How To Be Secure In Your Views And Knowledge

I don't know about you, but the thinkers I respect the most are the ones that are very secure in the knowledge they posses and in the views they hold. Of course I'm not talking about obstinate and closed-minded know-it-alls. I'm talking about thinkers who have views and information that are rooted in something much greater than speculation, emotion or shaky sourcing.

As a strong and deep thinker myself, I have found myself in countless debates with people who get highly triggered by the confidence and security behind the positions and perspectives I hold. And even though I hold less and less of these as I mature more and more, the few that remain and I hold on dearly to are just as threatening to those who don’t seem to feel as certain and secure in their personal convictions.

And here's the thing. Well, let me give you this analogy - since I love analogies. Not many days ago, I was putting shelves in my closet. To put them on, I had to find the places in the wall that are supported by what's called a stud. A stud, for those of you that don't know, is a part of the foundation of the wall that is solid and keeps that wall in place. It's like the skeleton of the wall.

Anyway, in a few misses, I drilled a hole and put a screw into the parts of the wall that had no stud, these screws where not supported by much more than the plaster the wall was made of, in other words, there was nothing solid or substantial behind it. Any shelf I would try to hang on that would eventually collapse, as plaster alone could not secure much.

So just like that, if we're going to have a belief, opinion, view or idea that we're going to feel secure about, we're going to have to base it on a stud that can support and have something quite substantial and solid in place. Here are some things that are not substantial or solid enough to allow us to be secure or confident in our view:

1. Emotion.
2. Speculation.
3. Superstition.
4. Assumption.
5. Fear.

Although any or all of these could work with someone who is not a strong thinker, they will never work with someone who has spent a great deal of time "stud finding" (to go on with my metaphor). None of these things could ever trump the following:

1. Awareness.
2. Experience.
3. Experimentation.
4. Evidence.
5. Testing.

To arrive at information, views and knowledge that have something solid behind it, we have to do more than just spew out our inherited, passed down, unquestioned beliefs and assumptions. It takes actual work and deep digging to find views that we're not going to feel insecure about.

The way to know if we're secure and have arrived at a view that is holistic is when we don't easily feel triggered when somebody challenges our point of view. When our point of view is in alignment with the powerful force of reality, it is pretty much in place as securely as a view can be.

That's the nice thing about it, reality is self-confirming because we are wired to feel in harmony and balance when we are aligned with it. All half-baked beliefs and views come with an immense amount of insecurity in them. That is why people get so emotional and "passionate" about their views - because they feel they have to campaign for them with all their might in order to keep feeling like how they see things is actually true.

And lest anyone reading this misconstrue my point: I am not saying that feeling very secure in what you believe is evidence that the belief is accurate - our capacity to be deluded and out of alignment is obviously monumental. What I am saying is that if our views bring us a sense of harmony, simplicity, peace and relaxation along with a feeling of warmth, clarity and love, that is how we know that we are in alignment with reality.

When we feel insecure, defensive, reactive and emotional, we can be pretty sure that something is out of whack.

I love how we are wired to reflect our state of mind. Any misinformation or out-of-whack belief will cause a state of insecurity and anxiety. The truth and sound and solid views don't have to attack, defend, react or go into crisis in order to make their point known.

So if you find yourself getting threatened by someone expressing their view or position that doesn't align with yours (or lack of yours) - use this as a gauge that there is more work to be done in the investigation department. Of course, if security and confidence are things you value. I have never seen someone becoming non-defensive and secure in their views without using their intelligence in a very pointed way to arrive at a place of clarity.

Maybe sometimes people do get there by virtue of aging, but I am of the bias that getting clear and straight in your mind, heart and gut does take some pointed and intentional work. Especially in a world that is full of folks that get by with very shaky foundations. If they survive and get away with it, then why bother? My answer: because paying the price of living in a state of psycho-emotional insecurity is no fun at all. And it leads to a lot of craziness. Invest a little, dig deeper and find some good instruction and guidance, I think it's worth it. It will make you more secure in yourself and way more confident. Of course this is assuming you haven't yet signed up to go on this ride. It's a long one, but it's a fun one. And it's totally worth it.

There Is No[t So Much Of A] Self

Through my spiritual journey, one of the teachings that has been the most intriguing and perplexing has been the statement that "there is no self." I'm happy to report that all these years into it, I have found a way to make sense of it for myself. Here's how I've done it...

