the houseless, "What has befallen your house?"

The fact is, some people have more passion for life than others do. But everybody has some (see my earlier post On Entrepreneurship – Its health benefits).

How best to bring it out? How best to teach? To educate?

HOW BEST TO INSPIRE?

It’s not by “limp[ing] before the lame, deeming it kindness.”

Patience and kindness and camaraderie and sensitivity are essential, but they should be woven in alongside a genuine and even aggressive intention to inspire and to teach.



I believe there is no better way to inspire than by example. Show how to be strong by being strong and expecting the same.

***

One day, my kid Aaron didn’t show up for tutoring, and simultaneously another kid’s mentor didn’t show up.

So I was paired with Sean, a 7^th grader.

If I were to abstract for a moment and pretend I were a teacher w/a class full of seventh-graders, each needing individual attention, and many w/priorities other than learning (priorities I had to discourage, for the sake of classroom order), I admit, I’d probably marginalize Sean as a “lost cause.”

Sean had nearly zero confidence. He dressed awkwardly, and it always seemed his clothes didn’t fit him. His breath always smelled, and his body language spoke of deep insecurity. He could hardly unzip his pencil bag with conviction, let alone hold a conversation.

I immediately identified. I was that same kid, just a few years prior.

The point is, Sean was deeply insecure and lacked confidence – he was the kind of kid you’d be most inclined to immediately “buddy up” with and be ultra nice to.

I chose to avoid that route. Because frankly, it may be easy, and it may be nice, but it’s not very effective.

Instead, I treated him with expectation. I chose to believe in him. And I refused to accept less than what I thought he was capable of.

Looking from the outside, it may have appeared I was being too aggressive, too stubborn, and too unreasonably expecting. Alec, the senior who oversaw everything, definitely gave me some strange looks. I didn’t care (partially because I could tell he was only doing it for his resume, as evidenced by his constant discussion of said resume).

We were working on mixed fractions. I figured out a way to explain them by drawing pizza diagrams, and successively dividing slices into smaller and smaller fractions by halving them, then adding together the new slices, the freshly divided ones now representing new units, new fractions.

At one point, Sean managed to solve a fairly difficult problem on his own using the method I taught him. And I’ll never ever forget the change I saw in him, just in that one moment.

I swear, he sat up straighter in his chair, his body no longer slouched, and he gave off an entirely different vibe. It wasn’t confidence. No, it was far more nervous than that, and far more premature.

I’m fairly certain he terrified himself. I watched his hands tremble in excitement, and his speech stumble as he clumsily, but correctly, explained his logic in solving the problem.

What was it?

It was his recognition of his own potential.

Seeing the concrete evidence with his own eyes – his ability to solve that problem on his own – fundamentally changed him.

I have no idea how Sean is doing today, and I’m not naïve enough to think that one session, with one small success, will turn a life around.

But it might.



And if you keep at it, with the same mentality of belief and expectation and guidance from the teacher, coupled with belief and discipline and hard work from the student, and over an extended period of time, I think it’s likely.

I believe it is these moments of inspiration, of recognition of one’s own potential – one’s own genius – that should be the primary aim of all education.



Not the memorization of facts and theories that can be used to impress and woo at interviews or cocktail dinner parties.

***

Did I contradict Khalil Gibran by pushing Sean? NO.

The fact is, I pushed him, but I pushed him at his level.

I was doing basic algebra in the 5^th grade. He was doing basic fractions in the 7^th grade.  It doesn’t fucking matter.

I saw potential in Sean, and I saw in him a willingness to embrace that potential. So I encouraged it. Aggressively.

I wouldn’t do this for just anyone, partly because I don’t have time, and partly because some people are so utterly closed-minded it would take forever to help them. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it’d be hard as hell.

Furthermore, it’s not my business to help people. Not unless they want to be helped. For that reason, most often I try to withhold judgment on people I don’t have a good reason to judge. In fact, the people I judge most, and most harshly, are usually the people I care about most, because I know my friends can take my critiques in the right spirit.

The thing about our social venture – we hope to target a very specific subset of people who struggle with depression: college students who know they are depressed, who want to get better, and who are willing to take action to do so.

These are the people I admire, whom I identify with, and whom I want to help unleash their potential.

***

You are good when you walk to your goal firmly and with bold steps.

***

In your longing for your giant self lies your goodness: and that longing is in all of you.

***

Embrace your longing for your giant self, and be bold in doing so.

Learn.

-David

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My Anchors – Intro (Your story)

In my previous post, I promised to share an “anchor” of mine, as an example.

My original intention was simply to recap for you the time I spent in China this past summer. Though I was only there for four months, those four months were probably the most significant single block of time in my life thus far.

When I sat down to try to do it, however, I found it impossible.

The fact is, I am a person who actively uses several different anchors.

Now, I don’t always have the best memory for a lot of things. Often I won’t remember, or even pick up on, things that would be incredibly obvious to most people.

When it comes to the things that are important to me, however, I have a great memory.

Some memories I’ve stored so vividly I can practically relive them, sometimes down to actual footsteps, or the turn of a door handle. I recognize that some of these details may have been fabricated by my (flawed) memory. But the point is, I pay very close attention to the things that matter to me, and as a result they stay with me in a powerful way, and continue to affect me long after I’ve experienced them.

For instance, due to my nomadic lifestyle, I often find myself in transit. If I’m in a situation where it’s impossible to read or write, or if I’m simply not in the mood for information intake, even for something as informal as people-watching, I’ll simply revisit memories in my head.

I can actually do this for hours at a time. Sometimes I’ll play scenes, sometimes I’ll focus on a snapshot, sometimes I’ll just flip through faces.

Sometimes I’ll put one on replay, but sometimes I also like to mix it up.

Sometimes I’ll do this with really trivial mental material.

Often I’ll do this with my anchors.



I’ve said this before, but I’ll say it again, because I think it’s crucial to understand:

In the end, everything becomes just a story.



