Going Above and Beyond...

The Story
I sat in class the other day hearing my classmates talk about artist from centuries ago... Creative people who made an impact in the world of art, dance and theatre. (We all were given a person to research and present to the class). Anyways, I sat and listened to these stories in awe. These men and woman were so passionate about their craft, it was their true love... They didn't "want" to be an actor or dancer... they "needed" to. It was their air...

Hearing these stories inspired me to fall in love with my craft so-to-speak.

One of my friends favorite quotes is ""In all things you do, strive to do them so well that no man living, no man dead, and no man yet to be born can do it better."-- Benjamin E. Mays

I feel like these men and women I heard about and read about knew what the word "strive" meant. But, they weren't doing it for fame, or for money but for the love of the art and for themselves. Hearing some of their life tales about their madness to obtain a deep creative understanding of their work was enlightening. They would stay up all hours of the night to go over scripts and ideas. It's quite romantic hearing about their life and love for the arts.

The Inspired Thought
I sat down to write this entry and express how the stories of these peoples past effected me. I was going to talk about passion, love, about the ability to go beyond the acceptable rules of the times, to break the norms against all the odds etc. because these were the images that popped into my head. However, when I sat down to write... I felt inadequately equipped to do so. I wrote a sentence about Passion and immediately questioned did I really understand that word. I've never really looked it up. This triggered even more thoughts...

I admit I take many things for granted (which I'm trying to work on) but language is something I use every day, and I've had no regard for it. I throw words like Passion, and Love and Rage and Strive around so loosely, yet these words carry so much emotion... so many stories. As my classmates would read quotes spoken by their "person" people would actually come to tears because of what was being conveyed, through language.

The Bigger Picture
I keep thinking about my friends favorite quote, and I keep thinking about my pursuit of acting... the training and evolving. I think the key word in the quote is striving. What do you do when you are striving for something beyond greatness? You learn... better put, you seek out information, and you never stop.