A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of staying with my brother, his wife and their 11 and 4 year-old. During my stay, my mother came to visit from the Dominican Republic and I got the opportunity to observe how all this self stuff works. I feel so lucky and grateful.

Here's what I saw... so my nephew who was then 3, but is now 4 seems to prefer junk food over whole foods. Now his father, mother and my mother (his grandmother) all obviously prefer that he eat wholesome foods because as grown-ups we understand whole foods are more nutritious and nourishing. Of course my nephew doesn't understand nor care about that. He's a 4 year-old.

Anyway, here's what I saw and how it clicked for me that there isn't nearly as much of a self as most of us seem to believe... My mother, with all her good intentions is trying to get him to eat actual food... but he's still being stubborn and throwing a tantrum that he wants the sugary and unhealthy stuff.

And it was around this time when mom turns to me and tells me something to the effect of: "He doesn't like real food, he only likes junk."

Something about when she said this made it very clear to me that what she was referring to as "He" was his supposed "self," but really, "he" is just a human with a tongue and a brain that are susceptible to addiction. Processed sugar is a highly addictive drug - when we give it to very young humans, their taste buds and digestive and biochemical systems trigger a chain of effects that sooner or later become cravings for the substance.

So is it that "He" (his "self") prefers processed sugar over wholesome foods or is it that his body is addicted to a substance completely unbeknownst to him? And here's where excessive "selfing" begins. His parents and peers tell him "YOU only like junk food" (When the fact really is: your body has been repeatedly exposed to an addictive substance and now it is craving more of it). Repeat and drill the idea that it is "YOU" (whatever that is) that loves junk food, and now we have a self that actually believes that "he" is a junk-food lover.

And the same goes with so many other things. "YOU" like this cartoon. "YOU" like this color. "YOU" like to drive me crazy. "YOU" like to manipulate. "YOU" don't like to read. "YOU" don't listen. "YOU" are... "YOU" aren't...

Before you know it, these messages get repeated and reinforced so many thousands of times and it all starts so early that it just keeps piling up and being recorded in a way that creates a seemingly solid self that was never real to begin with. And all I keep thinking about is all of the years of meditation and self-inquiry that are necessary to get dismantle this innocently created mess.

For me, when I was a kid, my mom and my dad used to look at me and tell me stuff about "myself" that to this day baffle me. And maybe that is how I was able to remember and see this innocent process happening. Because I would see the baffled face on my nephew when he would be told certain things. Kind of like "huh?" Followed by "I have no idea what you're saying, but you sure do sound really convinced and you're an adult, so you must know what you're talking about."

And that power differential is what tends to get the young child to buy and accept and embrace these false aspects of themselves. And as anyone who has looked at human development and psychology enough knows, it won't be long until the child actually starts to play that role to fit in with the family. A role that more often than not becomes a self for a long time.

Hopefully that little vignette is clear on how I've made sense of the "there is no self" teaching. Basically we are all just animals who are assigned names and then these names become the containers of a bunch of aspects of ourselves, none of which are ultimately real. Just like our name isn't actually who or what we are, neither are such acquired conditioned aspects of the "self." They are all just adaptations.

At some point, if we're lucky, we start to look at all this stuff and try to get to the bottom of what is actually so for us in a more organic way. I haven't found we ever completely get rid off all the stuff that was given to us by others who were and are there as we grow and develop, but I have found it is possible to get by with a lot less than was given to us. Especially the heavy stuff. And boy was I given some heavy shit to carry. Thank God, I don't feel I have to carry those heavy loads anymore.

By the way, the picture I posted is a Dominican doll that is faceless - it points to how the Dominican people don't have a specific face because they were colonized and populated by so many different races and cultures. In a way, I thought it went along with the no-self theme.

Lastly, I still do feel and think there is SOMEWHAT of a self, just one that is a lot more rudimentary and simple than we realize. I believe every animal, cell, tree, human has somewhat of a self - that self is what makes it an individual. And I believe that is what most humans are disconnected from, their basic, more real and true rudimentary self. I think that's what deep spirituality is trying to take us to. To that primordial, essential, basic self. And I believe we all share the same self, except we all are unique expressions of it. To get there, we either first have to realize that universal Self or we have to see through enough of the false created self. It takes a degree of maturity and interest in really getting the the bottom of who am I really - which is an interest that doesn't arise until one is ready. :)

Gassho (this expression represents two hands coming together in front of the chest, each hand representing a heart. "My heart and your heart are one" - that is what the meeting of the hands represents)

Namasté (this expression means the light of the universal Self in me honors the light of the universal Self in you. Or you could say God - I replaced the word "God" for universal Self this time.)

