This past weekend I performed a solo at my friend’s 40th birthday party. I shared a few words before the performance. I asked everyone to consider some challenge they were facing - a challenge they would like to overcome in the near future - a challenge that had them a bit stumped. We stood in silence for a moment while they considered. Then I asked them to project that challenge onto this motion sculpture and observe me attempting to overcome it. I said that the piece wasn’t about me. I was a conduit for their own liberation.
After the performance, a man in the audience reflected on how generous this was. I said it is a trick of the mind. It made it much easier for me to do my best in the performance. Egos are heavy and confusing. They are constantly in a state of expansion or contraction. Not only that, they are complicated. They can tie your mind up in knots and use up your brain space. Egos can make you shy and unable to fully go for it. By offering myself and my artwork up as a tool for the audience’s liberation, I was able to clear my mind of ego pursuits and complications and give the performance my all. I didn’t hold back for fear of being too vulnerable, too intense, or too anything. It wasn’t about me anyway.
I let him know that giving it away was the most selfish thing I could do. I enjoy performing the most when I provide a technically flawless performance and am in my moment the entire time. If I am ahead of my moment - thinking about what is to come - or in my past - thinking about what I just did - I don’t feel as transcendent. Being a conduit sets me up for transcendence.
I wonder what other areas of my life I can apply this trick of the mind?