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| Confidence |
I feel like I need to start this blog with a disclaimer
because I'm going to talk about things that need to be clearly identified as
not belonging to each other. They are
the differences between confidence and self-absorption. I am all about
confidence. Everyone should have it and
everyone should display it. I've been
told I'm in fact much too modest. Trust
me I do this on purpose because the megalomaniacal beast that I hold at bay
daily is no cake walk I assure you. I
try to channel that through my characters.
Let them be larger than life and I can just be me.
I suppose I find myself wondering about the state of wealth
and celebrity. The wealthy are pretty
obscure. Very few people even know the
names of the wealthiest people in the world.
They couldn't pick them out in a crowd, and can't easily identify their
names in print or vocalized. However
celebrity is all the rage. People can
identify a celebrity without even trying, thus they become the image that is
often associated with the wealthy. Even
pop cultural anarchists like myself can tell you a few basic tenets of modern
pop culturalization.
The best way to get press is to get caught doing something
amoral by 'good' American citizen standards.
As an entertainer it is nearly impossible to not eventually do something
that other people disapprove of. Never
underestimate the ability of people to do two things, misunderstand, and then
judge what they never understood. The irony is that the best way to keep fame
is to then somehow transcend what got people's attention in the first place.
Which I believe is that crucial step between confidence and self-absorption. It’s
'I got away with it' syndrome. It leads
to a life of 'getting away with it' and expecting to always do so. This is when the first inkling of "I'm
better than you starts" to really cement itself.
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| Remember this story? I do! |
Self-absorption starts with that one basic idea. I am better than you. Every case of it stems from that one primary
thought. I've had brief brushes with celebrity and I hated it. I hated it because this entity of celebrity
can somehow prevent and hinder the ability of making true connections. My life
has no meaning without true connections to other people. It was hard for me to tell the difference
between the truth as it was, and the truth as it was being presented as. The biggest favor I ever did for myself was
to discover the difference. From time to
time I still slip up. But with less
people involved in the process to snow me over for their own gain, it’s easier
than it could've been.
The only aspect of celebrity that I didn't mind was the idea
that financial woes would cease for myself and those I loved. However at what
point does your financial success when combined with the specter of celebrity
make you not see anything beyond yourself.
To be successful in any industry a certain level of personal choice and
compliance has to be given up. To be
successful in a performance based industry this is multiplied by 10 because
usually you aren't talking about just a job.
You are talking about doing something you are passionately in love with
to a degree that it is a part of you.
You need it to exist more than you need breath. Sometimes that peak is
very far away. So far in fact that people have to convince themselves beyond
what is actually true to reach it. Which
means you have to negate reality as it is and replace it with one of your own
(shameless Mythbusters steal).
So I test drove it.
This new reality for me was dark. It was filled with pitfalls and
attacks. An unending landscape of fire
pits and terrifying creatures ready to snap your head off for fun. I explore this idea more in a romance I'm
writing featuring a Hollywood movie producer and a grassroots painter. It
explores how alike they are yet how their choices made them seem so different
from each other. Working on this again made me think about my own peccadilloes
with fame, celebrity, and the price that I thought was too high to pay for the
promise of money, glory, and popularity.
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| Overconfidence |
I've never thought well of celebrities or people who needed
and wanted fame. That is my prejudice
developed from people I've met and known in my past in addition to my disgust
at the assumption they made that I was in fact just like them. I made
assumptions about them based on my value system. As unfair as that is, I do it because I
realize they have done the same. The truth is I am just like them, we all
are. Some of us just channel it
differently. But the core that makes someone choose to pursue fame and choose
not to are basically identical. The need
to associate, develop, and ultimately belong to something. Always trying to
find the formula to a happy fulfilling life. We just make different choices as
to how to fulfill our core.
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| Celebrity Weddings |
There were things that I attached to celebrity and fame
because the actions others encouraged me to propagate in order to achieve it
left very obvious victims. I never wanted to believe it was okay to look down
on people. I never wanted to think that
some people just deserve less because I was able to achieve something considered
'more'. I never wanted to be able to justify
making ridiculous amounts of money and not starting a charity. I never wanted my need to express my talent
to mean more than human decency, kindness, and empathy.
The point is I never wanted to be able to ignore another
person because I thought I was better than them. I always think about the people who I know
now that I most likely would not have met had I chosen a different path and
what a grave loss that would be in my life.
Most importantly I never wanted to wrap myself in that cynical cocoon I
was developing that didn't even allow grace in.
I wanted to remain human enough to understand the importance of
humility. To ultimately keep the magic of meeting special people that the world
for whatever reason ignores. That
feeling of discovering this perfect meadow that has somehow remained untainted
by the filth of the world.
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| Yes this is that car |
When I see that some rapper has blown $370,000 to destroy a
car in a music video I cringe at what I could've become. When a musician refuses to do a charity
concert because they aren't getting paid I wonder why do they need more
money. They already have more than they
need to live well. When I see music, art, dance leaving schools and very few of
the people who benefitted from these programs care enough to do something about
it, I wonder how can they claim to love what they do if they don't care enough
to make sure that it always exists. You
can hear it in everything they do. I am better than you. And all I can think is
I no longer care about anything you do.
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| Why? |
Why does celebrity lead to this 'us versus them' mentality
no matter what type of fame it is? This 'I as a celebrity cannot be bothered by
you a regular person' nonsense. I've
meet people that aren't like that, but the majority abide by and prefer this
separation that is in essence contributing to the class war that the wealthy is
waging. The extremely wealthy are using
celebrity as their front line fodder. Celebrities bear the brunt of the criticisms
for overt wealth and wealth flaunting practices. If celebrities would take a
moment, and just be with 'regular' people they would be moved to discuss their
plight and be less villianized. But in
this country our celebrities are sometimes even worse than our
politicians. Because for entertainment
careers being a savvy politician is necessary for success.
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| Love word clouds |
The question I could never answer, and was too afraid of
losing myself to confront was this. Is
it even possible to retain any empathy, compassion, or reality when fame is
your reality? What would lead a
character who is being victimized by his own fame into understanding the plight
of a person on the other end of life? In
this case I choose magic. A witch to be
exact. I wonder how their story will end? Coming soon. . . .
Confidence courtesy of: http://danpetrosini.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/confidence.jpg
Overconfidence courtesy of: http://www.psychologytoday.com/files/u107/confidence.jpg
Better Than You Book cover courtesy of: http://adaptiveblue.img.s3.amazonaws.com/books/i_am_better_than_you/robert_lopshire/small
Why courtesy of: http://www.maddymann.com/publicity/crywhy.jpg
Rap Car pic courtesy of: http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/08/13/article-2025575-0D691BAB00000578-428_634x427.jpg
Word Cloud courtesy of: http://www.compassnt.com/Compassion_Quotes.html
Celebrity Weddings courtesy of:
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