Best wishes.

Forgive Yourself

We all screw up. A lot. It'd be great if we knew that we were screwing up in the midst of our screwing up, but it just doesn't work that way. And would it be great? Would we ever really learn if we didn't fall hard? I don't know.

 A part of my fantasy has always been that we all just "know better" - but would that really be ideal? Or is it better that we, in fact, don't know better, think we do and then fall on our faces and learn?

Is there a designer to the way this all works? A God that intentionally planned for all of this to be this way? A God that decided that we would get cocky, act in ignorance thinking we were fully aware and then look back and feel like an ass?

I don't know - and I don't think it matters. I think that what matters more is that when we wake up out of an ignorant phase where we thought we knew what we were doing, we act with great compassion and kindness towards ourselves.

And I know this is very hard to do when we have a long history of being shamed when we made a mistake. We really don't need to keep doing that. So you royally screwed up (acted a fool, said yet another big fat lie, sabotaged a great relationship, made a dumb investment, treated someone like crap or whatever other dumb thing you did) - OK. It's true, it hurts. It's true, you feel like a total ass. But do you need to beat yourself up and keep perpetuating the shame? Do you really need to keep telling yourself that you're such an idiot and that you should have known better?

You didn't know better. Now you have the opportunity to learn what you didn't know then. But you can only harvest the fruit of that hard-won learning experience if you're able to get past the self-hatred and ongoing shock and disbelief you have about having been such a fool.

We are all fools. And that's the thing that is so hard for us to get. We keep lying to ourselves telling ourselves that someone out there that we respect and look up to a lot is not a fool. And we tell ourselves that we should and could be like them. The thing is... that person you look up to and admire is also a fool. You just don't want to let yourself know that because then you won't be able to keep fantasizing about one day not being a fool. If they're also a fool, you can no longer keep buying time to hopefully one day be no longer a fool like them.

I know this for two reasons. One, I happen to keep on falling for the sticky trap of idolizing and idealizing certain people. I swear up and down they are not fools like me. I swear up and down that if I could just be them I would no longer be a fool. I project a highness onto them and I fall for it over and over again. Two, I happen to be aware that some people look up to and idealize and idolize me. They swear up and down I am not and cannot be a fool like them. They are wrong. But they won't allow themselves to know that. Again, because that takes away their naive hope that they so deeply and desperately cling to. The hope that not being a fool is actually possible.

The day that you or me won't be a fool won't come. The day that your or my idols won't be fools won't come. That's true because we are all fools.

The only way one can successfully not be a fool is by being an idea in someone's head. But hang out with that person long enough (move in with them) and the reality will replace the idea and you will see a foolish human sooner rather than later. I repeat, the only way to not be a fool is to be an idea or an image in someone's head. And the only way to maintain that image is by having very limited contact and closeness with the real human person that this wishful thinking idea represents.

Idols are just that, idols. Not real people. And all real people have foolishness as a component of their humanity. All kinds of foolishness.

As crushing as this is for the naive little child inside of us, it is very important that we come to terms with that truth. And I am not saying it is easy. We have invested a lot of energy into fantasizing about being extraordinary or believing in extraordinary people. We have put a lot of our eggs into that basket. But the truth is that people are just people. And all people have many flaws.

Now, this is not to excuse any of your shitty, stupid or dumb behavior. And it's also not to give you a pass into not paying attention to your way of moving through life. This is not a get-out-of-jail-free card. It is far from that.

This is more an invitation to forgive yourself and accept the shitty actions, attitudes and beliefs and opinions you've held in the past and to see them as natural waves in the development of a human, for the sake of continuing to develop and grow as a human.

Just because we are all fools and just because we will always be fools doesn't mean we can't continue evolving and growing and becoming more conscious, appreciative and humble people as the process of maturity keeps taking place. It's just that this process of maturity literally cannot happen as long as we continue being unforgiving and self-shaming of our inherent fallibility.

