I act on stage. I’m not that great, and the productions are small & forgettable, but to me each performance means the world. I guess it’s because it’s one of the rare times I get to step out of my miserable existence and pretend I’m someone else. And the audience, however small, validates this “character” I’m pretending to be. After the show I hurry home and resume being my real wretched self, playing to an audience of 0.
I’m sick of it. Sick of living for just those few moments on stage when I’m pretending to be something else, then having to spend days alone with the real me. Especially since the real me spends all his time preparing to be the fake me.
Whether you’re an actor or not, I think a lot of you face the same horrible problem. There’s the fake you who appears in public, and there’s the real you who hides alone somewhere. The fake you receives validation from people while the real you shrinks further & further into the shadows.
But the fake you fights back. It burns your insides and smashes your ribcage like a mad prisoner. My solution is to keep him sedated. Pills, alcohol and more pills do the trick sometimes. Only sometimes.
I can’t be the only one with this problem. I feel like our entire society has become a legion of actors, each pretending in front of each other. That person you stand behind in the supermarket checkout lane, is it really what you see? Or is it something darker, troubled and possibly as suicidal as you are? We are a race of actors, suppressing our own true nature and instead playing the parts that someone else (parents, friends, bosses, teachers) have written for us.
The show must go on. Or must it? I feel like suicide will be the one & only genuine thing I’ve done in my whole life. My choice, my action, my consequences. I just can’t put up with the show anymore.
2 comments
we all hide ourselves to a varying degree. for me it is self protection. when the “real” me wasn’t accepted as is i built a wall around her. heard of the saying got to go along to get along? that is what i and most everyone else does to survive. i know your pain. you have found an outlet-use that as a release. that pain is a foundation for a lot of creative people. reveal yourself through your art.
You are not the only one
We are more than the sum of our parts a problem occurs when we identify our “self†with just one part.
To deal with the world we create personas and a person may have many personas: daughter, sister, friend, wife, and actor.
If a persona is helpful or not is another question but to indentify the ‘self’ with a single persona can be at the root of depression for many people.
For example a person solely identified with role of mother looses all sense of self when their children leave home.
We also experience the world in two ways, objectively – the actual events and subjectively – our inner response, thoughts to the event.
Objectively you receive validation for a role that you played, subjectively you don’t feel worthy or that it has anything to do with your ‘true self’. Both were real and both were not.
Between the objective and subjective is allot of room for illusion!
Studies have measured a 0.5 second gap.
0.5 seconds to filter the objective experience and change it into something else – so sensing an experience as fake is understandable. Though it may be more helpful to change the word fake to illusion.
Your distress seems to be you’re in awareness of the gap between the objective and subjective so everything feels fake.
You also seem to be focusing a lot of attention on other peoples persona’s which as a actor makes sense for your craft but is unhelpful if you identify the persona with the persons ‘self ‘.
As an actor you have the wonderful opportunity to experiences personas that aren’t a part of ‘your self’ and can be used to better understand others and yourself.