Whether horrific or mundane, momentous or inconsequential, everything becomes just a story.

One of my all-time favorite movie endings is that of Martin Scorsese’s “Gangs of New York.” The final words:

“It was four days and nights before the worst of the mob was finally put down. We never knew how many New Yorkers died that week before the city was finally delivered. My father told me we was all born of blood and tribulation, and so then too was our great city. But for those of us what lived and died in them furious days, it was like everything we knew was mildly swept away. And no matter what they did to build this city up again... for the rest of time... it would be like no one even knew we was ever here.”



­-Amsterdam Vallon, played by Leonardo DiCaprio

Even the most revolutionary of events, or the most influential of men, eventually become nothing, lost or forgotten.

Thanks to a powerful human desire to preserve and chronicle, and to refuse to let go, we have remnants to hold on to and to appreciate.

These remnants take the form of stories.

But ultimately, even the most extraordinary stories of the past are of limited importance. Paltry even.

History is utterly insignificant compared to the vital force of now.



And the now – the present – doesn’t hold for any single story.



At its heart, that is what your life is – just one more story in the story of humanity.



But take fierce pride in the fact that your story is in the here and now.



Because of that, it is as important as any story that ever lived.

So live your story with vigor, and embrace your life with joy and passion. Don’t live too much in the past.

But every once in a while, take the time to revisit your story, and to learn from it, not just from reading “the classics” or "the Great Books" of the Western Canon, or whatever other stuff other people tell you is important.

Realize that far more than with any book, or any blog, or any other assembled collection of words, you can relate to your own story.

Not only can you relate, you can distill the essence from your story, and use that essence as an anchor to hold you steady through life.

With all of this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on my own essential stories, on My Anchors, of which this is the introductory post. Many of these will come from my time in China, but I'm sure there will be many more from elsewhere.

This will be one of the most selfish sections of this blog. Hopefully you'll still be able to learn from my stories and my anchors, and most importantly, use them to help you shape your own stories and anchors.

THEY SAY

You walk around slinging the story of your life on your back.

Your story informs how you see, how you feel, how you do.

Wellspring of your thoughts and actions, self-woven with the most vibrant bits and pieces of your life, and held together by the stitches of your personality, your story is inescapable.

It is who you are.

Make sure your story is a good one. It's in your hands.

-David

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On Motivation – Finding your anchor (Part I)

It seems there are so many external sources of motivation these days. For the young college student, the first few links of the motivational chain may go something like this:

GPA – Recommendations – Internships – Grad/Professional School – Jobs

And so on.

Add to the mix external factors that are less tangible but still exert a strong presence, existing somewhere in the ether: parental approval, societal influences, etc. It can get pretty overwhelming.

Presumably this will all lead to the grand finale: “The good life.” But what does that even mean? What does it mean for you?

The thing about external sources of motivation is that they’re just that – external.

Mangle or knock out one or two links of the chain, and you may end up shafted.

What then?

Even if things go smoothly, many people find themselves discontent with what they have, even years and years after they’ve accomplished everything on “their list,” or at least the list they made taking cues from external pressures.

Hence, the mid-life crisis phenomenon.

Traditionally, we look upon the mid-life crisis as a source of amusement, even hilarity.

But is it really all that funny?

If you think a little deeper, it’s actually pretty tragic. People with an enormous amount of potential channel all of their energies and ambitions into following the links of the chain, and in the process subordinate their individual genius to fit the cookie-cutter standard.

What a fucking waste.

And how utterly lethal to personal growth and health.

If you plan and carry out your entire life according to external sources of motivation, you cheat yourself in the grandest way possible.

You destroy the essence of you.



What drives you? What gets you jazzed? Passionate? Fired up? And on a consistent basis – day in and day out?



These are the questions you must start answering now, and those (evolving) answers are what will stay you through the most difficult of times. That is,

You must find your anchor, and you must find it now.



What will sustain you when life hits you with a grand piano from the 100^th story of a skyscraper? (Thanks Looney Tunes, for the idea)

And how do you find this anchor?

The thing about an anchor is that it must be personal – it must come from the inner.

None of this external crap.

To find your anchor, draw upon all of your previous experiences, and really reflect hard on what’s important to you. Then use your imagination, and just go with it.

Know that words and images and memories can be powerful tools.

They can be used both positively and negatively.

I strongly encourage you to dig deep and find your anchor, and to use that anchor as a source of eternal strength.

Fuse together words that are meaningful to you, images that stick with you, and memories that are powerful for you, and use them to motivate yourself, even when you have nothing else left going for you.

Remember that you don’t have to have just one anchor. You can have many, perhaps different ones for different situations.

And don’t feel like you’re being inconsistent if your anchor(s) change over time – that’s perfectly fine, and might even be an indicator that you’re doing a good job of living.

They say that mid-life crises are becoming quarter-life crises these days. Usually, this carries w/it a sort of gloomy doomsday prophecy tone.

I say that this is a great sign. It’s better to grapple with the crucial issues sooner, rather than later (or never at all).

If you are of college age, or near it, and you are going through some really difficult shit, know that now is the ideal time to go through shit.



You have so much time to learn, and so much time to course-correct.



Radical change is possible in the shortest of times.



I know because I did it.



If you’ve made major mistakes in our life, pledge to yourself to learn from them, then forgive yourself and move on.

Keep on making new mistakes, and keep on learning from those too.

Struggle in uncertainty is good. It helps you move toward clarity.



-David

P.S. Read the continuation post for an example of an anchor – one of mine.

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On Details – Intro (The little things)

One “symptom” of depression is an overwhelming feeling of “emptiness.” We feel like our entire lives have meant nothing – that we are nothing.

I believe that part of the battle in fighting depression is filling in the details. Being able to see the beauty in every day detail, and learning to take joy from and focus on that beauty, rather than on pain.