And again, just because we'll never be fully perfect, doesn't mean we can't be earnest and sincere in our desire to continue to grow and evolve as much a possible. Just because "nobody's perfect," doesn't mean we can't tap into our deep desire to every day be a more honest, humble, kind, sincere, empathetic, compassionate and reliable person. Sure, none of us will ever get perfect at it, but all of us can grow, one baby step at a time. We can all move more and more into the side of the spectrum that represents the values that through many generations we have come to know as goodness.

Is it easy to transform and grow in this direction? Not necessarily. Does it get easier with practice? Yes, over time. Can we do it alone? To a certain extent, but like with anything else, doing it with proper support makes it more effective. Can we forgive ourselves for our past transgressions? When we're ready, yes, just not before we get over the fact that we have all been and continue to be vulnerable to being an ass.

I write this because I know many of us struggle with self-forgiveness. And I write this because I know it is possible to make this struggle a little less difficult. The key is wanting to be compassionate and gentle with oneself more than wanting to be self-condemning and vindictive with ourselves.

The nice bonus is that the more magnanimous we get with ourselves, the more magnanimous we get with others. Over the years I've learned that we can only be as forgiving and understanding of others as we can be forgiving and understanding of ourselves. And I've learned that self-forgiveness and forgiveness of others is always completely worth it. You won't get cash and prizes for it. Not at all. Life and other people will be as challenging as always - but at least you'll live the rest of your time on this planet with less of a burden on your shoulders, with less pressure in your head, with less of a burden in your body, with less of a monkey on your back.

So give it a try, forgive yourself.

Her Creativity And Mystery

When an infinitely curious and inquisitive mind and a sensitive and emotional heart like mine meet life, there is great potential to live in a combination of infinite wonder, torment and faith and doubt.

Questions like does perception create life or does life create perception circle round and round at times giving rise to creative stress that leads to burnout and at times leading to creative tension that leads to openings that satisfy the insatiable thirst of an infinite philosopher.

Inquiries like these make the chicken or the egg conundrum seem trivial. They make the notion of sanity and insanity seem arbitrarily subjective.

Sometimes I wonder if life is living me or I am living life. Sometimes I wonder if I am in a waking state or if I am inside of a dream. Sometimes I wonder if this is the afterlife. Sometimes I wonder if I am even me at all.

And how could I not have these questions in the midst of the bottomless creative mystery that life is? How could I not be constantly sniffing beneath every manifestation if they all exude a scent of the universal essence that my heart has always been longing for?

I am quietly, calmly and intensely desperate to realize the eternal in a way that satiates the existential angst that lives in my gut. I am secretly crossing beyond the threshold of the supposed known into the depths of the timeless divinity that permeates all that is.

And how could I not be? After all this unrest. After all this unease. After all this longing.

I would write that I am ready. But I don't know who I am. So I'll just write that I am here. Willing.

What's The Point Anyway?

Somehow at some point in my life I decided that I was going to pretend like I was always doing well and living my life with a sense of meaning and purpose. It seemed like a good marketing strategy as a voice teacher living in a very competitive and capitalistic world.

How will I present myself to the world if I want to seem attractive and compelling? Well, by coming off as a happy-go-lucky kind of guy. A guy that always has a passionate fire burning within and is always enthralled and in love with his life and his life's work. A guy that is always lit up and happy to be alive. It was a good plan, wouldn't you say? I mean, who wants to study voice, acting or work on their self-esteem with a miserable dud. How will I put food on the table if I don't figure out how to appeal to my prospective students?

So yeah, I've always been that strategic planner that does things with attention to detail and with awareness of the implications of his choices. Well, not always, but you know what I mean - after I grew up and stuff.

As a teenager I was always embarrassed to have friends over. I always thought my house needed to be repainted, cleaned up and organized. Somehow, I always felt like the disheveled state that I perceived my house to be in said something about me.

Truth be told, and contrary to my boyfriend's belief. I take tremendous pride in the way that I present to the world. It is utterly important to me that my house, my car, my body, my, my clothes and even my spelling and social media don't elicit the idea that I am some sort of unaware hot mess.

And like many people, I made the mistake of linking my pride in myself with an outrageous sense of entitlement.

In other words, I felt that if I was educated, fit, clean, organized and presented myself in a professional, skilled and well refined fashion, I would automatically be granted success in whichever endeavors I pursued with sincere intention. Because after all, isn't that what is drilled into our brains from the second we come out of the womb? (Or should I say from the second we are conceived?)

