Cris-i-tunity

The post below is something I wrote for a new blog or perhaps even a book that I plan to start writing soon. It has been on the sidebar of Off-Stage-Right for a while, but some readers suggested I bring attention to it by making it a post. I will still leave it on the sidebar, it is a guide for me in a deeply personal way. As I was thinking today about why I am writing this blog, I realized the friends who suggested it be a post here were right:

I can't help but feel that we (and unquestionably I) have entered a new era and that we must shed the past, taking with us what we learned but facing the fact that none of it may be useful in the future.

Everyone is more than aware of the global economic turmoil we are experiencing. It is impossible to escape TV reports, newspapers and magazines, internet alerts, etc. that let us know how horrible the situation really is. Even the President of the United States has to be honest that these are trying times, and they are going to get worse. And, no one can really say how long recovery will take or what recovery looks like. We find it difficult to even discuss or if it is recovery or is it more truthfully outright change.

The world of theater - especially nonprofit theater - is not experiencing a bump in the road, a correction, or simple challenges. We must acknowledge that we are entering a new reality and must adapt our organizations and, yes, our art to thrive in this new reality.

Personally, I am also going through circumstances beyond my control that are creating a new reality for me. I have lived my professional life in the world of theater - although I had a global perspective in learning, I rarely journeyed outside of the theater world, and today I am faced with a great unknown as to whether I can or will continue to do so, or whether I am supposed to be traveling another path.

Without question this personal, national, and global crisis has manifested for myself and I am sure many others a response similar to Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's five stages of grief -denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. I am sure that dissertations have been written relating grief to life changes or periods of crisis.

However, I posit that for life changes or crises there is a sixth stage. A stage in which we take action. That stage is opportunity.

Therefore, even though my professional and personal life may be in crisis and the world is facing tremendous social, economic and cultural crises, it is time I emerge from denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance into opportunity. I expect there to be minor/major shifts and bumps in the road, so I will just call this period - Cris-i-tunity.