I was once hospitalized at one of the “best” clinics on the East coast. Among the activities we were encouraged to attend was “Art.”

Frankly, it was bullshit – infantilizing, demeaning, and ineffective. And the person who led the session did not at all grasp the nuance of what it’s like to struggle through the day with severe depression (granted, I’m sure it’s a highly variable experience). There were also 2 premed students joining us to “observe” – they seemed quite utterly detached from the group, and rather self-absorbed, which made me strongly question their future ability as doctors. But I digress.

Still, being a team player, I played along, if only half-heartedly.

Many of my fellow inpatients were dual diagnosis – in addition to depression, they concurrently struggled with (and were diagnosed with) disorders like alcoholism, narcotics addictions, etc.

Several made reference to their drug addictions in their art. One girl drew the street crossing and chicken joint where she met w/her dealer to purchase heroine. An older man (proudly) drew a horse, also in reference to heroin.

Some just scribbled on paper, with no particular aim at all.

Not knowing what to do, and never having been particularly artsy in terms of drawing/painting, I grabbed some colored pencils and a big blue plastic alphabet stencil off the ping-pong table (we actually used a ping-pong table as the table – the art room became the rec room later at night).

I folded in half a blank white piece of 8.5 by 11” printer paper, then stenciled out a word on the left half. I’m straining but can’t remember exactly what word (I could probably find it if I sifted through old boxes). I’m pretty sure it was just my name.

D A V I D

The letters on the stencil were pretty big, in terms of stroke width, so that there was room for me to trace the inside of each letter on the stencil w/a colored pencil and still have the interior of the letter still stay empty (white). I remember this pretty well - I think the stencil was originally designed for markers.

But then I grabbed another stencil, also made of dark blue plastic, from the ping-pong table. This one didn’t have any letters at all – it was just patterns. There were flowers, big and small, and the level of detail was astonishing, at least for a stencil.

On the right half of my piece of paper, I traced out a few of the flowers, again w/colored pencil, using different colors for the different parts of the flower. It came out really pretty, and not at all due to any artistic ability on my part – the stencil simply had very intricate detail.

Then I looked at my piece of paper, and thought about how I was going to present it to the group (we were supposed to talk about our artwork at the end of each session).

And then it hit me.

To some degree, I initially was really just bullshitting. Drawing whatever tenuous connection I could find b/w whatever things happened to be on the paper, just so I’d have something to say. (This is an essential survival skill that all students who go through today’s education system develop, and usually by the time we make it to college, we’ve got it pretty well honed)

But I took one look at the big empty letters on the left half of the paper, and then at the intricate flowers on the right half, and I knew exactly what I was going to say. It came out something to this effect:

“The left half of my paper embodies the emptiness and nothingness I feel when I think about my life. The right half is my hope for the future – where one day I’ll be able to fill myself up and learn to appreciate the small details again.”



They – famous architects, and wise people, and Chinese restaurant fortune cookies – say that God is in the details.

To some extent, I believe this – I find that many of the most miraculous things in life are things you wouldn’t notice unless you really paid attention.

With all this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Details, of which this is the introductory post, where I will point out some of the every day (and not so every day) details that inspire me.

I guess this is really a subcategory of my series of posts on Joy, but it’s separate enough to merit a new category.

Hopefully you’ll learn to (start?) pay attention to some of the little things in life, and to find (create?) joy in doing so.

The little things - they’re some of the greatest gifts anyone could ever give or receive.

And they’re free.

-David

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On Acting – Intro

As someone who aspires to be an actor one day (in truth I see myself as an actor already, it’s just a matter of getting training under my belt, and a job), I’m very excited about the potential acting/acting training holds for changing the individual, and for changing the world – and thus for solving depression.

Here’s an excerpt of an email I sent to my team a few weeks ago, when the idea first took root in my mind (it was a very rough idea then, and remains so now):

“Hey guys,



So I've been reading a lot of acting books lately, and I'm getting really excited about the prospect of ACTING TRAINING becoming a mainstream cure for depression.



As an actor, you identify with the need of the character you want to portray, then use your body as the instrument to portray the motions appropriate to this need. In doing so, you must utterly remove yourself from everyday reality and learn to lose yourself in the real life dream you are creating as an actor. You become hyperaware of your body and mind and you learn to master them.



What better way to train oneself to escape the mental loops and mind traps of depressive thinking? And to weld that with taking concrete action when you least feel like doing anything at all? And to build confidence and a sense of self-worth while doing so?



Actors who take their craft seriously realize that they are acting every second of every minute of every hour of their lives, and this type of mindset will provide a sort of constant vigilance for depressed people to guard against suicidal/negative thinking. And acting is all about physical and mental exchange with fellow actors - that will put a check on isolation (both physical and mental).



Just a thought - and an example of how something seemingly disparate could become extraordinarily relevant.”



Since then, the idea has only grown on me. I see enormous possibility. I intuitively see that acting is all about THINKING BIG, IMAGINING BIG, and most of all, ACTING BIG! This kind of mentality is exactly what‘s needed to help someone overcome depression.

And not only does acting hold enormous possibility – the products of acting (movies, plays, culture) wield enormous power for change too! For instance, check out this article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/04/world/middleeast/04iranfilms.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

In general, I think fame could be leveraged more effectively to create positive change in this world, beyond just publicity trips and charity concerts, etc. There must be a better business model to accomplish this, in a society where unfortunately fame’s the name of the game, to a very large degree. But that’s another discussion for another time…

With all of this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Acting, of which this is the introductory post, where I will present my ideas for how acting training can help people overcome depression. Some of these ideas you may see in the section on Action, but others you will see here.

I’ve been accepted to a weekend program w/the Stella Adler Studio for Acting in NYC (8 hrs/day on Saturdays and Sundays), and I look forward to sharing with you some of the things I learn!

Check back in for more in the Acting series! My classes start January 16^th!

-David

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On Action – Intro (Part II Hold a baby)

Hold a baby.