"You are the master of your own destiny" - do this, this and this and you'll get this, this and this. But it's just not true is it?

So there, that's where the "what's the point?" title of this post comes from. When you feel like you're doing your best, when you feel like you're being earnest and sincere, when you feel like you are working really hard and paying attention to just about every angle but are just not seeing the expected results. What happens?

I don't know about you, but for me it's a state of helplessness and despair. And then a story starts to deeply embed itself in the fabric of my unconscious. "It's pointless" - I won't get recognized or rewarded for my efforts anyway. "What's the point of working and trying so hard if I can't even pay my bills?" "Better to stay on the couch and stay on my phone."

This is what in psychology is known as learned helplessness. It's a pattern and cycle that becomes extremely difficult to become conscious of in oneself. And it can happen to us in any area of our lives.

For me, it usually gets me with career stuff. For others it gets them with relationships. For others it gets them with health and fitness. For others it gets them with life as a whole. For my students, it can get them with vocalizing.

Giving up is doesn't always happen because we're lazy and because we want things to be easy. Giving up can also happen because we are literally burned out and tired of attempting to achieve something without any measure of success that we can account for. It happens because life can be hard, society can be unfair, people can be cruel and stuff can just suck sometimes.

But the hardest thing to get past is the idea that we are in control and that we are entitled to something. And the other hard thing to get past is giving up on our familiar persistent desires and wishes. Another thing our culture drills into our head to NEVER give up on no matter what. Another piece of shitty advice that we can thank the delusional world we live in for. And come at me with your rebuttals, because I am ready.

The point of my sharing this is not to be negative, although it will inevitably appear that way to anyone who is still in the phase of ardently trying or anyone who is in the phase of enjoying the illusion of having created their own success. But the point of me sharing this is for creating awareness around how real life can work sometimes and letting you know that if you're burned out and feeling hopeless and tired of the "same old shit" - that you know that you are not alone and that you are not crazy or lazy or stupid. Because you are not. You are just experiencing some very justified exhaustion and weariness that is part of being alive.

Regardless of what privileged people say, life is really, really hard sometimes and it's okay to admit that and to wonder what the point of all of this is. Sometimes, asking that question is perfectly reasonable and normal. Sometimes feeling like a victim that has not been lucky and who the gods must be playing a joke on is a natural result of walking on this earth. And in my book, that is totally normal, natural and even acceptable.

So there. Maybe there isn't a point. Maybe it's okay that you're fed up and tired. Maybe you just need to know that someone knows how you feel and understands you. Maybe you just need to know that it's natural to feel the way you feel sometimes. Maybe you just need to know that you are OK. Maybe you just need to know that there is nothing wrong with you.

Maybe you just need to hear that the way you feel makes sense. Maybe you just need a hug.

And here is my hug to you.

Me Too

Usually when I'm going to write something, I write it from what feels to be a spontaneous and unplanned place. This one is different. To be honest, I feel my heart pounding a little faster and I honestly feel scared to write what I am about to write.

Since the Weinstein horrors have been surfacing I have kind of been undesirably forced to look at the parts of my past that resonate with the sour notes being played by these public revelations on some of the realities of the world of show business.

What I am mostly scared about, is not about telling the truth about some of the resonating things that I have been through, but what I am more scared about is the lack of caring and the negative reactions that I might get for publicly divulging how I have been a victim of sleazeballs that were not respectful of my naive and youthful mind, brain and body.

Lucky for me, I've always had the makings of a strong and self-protective soul that for whatever reason knows its worth and value. Unlucky for me, that was only a latent potential that wasn't always as realized as it is now.

Normally, I am of the folks that chooses to go with the classic deep denial line of "I don't care what people think about me" style of portraying myself, but the consideration of even writing this note is challenging that protective layer of denial. Again, I am scared of what people will think about me when they read this. Even worse, I am scared that people won't even read this.

And that's a clue into one of my primary fears. The fear that no one really cares about me. The fear that people will call me a drama queen. The fear that people will tell me that I am only sharing this because I have nothing else going on in my life and that I am doing it for attention. The fear of people thinking that I am just doing this to jump on the hip #metoo wagon. The fear that I'll be blamed or punished in any way for revealing what I am about to reveal. The fear that I am going to be accused of writing in a way in which I believe myself to be more important than I am and that I am just manipulating people into caring about me. And believe me, I cold go on with the list of fears. But I won't. I won't thanks to Anthony Rapp daring to go forth in sharing his story.

