Today: Registration day. This registration put a lot in to perspective for me. I only have two semesters left; two more registration days. And then I have to figure out what’s next. That’s kind of a scary thought.
I sat down after registration and planned out my classes through winter of 2013. But that’s the easy part. Classes are the easy part. Classes are defined; scheduled; required. They fill in blanks to push me forward to where I need to be.
Once the classes end, it’s time to take the next step.
I’ve always had a plan. I want to stage manage – for the Cirque du Soleil, to be specific. To get there, I need more experience – I need to perfect my technique as a stage manager. I want to complete the apprenticeship with the Purple Rose Theatre Company and attend graduate school at the University of California, San Diego and work with Lisa Porter. Eventually, I’d like to work as a stage management intern with Cirque du Soleil and move on to a permanent position. I’ve also recently been considering working with Cirque’s social work partnership, Cirque du Monde.
Looking at these intermediate and long-term plans, it seems that I am well prepared and focused on where I am going. But thinking about “the next steps” has made me consider what I really need to be doing to prepare. I come home at night and make checklists of things that I need to complete: things like homework and laundry and paperwork for my shows. But all of these things are things I need to do to “get by.” They’re short term goals that are going to get me through my next class period, or get me through the next rehearsal. And yes, eventually getting through my classes and my shows will set me up to achieve the next step in my plan, but it’s basically like doing the bottom line. I’m not achieving anything.
What I’ve realized is that people get lost in the short term. We spend so much time thinking about a single day or week of class, work, and homework that we forget to think about the things are going to develop us as individuals and as leaders.
I’ve realized that I have all of these seemingly grandiose goals and I receive all of these incredible opportunities, but I am floating my way through a regiment of objectives and I’m not actually focusing on my work or really learning from my experiences. I’m drowning in my short term goals, and I’ve developed a type of tunnel vision for simply “getting by” until I have the free time to focus on what really counts for my future. But the thing is: the free time never comes and I never really focus.
I could go on for paragraphs about the things I wish I was doing but am not – school and theatre have had a tendency to control my life since high school. But what I am realizing is that I can’t let that be an excuse anymore. I need to focus on the things that are really going to prepare me for my future. Graduating is a goal, as is doing well in my classes, but simply graduating does not develop or prepare me in the necessary fashion.
If I want to make it to Cirque du Soleil, I need to be great at what I do: I need to be a great stage manager. But to do that, I can’t just “get by.” I need to focus on the things that will set me apart: the Roberts Fellows, my thesis and trip to Spain, and my passion for philanthropy in my work. I need to create the time enhance these aspects in collaboration with my work in the theatre. My class work, as hard as it is for me to say it, is almost secondary.
I can’t have blinders on. Yes, I need to focus on finishing this semester, and the upcoming semesters. But I need to adjust my priorities. I need to prepare for Asia, for Spain, for my internship and my research, and for my thesis just as much, if not more, than I need to achieve perfection in my class work. These are the things that get pushed to the side because of the little things that I need to complete. I plan to focus better in the coming months so that I can actually complete what needs to be completed and get the most out of the time I have left with the Roberts Fellows and the time I have left at SVSU.
I may not know exactly where I want to end up or where my path will take me, but I know the major goals that I want to achieve – I know what will make me happy – And I can use those goals, and the steps that get me there, in order to outline the rest of my life that may be less certain.
My new plan for the future: no tunnel vision; no blinders.
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