***

My brother is 14 years younger than me.

The first time I babysat him alone, when he was just a few years old, he cried for hours.

There was nothing I could do to console him, so I just held him against my chest.

He was so close, I could feel him cry, could feel his body writhe up and down against my chest as he sobbed, and if I held him away from my body for a little, I could see the ugly contortions of his face.

When I say to “hold a baby,” I don’t mean take your favorite toddler niece into your arms, sigh at how cute she is, then hand her off to the nearest adult.

The thing about actions – there can be so much more to them, below the surface.

When Daniel Day-Lewis wields a blade in Gangs of New York, he’s not acting. It’s real.



He took lessons as an apprentice butcher. He dressed as a butcher would, and refused to wear warmer clothing or take medicine after being diagnosed with pneumonia during filming. I imagine he let himself and pushed himself to become a butcher for months and months before they started filming. By the time we get to see him hold a knife on screen, he’s holding it not as an actor, but as Bill the Butcher in the 1800s. He’s considered every possible circumstance in order to understand why he’s holding that knife.

When I say to “hold a baby,” I’m asking you to do the same.

Look at the baby, not as if it were a cute “thing,” but as if he or she were a human. As if he or she could one day be the future President of the United States of America.

In my mind, when I see young children, when I hold a baby – that’s the kind of thought that runs through my mind.

There is no single human being, dead or alive, that inspires me more than my six-year-old brother.

Because he represents the future, and to me that is greater than anything that exists now, or that ever existed before.

***

I am a very ambitious person. To the point of lunacy, even.

Sometimes, when I look at my current situation – I have no money, no credentials, no real set path to follow that will lead me to success – I briefly remember that all my visions for my future are in my head, and my head only.

All I have are my hopes and my ideas. And a few cloudy notions of how I can put them into action.

And yet I intend to do extraordinary things with my life. Revolutionary things.

There's a good chance I "fail." But even if all of my deepest hopes and desires, and a lifetime of sweat and guts and pure unrelenting work – even if all that comes to bear fruit, they will never compare with the hopes, and promise, and possibility of future generations.



I hope with all my heart that my brother surpasses me in every possible way.

And that future generations surpass him.

There’s an eternal comfort I take in knowing how truly small I am in the scheme of things. In knowing that one day not too far from now I’ll clear out to make way for the new – that I’ll pass on the torch.

“I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no "brief candle" for me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it on to future generations.”



-George Bernard Shaw



We hold the splendid torch for only a moment, and no matter what we do with it – whether we sweat or bleed or even die for it, or whether we sit back, relax, and take it for granted – we still hand it off in the end.

All this reminds me that any failure is temporary, as is any success. In the end, the world moves on.

So don’t impart any sort of cosmic significance to your situation, no matter how dire it is (or how fabulous).

Remember that no matter how much pain you face, you can and must endure, and having endured, you will one day pass the torch on to the young.

***

When my brother finally ceased crying that night – ceased from pure exhaustion – I experienced a momentous calm in the room.

I was changed.

Changed in the subtlest of ways, so subtle that there was no way I ever could have articulated it back then, years ago.

But this powerful memory stuck with me until this day, and it helped me to appreciate the gravity and the beauty and the sacred promise of the young, and to put things into perspective in light of that appreciation.

Hold a baby, and approach the task as if every moment in history has culminated to lead up to the action you are about to take.

Let it change you.

-David

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On Action – Intro (Part I)

At the heart of our social venture is the belief that action is the key to overcoming depression.

I love words and the incredible transformative power they hold, but in my heart I truly appreciate that no words I can put down on paper or say out loud will ever match the right action, taken at the right time, with the right intentions behind it.

At risk of sounding like a broken record, I’m going to repeat Leonard Schlesinger’s prescient words:



You can act your way into new ways of thinking.

Just to be clear, we do not at all condone the sort of condescension that says, “Get up off the couch, you bum.” No, that is not at all what we advocate. In fact, being that sort of a disciplinarian to yourself often backfires, though it may work for some people.

But before you can take meaningful action, you must believe in yourself.

This belief can be flimsy and tenuous and utterly pathetic, but it must be there, at least to some degree. Otherwise you’ll just be moving muscles, and expending ATP (energy). You’ll just be going through meaningless motions.

But so long as this spark of belief exists, you must begin to take concrete action to uplift yourself.

And you must take this action with the right thought and intention behind it.

It is thought and preparation and intention that lend action its power.

If done with the proper mindset, your action should help you believe in yourself, and that should inspire further action, and stronger belief, and so on, in a powerful positive feedback loop.

It doesn’t matter if the action you took “failed” or didn’t achieve the exact desired effect. As long as you took action with the right mindset, and having put in significant thought and preparation and intention, it will move you forward.

With all of this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Action, of which this is the introductory post, where I will give you ideas for concrete actions you can take to overcome depression, and more broadly to change yourself .

This will be perhaps the most important category of this blog, at least from the perspective of taking action to overcome depression.

Some of my ideas may sound ridiculous. Know that they are just that – ideas.

Whether or not you try them is up to you. Whether or not they work is also up to you.

Whether or not you can overcome depression, or whatever other difficulties you may face in the course of your life, is ultimately up to you.



Ideas hold powerful potential, but they are useless unless someone uses them – puts them into action.



Just keep in mind that even if a particular idea sounds stupid or doesn’t work for you, that’s perfectly okay. Don’t get discouraged.

But it’s crucial that you keep an open mind and be willing to try things out, because you never know what might work. Keep on trying, and keep on keeping on. And if something doesn’t achieve its desired effect, I guarantee you’ll still learn from it if you pay attention.

I wish you all the best as you take action to overcome the important challenges that face you, and come out stronger and better for it.

Read the continuation post for my first idea. It will be an unusual one – it comes from a memory of an important experience of mine.