I will, however, explain a little bit of why I feel so afraid: First, because I am thoroughly trained in expecting people to belittle the pain of most of my vulnerable confessions, especially when they are not seen as a "good enough" reason to be stirred by the event. Second, because for whatever reason I feel that people only care about popular or renowned people. Regular folks like me have no business publicly sharing stuff like this because it doesn't serve anything other than playing a victim and making everyone around uncomfortable. That kind of public confession should be reserved to celebrities, because underneath it all, we regular people just don't matter enough.

Well today I am deciding, as I have been deciding little by little for all of my life, that I matter enough to share my story. And here it is...

Pardon the redundancy, but due to a large combination of events, along with my temperament, personality and life experiences, I was a teenager that arrived at the point of profoundly feeling like I really didn't matter. It's a long story, which I am open to talking about, and in fact have been for most of my life, but without much success in creating many significant and mature dialogues about it.

I always loved to sing. It was one of the few things that made me feel important and like I mattered at least a little bit. Whenever I would sing as a kid on my family summer vacations, my uncles and cousins would praise my voice. Not so much because it was great, but because they just thought everything that their visiting cousin did was cool. But it didn't matter, I loved to sing and I wanted to believe that I was good. Which honestly, I kind of was, except I couldn't keep up with the singing stars of my youth, my voice would horribly crack when I attempted to sing the really high and loud notes. But again, it didn't matter, I was still celebrated.

Those summer vacations, and a handful of oohs and aaahs as a reaction from strangers hearing me sing, made me feel like I had a gift. But even beyond that, I really, really just loved to sing and I kind of liked the way I made myself feel when I would sing my favorite songs as a child.

Long story short, the combination of my love of singing and my idea that few others thought I was good along with my feeling of not mattering because I was nobody, led me to a path of pursuing a career in which I believed I was going to be an important international singing superstar. I decided that to matter I had to be famous and that to be famous I had to study singing and acting in college.

So I did.

Come to find out, I really wasn't as good as I thought. I mean, I was, but I was not experienced enough and lacked the confidence in the face of reality. I went from being one of the only people who could sing in a small suburb in the Dominican Republic, to being one among many who had been playing the leading roles in their high school musicals. Something that the pretty much none of the high schools I had attended down in the Dominican Republic had.

So I went from being a big fish in a little pond, to being a small fish in a much bigger pond. And I didn't even go to a big or well-known school. In fact, I ended up going to a school that very few people know and that to this day has a relatively small theater and music department.

My first audition to get in the musical was horrendous. I was so nervous, clueless and insecure that I basically screamed the whole song, rolled my eyes to myself the whole time and was incredibly awkward in my entrance and exit. There was nothing I gave that said "promising," at least in my eyes.

But I'm not the type of person that tanks something and then goes "oh well, this must not be for me." Fortunately I have a little more perseverance than that. And I also have days when I can admit that I am responsible for my failures. And this was one of those days. I knew I had tanked my audition and I didn't really expect to get a part in the musical of my freshman semester. I had a feeling my name would not be on the callback or casting list on the days to come.

I accepted my defeat gracefully and when the musical went on, I of course went to see it. I loved it so much I wrote a great review for it. It had been so nice to see all these people up there doing what I always wanted to be doing. Singing for an applause. Singing for recognition. Singing for the sake of loving singing. I wanted to do that so bad. And I was so proud and happy for them to have done that for themselves.

Fast forward to my second semester in college, and I had already made some progress, definitely not enough to be in these musicals either, but enough to be in the ensemble of the children's musicals, which I didn't even make. To this day, I don't know if it had anything to do with my horrendous first impression or if it had to do with there not being enough room for me. The point is, I was involved in the shows as a stage hand and although I was dying to be a member of the performing cast, I was happy to be so up and close with the whole cast. I was a silent, yet also often vocal cheerleader wishing all the performers the best and admiring the work they did as actors, dancers and singers. I was fully collaborating and participating in the productions, but still silently struggled with my sense of not mattering, especially since I was nothing but a stage hand. So I know how it feels for people who have jobs that people consider menial. Especially when it's paired with the level of low self-worth and self-esteem that I was silently struggling with. It's not pretty, but you push through it and "you do for the love of others what you wouldn't do for yourself" as someone I respect very much says.