-David

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On Camaraderie with Strangers – Intro

So much of our venture hinges on social connections, and that’s because social connections are crucial to happiness, and to both mental and physical health.

Some people are blessed with a strong social environment – they have close-knit families, a group of supportive friends, and coworkers who share the same passions. These things go an incredibly long way to promote wellbeing.

But many of us don’t have quite so many people supporting us. You hear terms like “Loneliness Epidemic” tossed around these days, and really it’s abundantly clear on its own, w/o journalists having to declare it, that too many people struggle to find companionship.

Let me be clear: To be alone for any extended period of time, whether physically or mentally (or both), can cause real pain.

This is not a weakness – it is simply a product of human nature to desire and seek out company.

And while being alone can teach you volumes about yourself, and can give you great strength, ultimately it’s not good for you. We can’t all be expected to be Zen, and frankly it’s just not necessary. The desire for rapport should and must be expressed.

In just a few days, I’ve already seen this very strongly in the modeling world. Many models seem to have an irrepressible desire to connect – to bond with each other, if only briefly. Outside in waiting rooms, we share small talk and sometimes life stories and well wishes, and we comfort each other when we’ve been treated coldly by the people who hold the purse strings. (Of course, many models also seem to be utterly cutthroat and self-absorbed, and won’t even look at you)

Yesterday, after one swift rejection, I randomly bumped into another model who’d been rejected right before me, out in the street.

“Well that was brutal, huh?” he joked.

“It happens.”

“You going to the other one right now? There’s one in 20 minutes, we can walk together.”

“Which one? Oh you mean ReQuest? I already went to that one, they let me go early. Good luck man.”

Outside an agency in Boston, I met a 16-year-old triple threat (shoutout to Tori and best of luck) who also figure skated for the Hungarian Nationals team. This girl, her mother, and I talked for about 15 minutes while waiting for the director of the agency to see us. Over the course of the conversation, I discovered they were from Deep River, CT. Coincidentally I’d been in Deep River for the first time just days before our meeting. They were shocked to hear I knew about the Cumberland Farms and the Da Vinci’s pizza place there – Deep River’s (ever-so-modest) claim to fame. Before we parted ways, the mother offered me free room and board anytime I was in Deep River.

I’ve come to realize the incredible value of connecting with strangers, if only briefly.

It fills the emptiness that can loom and threaten to crush you if you’re taking a path that’s outside of the mainstream.

And it really inspires and refreshes your faith in humanity.

With all of this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Camaraderie with Strangers, of which this is the introductory post, where I will chronicle the brief connections I make with random people that cross my path.

I hope to show you just how good most people are (despite an overwhelming pessimism I encounter in many people who seem to believe that most people suck), and to show you how you can enrich your life by stepping outside your comfort zone and introducing yourself.

-David

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On Rejection – Intro (New York Model Management)

Many problems that revolve around self-worth (among them depression) seem to stem partly from the inability to deal with rejection in a constructive way.

From the words you read on this blog, I may come off as confident and determined and able to brush off anything, but you should know that for the overwhelming majority of my life, I was quite possibly the most insecure person I’ve ever known.

Again, it is very important for you to understand that although I now have the strength and the willingness to put myself in very uncomfortable situations for the sake of getting things done, at one point in my life I was painfully unsure of myself.

A lot of that had to do with perfectionism and the intimately related fear of failure, and for several other reasons too, but for now I will focus on the inability to handle rejection.

Rejection-sensitivity, whether in the form of fear beforehand or a negative reaction afterwards, is one of the biggest inhibitors to success. This is the case when it comes to personal successes, yes, but also the more tangible successes, like making money, for instance.

If used properly, rejection should educate you of your shortcomings while simultaneously fueling your desire to succeed.

That is, it first gives you some of the tools you need to succeed (self-knowledge and awareness), and then the motivation to succeed (“I will prove wrong everyone who doubted me, even myself if necessary”).

The only costs to making full use of rejection are courage and the willingness to suspend your ego.



Both of these can and must be practiced.

You could probably, if you tried hard enough, artificially create the psychological circumstances that would allow you to practice the skill of commanding rejection. But I’d strongly advocate you skip the training wheels and just put yourself in real situations right away. Why slow the process down?

To illustrate a little of the kind of mindset I’m talking about, let me go personal-anecdotal for a moment:

Late Monday afternoon, I finally procured my comp cards from Model Club Inc., the modeling agency that represents me in Boston (a comp card is sort of like a photo resume). For the first time, I finally (I guess) earned the right to meet the director of the agency. He told me I shouldn’t have too much trouble finding jobs in Boston because I can pass for a wide age range – from late teens all the way to late twenties.

Well, given that I’ll be spending at least my weekends in NYC for the next few months, I figured I’d take my comp cards to modeling agencies in NYC and try to model there too. On the DL, of course, although it’s actually allowed according to my contract, since as a model I’m technically considered “self-employed” even though I (and the agency) have certain obligations.

Anyway, immediately after I drove back from Boston, I checked online for open calls in NYC. It turned out New York Model Management would be holding one the very next day from 10:30 to 11:30 AM.

Not one to wait (time = jobs = money), I called up a friend (shoutout to my good friend Andrew), asked if I could crash at his place, then drove the 5 hours back to Princeton, arriving late at night and bone-tired from the day and the commute.

Bright and early next morning, I was on a train to NYC. About twenty minutes before 10:30, I got to New York Model Management on the 7^th floor of 596 Broadway, and rather quickly I realized I was out of my league. I knew this because according to some of their literature, they represent Sports Illustrated Swimsuit models and lay claim to the #1 male model in the industry (whatever that means).

Needless to say, I was rejected. I did make it farther than some of the (much better dressed) models, though. People w/o comp cards were straight out turned away, and frankly some of these hawt guys were just too arrogant for their own good.

But I didn’t even make it through the opaque glass walls, to the area where you could hear the VIPs were contentedly chatting about what sounded like absolute horseshit.