Now it's next year, I'm a sophomore now - I've had a whole summer to get better, a whole summer to work on my singing, my acting, not much on my dancing, because I never though that was going to happen for me so I didn't bother much, but it didn't matter, because many leading roles, which were what I wanted did not require dancing. Well, many except the one that we put on that year which was a heavy tap dancing show. Needless to say, I didn't get a lead. But guess what? I made it into the tap-dancing ensemble because they didn't have enough men! Something that any small theater school attendee knows all about. Most of these people are women. And the guys either don't sing, don't dance at all or don't really strive to get into musicals.

So there I was, tap dancing through rehearsals, scared shitless, half dissociated, and extremely uncomfortable trying to push through my total inability to tap dance. It was embarrassing. Not that many people noticed, because if the school I went to was good at something, it was at reinforcing my sense of loneliness and not-matteringness that I had already been going through. Like many theater youngsters, most of these people where fixated on themselves. If I have more than three stories in the banks of my memory of a fellow thespian noticing my struggles and offering me help, I'd be shocked. But maybe they were there and I missed them in my cloud of self-loathing and phony confidence. I don't know.

At this time, my school had three major theater authorities, Laura, who was my favorite. Milton, who was the Academy Award Winning celebrity professor of acting, and Phil who was in charge of the musicals. There was also Christy, from the music department. At the time, she played the piano for auditions. And incidentally, she had rejected me in my entry audition for the school, on the basis of me not even knowing the most basic of music notation. By the way, Laura was the one who accepted me into the school as an Acting student, she even got me a partial scholarship based on my talent.

I hate this part in writing, when I feel like I am about to get to the meat of what I want to share, and I find myself meandering and losing steam. But I am doing my best here to push through. The inner saboteur keeps telling me to scrap all of this and just go for that walk that I intended to go on before I stopped on the way out to start writing this. But I know this aspect of me too well, and I will push through and get what I need to off my chest. Because I matter, dammit.

If my memory doesn't fail me, it is now the second semester of my sophomore year, around the time of auditions for the season's shows. Milton, the one that gets away with telling me in front of the whole class that I look like a bum, that is asking me what the fuck I am doing, gets in the bathroom where I am going to pee and locks the door behind him. This creepy, intimidating, namedropping and crass figure is now directly behind me, slides his hand across my chest through the inside of the top of my shirt and says "Oh Gabriel!" in the creepiest possible way. I can't remember if he kissed my neck or not, but I am pretty sure he did. I had no clue of what to do. I wasn't as scared as I was paralyzed and shocked. I had no idea what to do other than to say "Milton! What are you doing?" to which he reacted with a smile first, and then by stepping back when he saw how unwelcome he was. I was grossed out. I told some of my peers and they had not much more of a reaction than "Really? What the fuck?" which was pretty much all I wanted at the time. So it was all good. Or so I thought. But I don't think so. I don't think I'm OK with what happened that day. I can tell because as I wrote that, I feel my body flooded with adrenaline and disdain and anger. I was violated that day and that was not OK.

Was I an adult? Yes. Did I keep it from going further? Yes. Was this still assault and violation? Yes. I wasn't consenting. I was a vulnerable student and this man took advantage. I am disgusted as I write this, because I would never want something like this to happen to anyone else under similar circumstances. It's abuse of power, it's crossing a boundary and it's not OK.

And I wish I could stop there. But Phil, the married man, who I hope is now healthier and more mature also made a pass at me. In some ways even worse because he kissed me on the lips in the small costume room by the black box theater in which the first musical that I wrote the review for took place. This other creep, who I hope with all my heart is now reformed, used to make inappropriate remarks into my ear about details of my sex life that I would regrettably share with a peer with a big mouth at the time and then he would disgustingly lick the inside of my ear. He did this once or twice, I can't really remember, but he did it once and that was bad enough.

The incident in the costume room happened shortly before auditions took place too. I don't know if that was just a coincidence or these power abusers just knew that the students were more vulnerable around that time because they wanted to get in the shows so bad or what the case was, but whatever the case was. He made some inappropriate remark, he was married and had introduced all of us to his husband whom he "loved" and would tell sweet jokes about, he knew I had a girlfriend and he still took advantage of a time when we were alone and he reached in to kiss me. I kissed him back out of feeling cornered and also dying to get a leading role and I immediately realized what I had done and retreated. Remorse set in instantly and I felt cheap and horrible for longer than I suspect I allowed myself to admit to myself.