That’s one thing you may be interested to know about hot shot modeling agencies: to cover up what sounds to the objective outsider like a bunch of elitist assholery (maybe there’s more to it when you peel the onion), they hire the nicest guy possible as the front-man. That guy was nice…softspoken, and polite, and brotherly, and the antithesis of what the other people seemed to be like.

But I digress.

The very kind front-man went in with my comp card and my application, and ten seconds later came out with my (rapid) rejection, blunted ever so slightly by his softspoken voice. He then repeated this exact same process with 4 other models – only one of us made it through, at least during the first minutes of the open call, and I have no idea if he actually made any progress beyond that. (Judging by the photos that lined their walls, they were going more for either dangerous hipster, or Euro-sophistication w/Nordic features…that kind of feel…no Asians in sight)

But here’s the important part: after our rapid succession of rejections, he offered to give each of us a list of legitimate modeling agencies in NYC, and their numbers.

Some of my fellow rejects rejected this peace offering. Others took it (seemingly) lackadaisically, glanced at it, then shoved it away.

I looked at this thing like it was a big nugget of gold.

Alright, it wasn’t that precious, but it really was a lot more convenient than having to individually research agencies online. Turns out there are some bogus agencies out there, and sometimes they even purchase real estate and hire people to set up a front and con people. It would be a pain in the ass to have to check the Better Business Bureau for the legitimacy ratings of every single agency you stumble upon.

So in short – HOW I HANDLED MY REJECTION:

I stood just outside the waiting room of New York Model Management and called up every single modeling agency on the list (36 of them), and found out the dates and times of their open calls (many don’t do open calls, and many don’t represent men).

It’s 6:30 AM right now, and in half an hour or so, I’ll be in my car, on my way to Princeton Junction to catch a train to New York Penn Station.

And I’ll be doing this every single day for the rest of the week.

Do I really care about modeling? No.

I hardly ever treat my pursuits this lightly, but in the long run I honestly don’t give a shit about modeling (what blasphemy). In the short run here and now, I badly need the money, but to some extent, I even vehemently resent the whole industry for what it represents and for what it encourages, both in its models and in society as a whole.

Still, I recognize that it’s an art form, and that some people derive value from creating it or from looking at/wearing its products. I see modeling as an opportunity to make some much needed money, to network with people who might one day help me, and to possibly gain attention that I can leverage to my advantage. Above all, I see it as a chance to learn – to acquire a deeper understanding of myself, to better understand other people, and to apply this knowledge to our venture and anything else I will ever choose to pursue. You never know whom you might meet, or what you might learn, that will give you an epiphany of understanding, or an incredible opportunity. So don’t nix those chances by fearing rejection, or handling it negatively.

The point is, I embraced my rejection and turned it into opportunity, and eventually into a story.

After it's all said and done, that's what everything becomes - just a story.

And at the end of the day, that’s all you’ve got – your memories. Strip away everything I have, and I’ll still have my memories to keep me company. Throw me in solitary, and I’ll try my damn hardest to cling to my memories as an anchor to keep me sane. That’s how Sirius survived Azkaban, is it not? (sorry, but my generation = Harry Potter)

Some of the best stories come from rejection. Rejection stories are battle scars, and you can learn from them and even use them to entertain.

So with all of this in mind, I’ve decided to start a series of posts on Rejection, of which this is the introductory post, where I will chronicle my (sure to be) many rejections and draw out the humor and insight in them.

Hopefully you’ll learn a bit about what it’s like to pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and go at it again…and again…and again…and again.

Keep in mind that through time and practice (and to some extent necessity), I’ve fully 180ed my strong innate tendency to doubt myself. At some point, I will almost certainly share with you more stories from my past, to fully illustrate the full extent of this reversal.

And I absolutely am nothing special – anyone can do the same.

So check back in for more of my rejection stories! Feel free to share your own stories too!

-David

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On This Blog – A new vision for the new year

In preparation for a few moves we’re going to make to massively publicize this blog (and our venture) to college students, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how I can best use this blog to help people.

To some extent, this brings me to the same dilemma many writers (not just bloggers) face – how to best strike the balance between writing for myself and writing for my audience? And who is my audience anyway?

Make no mistake, I write this blog partly for myself.

The fact is, nearly everything I’m “doing with my life” right now is high risk, and repeated “failure” is virtually guaranteed. Any returns that might come will come much later, way down the line, at least from the perspective of “achievement.”

Truthfully, I don’t really view it this way – I see the journey as the greatest reward.

But I won’t lie, I do care about “success” to some degree, and to the extent that “success” means helping people realize their potential, I care immensely. I’ve pretty much staked my life on it.

And I’m fine with all this. After all, I chose it. And in the long run, I think of myself as pretty much unemployable (in terms of holding a 9 to 5), and I like to at least pretend that I thrive and grow best under enormous do-or-die pressure.

But know that when I say that I write this blog partly for myself, I don’t just mean I write in a style that appeals to me. It goes way deeper than that.

This blog does nothing short of keep me sane, and it serves as an anchor for me in a highly unstable life. Seeing my words on the screen, and knowing that somebody gets something out of those words – that’s incredibly meaningful to me, and it’s about the only instant gratification that comes my way these days. For these reasons, I treat any comments I get from you readers as nothing short of soul food.

But at the same time, I make a very conscious effort to write with my readers in mind. When I tell a personal story, I try to draw out what I see to be important insights, and if I don’t outright say it, I try to place emphasis or hint at things to achieve the same effect.

Still, I recognize that so far, this blog has been pretty long-winded (among other things) and therefore may not be optimally effective in helping many of the people I most urgently want to help.

With this in mind, expect to see some pretty substantial changes to this blog in the coming month or so.

My team and I (shoutout to Hari and Colin for their invaluable role in envisioning the future of this blog) will be introducing several new features, both format-wise and content-wise:

Expect there to be more opportunity for you to directly contribute to it – for it to be much more interactive.

Expect that to some extent we’ll be “going commercial” and packaging the content in much more concise ways – ways that might make it more manageable for someone struggling with depression to use it.

Expect that there will be much more material directly relevant to someone struggling with depression.

Above all, we truly hope to offer real value to those who struggle with depression, but of course we hope that everyone who reads it will gain something from it.

For those of you who like the style and content of the blog as it is right now, have no fear! I’m not going anywhere with the long personal entries – they just might be moved to a separate section of the blog. Don’t drop out on me!

The fact is, even if you all abandoned me, I’d probably still keep writing those kinds of entries, if only because it’s a good habit for a writer to keep – it’s good practice.

Anyway, this was just a heads up – the truth is, even we don’t really know how this blog will evolve in the future.

So keep reading, and give me a shout every once in a while to let me know how I'm doing!

-David

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On This Blog – Depression Resources (Intro)

There are many good resources out there for those struggling with depression - guidebooks, memoirs, literature, etc. However, there doesn’t seem to be one place where someone could go to and find them all.

There’s no doubt about it, it’s a difficult task at hand – how to distill and package an immense amount of information into manageable form for the “average” sufferer of depression?

Still, I think it can and must be done better.

We need more creative people tackling this challenge of bringing available knowledge to the masses. And packaging this knowledge in memorable, and even entertaining ways.

I’m not sure how much time I’ll have to do this in the future (and I’m quite sure I’m not the most credible person to do this), but I promise to do my part whenever I can.

With that in mind, you will soon see my concise (and hopefully palatable and memorable, and most of all useful) reviews of “depression resources.”

And just so you know, I consider depression resources to be anything from memoirs to science textbooks to art to music to movies…and so on. I firmly believe more medical professionals involved in treating depression should be watching more movies and reading more literature and in general consuming more culture with the following frame of mind: What insights can I draw here that could help my patient/friend/family/etc overcome their depression? Hell, it might even be more useful than studying Orgo, or reading scientific papers.

Anything I stumble across that I think may be useful, I will (attempt to) recap in hip conversational form, and I’ll organize it all into the categories of this blog. Eventually, I hope to move them to an entirely separate section of the site, but that’s a task for another day…

Check back in soon for these personalized resources!

-David

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On Joy – The gift of gab (New Year’s in Chester, Connecticut)

One of my all time favorite pastimes is engaging in conversation, particularly with people I haven’t seen in a long time, or with complete strangers.

Two days ago, I drove to Chester, CT to spend New Year’s day with a friend of mine, Rob. I hadn’t seen Rob in a year or so, and he’d recently been dealing with a blood clot in his left calf. I had no idea what to expect from the visit – all I knew was I wanted to see him to make sure he was doing okay.

Pulling off the highway, I could see that his place was sort of tucked into the wilderness. Everything was covered with snow, the woods blanketed with delicate white.  I’d always wanted to see what these places were like up close.

He lived in a modestly sized grey duplex, back yard (also the parking lot) right by a stream (it’s auspicious to live by running water in some cultures). I parked my car next to a black Volvo that had seen a quite a few seasons, careful not to scrape the snow-covered canoe that lay by the house, then walked up the steep wooden steps that led to the entrance.

When Rob greeted me at his doorway, the feeling of familiarity hit me pretty strong. A lot had changed about him in that year, even just physically. He’d grown a full beard, whitish-grey, and the power of his voice seemed diminished. But it was still Rob, no question.

He welcomed me into his home, and I immediately liked the vibe. An assortment of paraphernalia lay around the place, out in the open – a glasses case, quite a few empty beer cans, books on boating and fishing, maps, a bag of vials for blood thinner injections, packs of cigarettes and accompanying ashtrays…

The place looked lived in – that’s what I was most fond of.

After the obligatory quick tour, he took me into the basement to show me his latest project – he was restoring a 100-year-old canoe. The cedar wood he worked with was absolutely gorgeous, with streaks of pure white running through the deep red wood, and seeing the planks of wood bent in unison to form the frame of the canoe was awe-inspiring.

Afterwards, we walked back upstairs and to the second floor, shoes still on (Rob being, among other things, a woodworker, it’s pretty standard for there to be dust on the floor).

He led me to what is now one of my all-time favorite rooms.

If you took a casual glance at it, it’d probably appear to be nothing more than an office. But at one point or another, that room has been a photography studio, a music recording studio, and an incubator for incredible conversations. That room holds a hell of a lot of memories.

And if you strip it down to its essence, the setup is really just two chairs facing each other. Sure, there’s a sound system, a guitar, some recording equipment, a chest, a computer, a mirror, some paintings, some framed photos, and a bunch of other miscellaneous paraphernalia.

But at its heart it’s just two chairs facing each other.

For the rest of the day, we engaged in un-interrupted conversation. Don’t get me wrong – there were silences. Sometimes long periods of silence, or perhaps with music on. But silence is just as much a part of conversation as talk is.

Kicking back in those chairs, legs crossed, uncrossed, parted, whatever – mano a mano, we shot the shit. For hours.

I admit, I’d only known Rob for a few days prior to this meeting, and under very unusual circumstances. Some would say I took a stupid unnecessary risk in visiting him.

But sometimes you can feel like you know someone very well, even after just the briefest of encounters. Sometimes this hunch turns out right, and sometimes it turns out wrong. This time I trusted myself, and I was right.

We talked about just about everything. The beautiful thing about conversation is that (and this will sound familiar) you realize the universality of individual experience.

I’d guess Rob is at least 30 years older than me.  We’re from completely different backgrounds. He grew up on a boat – he’s a “boat man.” He’s been an engineer, a boat captain (for longer than I've been alive), a tech writer, a professional photographer, and a woodworker, among other things. He’s been married, and he’s loved and lost.