I survived most of my teens and twenties by way of dissociation and denial. And I know I am not alone in this which is part of why I am sharing these experiences with all of you. I thought I wasn't impacted but again, I feel a rush of adrenaline and what I suspect to be a cocktail of brain chemicals releasing the suppressed trauma. So in that way, I hope this ends up to be a healing experience and not one of further trauma.

I ask that if you are helped or relate to this story or know anyone who would, that you share that with me and that you share it with anyone else. And if you went to school with me and went through anything similar, that you be brave and share with me either in public or in private so that I can feel less alone in these things. This really wasn't fun and although I wouldn't say this is the reason why I've backed off tremendously from pursuing a career as an actor and singer in show business, I have to admit that these experiences have had a negative impact on my view of the industry. Especially now with all the Weinstein stuff.

It's a power abuse issue, it's a corruption issue, it's pervasive in all fields where humans are involved. And I know that. I hate that I constantly feel like I have to defend my right to express what I've been through by working really hard for not wanting to come off as a victim. "I know I am not alone in this," "I know this issue is pervasive in all industries," "I know that fill in the blank with a statement that makes me sound like less of a victim and makes me sound like my sharing is not just for the service of my own ego." All of those caveats and statement qualifiers are stemming from the same issue that I began talking about in all of this. That feeling of not mattering, of not being important, of not being worthy. It's a horrible disease that I know most of us struggle through, and this time I don't say that to soften the blow that I might be giving to those who feel uncomfortable by my sharing, but more because I know it to be true now that I am in the position of being a teacher who has power. A power that I respect and treat with great caution because I know how prone to abuse it we are. And that is why I tread very cautiously with my students and I do everything I can to make them feel safe, seen, important and respected. So if there is a silver lining to all of this, it might be that. I don't know.

Lastly, at the risk of sounding contradictory, I wouldn't want to pretend like I have never made anyone feel uncomfortable or hurt anybody or been abusive of any power I might have in any given circumstance, but I do want to say that I find it extremely important that we all share with loved ones the things that we go through and the things that we feel we put each other through. People can't read our minds and unless we share what is happening in there, no one can know.

That is why I do this too. So that people can know. And sometimes it’s not easy. These two accounts I shared happened well over a decade ago. So I understand all these actors and actresses coming out now sharing their stories on the heels of the bravery of each other. Another reason why I think it's important to share your story. You never know who you might be inspiring.

OK, I think it's time for that walk now. I need it.

Thanks for listening.

Thank You Old World

As Kermit the frog likes to say, it's not easy being green. And I would know because I've spent pretty much all of my life being a green little knucklehead that has had no clue about life and how it works.

Which is why I want to take a minute to say thank you to all the old world teachers, like monks, priests and zen masters that came from Japan and the old world to bring their wisdom teachings to this very green and immature country filled with self-indulgent magical thinkers and trinket addicts.

Thank you to all the old wise men and women who have left their trail of breadcrumbs to guide the dumb, naive and stubborn folk like me.

Thank you to all the teachers, professors and mature and wise men and women who have truly emotionally grown up and have put their money where they mouth is. To those patient, persevering stand up people who didn't cower and stuck it out through thick and thin.

To those who didn't bail and run out and avoided facing the relational hardships in their lives. To those old souls, the old school, the ones who don't go into the childish "fuck its" that most emotionally grown children do.

To the men and women that have known how to cry and face their fears and given up their ego addiction to make way for love and taking responsibility.

Thank you to those who haven't fallen into the momentum of endless trends and fashions. Thank you to those old school souls that have been able to adapt and remain in balance. In spirit, mind and body.

To those who are able to look past the myriad of distractions and have been able to keep it simple and to the point.

Thank you wisdom teachers, awake beings, present folk, men and women of good. Men and women of heart. Men and women of truth.

Thank you sincere, responsible, caring and engaged and open hearts and souls who push past their own victim identities and become self-realized and actualized.

Thank you to those who didn't silo themselves and acted like aliens or islands unto themselves.

Thank you Africa, thank you Japan, thank you India, thank you Europe, thank you Old World, thank you conscious and wise grandmas and grandpas. Thank you masters, thank you teachers, thank you mature and truthful, simple and honest, common sense grown up souls.

Gassho. Namaste. Gratias Tibi.