I love nature and the outdoors, but I see myself as a city person. There’s an incredible energy I draw from being around tall buildings and masses of people that I can’t match anywhere else (I also draw an incredible almost transcendental energy from being alone in the wilderness, but it’s a very different quality of energy). I’ve been a lawn mower, a coffee shop barista, a mail courier, an EMT-B trainee, and briefly a tutor for Chicago youth, and I’ve just done my first photoshoot as a model in Boston. I’ve never been in a relationship.

You see how different we are? But we’re both self-taught men, and we both have a lot of life experience. And I firmly believe that as long as you make the most out of your life, and live life consciously and vigorously, paying attention to all that it has to teach you, the particulars don’t matter all that much.

I learned a lot from Rob (most of which I won’t put down here, because I’d see that as a violation of an important trust). I’m sure he learned a lot from me too.

I learned about what it’s like to deal with self-injections of blood thinners through the stomach, while constantly struggling to breathe from COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease – long-term from smoking and woodworking dust).

I learned about boating, about music, about modeling, about satisfying and unsatisfying jobs, about serendipity, about fishing. I learned that you can fly fish with the most intricate of “flies” made from duck feathers and animal hairs – it can take hours to create the perfect bait. I learned that with a little bit of work, you can make an $80 dollar guitar play and sound like an $800 Washburn.

I learned about loss – and how it’s possible to lose that which is most important to you, and still survive without remorse, if you do it properly.

I learned a lot from nonverbal cues too – intangibles, that I’ve stored in my memory, and that I’ll have with me forever to draw upon.

I learned about patience – as I observed his lifestyle, it hit me just how strong having to wait can make a man.

At times, our conversation would trigger powerful memories for him, and he’d briefly be taken away to another place, almost leaving me alone in the room, save perhaps a deep hearty laugh or a drawn out sigh.

At a certain point, some friends of his came over to visit – Jimmy and Jimmy’s son Adam – and we continued our conversation with company. Jimmy was one hell of a character, toothless (couldn’t afford the dentures) and free-spirit, with worn cap, lumberjack hoodie (grey chest hair poking out), dirty jeans, and scruffy shoes. Cigarette in one hand, and beer can in a cupholder in the other, he was a master storyteller, and he showed me a whole new world with his words.

A sampler of our conversation:

ON WOMEN AT BARS

“She was a real high-energy chick. Looked almost country western, with the big tits and ass, shaking it on top of a table. Oh, we enjoyed her. She was something to watch.”

ON CRITTERS

“What type of critters do you get in China?”

I told him about the tortoises we ate there, and how they were (rather gruesomely) prepared for a meal.

“We used to go after the snappers (a type of turtle) with a hatchet and a hammer. Those things will dig through anything to lay their eggs – even rocks. I’ve seen ‘em lay eggs, but I’ve still never seen ‘em hatch. I saw ‘em bite straight through an oar once. Those suckers will take out a toe, or a finger.”

In this last warning, I recognized the same delight my uncle in China took in giving this same warning to me. It seems warning the naïve is a pleasurable pastime for people of all races and backgrounds.

Then he told me how beavers will deliberately follow you and slap their tails against the water to splash you if you intrude on their turf.

ON THE DRUM CORPS

“Can’t play a whole set – I just wanna hit ‘em all. No, just give me one damn drum, I can work with that.”

“This one time, I was doing this drum corps gig with a bunch of guys, they were filming us for some parade or something. The director was an asshole. We’d be jamming when we got bored, and he couldn’t take that, started telling us to shut up. I told him if he really wanted us to shut up, he should go buy us some fucking beer. He did it, and we shut up real nice.”

By the end of our conversation, I felt a real camaraderie with these people – even though they’d been complete strangers just hours earlier. These were my kind of people – straight-shooters, with a passion for life, and a knack for storytelling.

Right before he left, Jimmy shook my hand and asked me, “You like floatin’ Dave?”

“What’s floatin’?”

“You know, being on a boat. Come this summer, you should come out here, and we’ll take you and show you some things you’ve never seen before.”

I cannot wait for this summer to swing around.

And I cannot wait to stumble my way into many many more interesting conversations in the future.

-David

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New Year’s Resolutions - 2010

Not sure I’m entirely comfortable doing this, but it seems like a bloggy thing to do, and it might prove educational, so here goes. Here are my resolutions for the coming year (and beyond):

1 Aggressively market this blog to college students (hint: you guys can help me do this! Tell everyone you know about this blog! Tell them to do the same!). Now that we’ve got our idea, we need people to know about us – you never know who might help, or want to be helped.

2 Get to know our “domain” (college students who struggle w/depression and other related mental health disorders) to an extent that nobody in the world has ever done before. We will do this via a combination of “hitting the streets” in-person stuff and social media (hint: at some point I’m going to ask you to help me with this too!)

3 Find a network of mentors/awesome people for our venture.

4 Make a name for myself as a slam poet in NYC. I will leverage any attention I get to do numbers 1-3.

5 Break into the NYC modeling scene. If successful, I will use the opportunity to gain insight into depression in the modeling world (it’s a big problem), and apply that knowledge to our venture. Again, I’ll leverage any attention I get to do numbers 1-3.

6 Learn how to act. I’ve interviewed and been accepted to a weekend program w/the Stella Adler Studio for Acting in NYC, and hope to one day break the mold of Asian actors being typecast as either ninjas or nerds. I also hope to one day shatter what I’ve long seen as an oppressive binary for bright young Asians – “hardcore academia” or “you’re a failure.” We’ve got a lot more to offer to this world than book smarts. Again, I will leverage any attention I get to do numbers 1-3.

So there it is. Some of this stuff may sound a bit absurd – I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I believe depression is, to some extent, a failure of the imagination. You fail to imagine the possibility for recovery, and instead become fixated on misery. To counter this, you must strong-arm these deadly mental loops and let your thoughts break free.

THINK BIG, imagine the possibility, and then take action to make that possibility reality.

I wish you all the best for the coming year!

-David

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