ImprovSpirituality

 My family and friends tell me I'm a bit of a control freak. I'm also a perfectionist, and not surprisingly, the person I'm hardest on is myself. I don't think I was wired this way. I've taken the Myers-Briggs as well as the Enneagram. My Myers-Briggs is ENFP, which is loose and fun loving. My Enneagram is a 7 with a strong 2 and 8. My desire to control comes more from my family of origin. I'm the adult child of an alcoholic and also child of a manic depressive. I grew into the role of family hero.  So, if things need to be done right, you can count on me. I have a strong sense that if I don't hold things together, they will fly out of control. This is the reason, I believe, that I love improv. For someone who always feels responsible, it's great to get on stage and let go. The number one rule of improv is that it's not about you, it's the team. Rules such as "Yes, and", "follow the follower", and "make your partner look ...

  Be Weird Like Jesus Let's face it, Jesus was weird. He was a rabbi, yet he seemed to ignore basic rabbinical laws. He was a holy man, yet he hung around with sinners. He didn't fit into what his culture said he should be. He knew things about people that were beyond explanation. He raised people from the dead. In fact he was, by the very definition of weird, strange, extraordinary, supernatural, and fantastic. So, when scripture calls us to be like Jesus, to pick up our cross and follow him, to be a fool for Christ, it's calling us to be weird. I know it can be hard to embrace your inner weirdo. As youngsters one of the worst names we could be called was, weirdo. Anything that made us stand out from the crowd was seen as bad. Peer pressure, along with some well-meaning parents, told us to stop be so "weird." Be normal, fit it. And so we did. We squashed the unique creative part of ourselves and conformed. As followers of Jesus, however, we claim to have been mad...

  Samaritan Cookbook - a review Food, as in breaking of bread and feasting, along with hospitality are integral to God's being. Jesus' command to "take, eat" is not just a Eucharistic command, but a call for God's people to put aside their differences and come together at table. Post resurrection Christ often appears to his disciples in "the breaking of bread." It was this and my personal interest in food and cooking that led me to jump at the chance to review Samaritan Cookbook: A Culinary Odyssey From the Ancient Israelites to the Modern Mediterranean by Benyamim Tsedaka. The first thing I noticed upon receiving the book was it's design. The book is beautifully illustrated with artwork along with pictures, not only food, but of the Samaritan people. The second thing I noticed was that the book is a balance between actual recipes, theology, and cultural information. This is a cultural cookbook in which the author and editors appeal to five main grou...

 It's been a few weeks since I've blogged. I had great intentions of posting once a week but then life happened. There were a couple of weeks when I let depression get to me. Then on a bright note, my daughter and her boyfriend came to visit for a week. I also spent some time away from improv to refocus on my spiritual life. Now I'm back to reflect on these past weeks in the context of improvising. The point that kept popping up in my head was the improv game, "Make Another Choice." I love Make Another Choice. In this game an improv team is onstage. Any time during the scene, I can hit my "make another choice" bell. You know, the bells you see on counter tops to get a clerk's attention. The team knows that whenever I ding the bell, they have to make another scene choice. For example. Actor A says, "It's a bear, Run!" Actor B replies, "What will be do?" (DING) "Oh, its just a cub, don't worry." ( DING)  Actor B, ...

If you take risks, you will fail. No, I don't mean play it safe and stop taking risks. What I mean is that you need to fail, and fail often, to move forward. We learn from our mistakes more than from our successes. Failure is a part of improv every time a performer steps on stage. Not every skit will slay, or idea be brilliant, but when the ensemble is built on trust and communication, it usually turns out okay. You stop, think it through, trust the team, and move on. Its the same in business, church, life. What needs to happen, though, is there needs to be a culture that values risk and experimentation. There needs to be a platform where new ideas can be tested without fear of failure. It's risky outside the box, and you need to know you will be covered if you step outside of it. If you want your organization to be agile and creative, then when a team member fails you can't be upset. It is your job to help them find the gold nuggets in the failure. What did you all learn...

Statistically five to nine percent of people suffer from glossophobia; fear of public speaking. Those are only people, however, who are incapable of speaking in front of others. There are countless others who may not have the actual phobia, but would place public speaking  high on their list of things they hate. The fear of speaking in public is all about making fools of ourselves. It's hard to fail, even more hard to fail in public. We become concerned about what people think of us. We put up defenses in order to guard our ego. We want to look good, be perceived as intelligent, successful, in control. If I don't risk, I can't fail. But on the other hand, if I don't risk, I can't achieve great things.  One of the catch phrases in Improv is, "Face the Fear." Run toward what scares you and face it head on. Let the ego die and don't be afraid of looking foolish. The defenses we put up in order to be cool and collected keep us from being as creative and...

Dear spiritual improvisers, this should not be news to anyone, but life is not easy. Everyone has problems big and small. The power to overcome problems can only come from within. The only thing we can control is our response to the problems life throws at us. You can worry and let the problems destroy you or you can let it go. Monty Python sings "always look on the bright side of life." Beyonce dedicates an entire album to her grandmother's adage, "if life gives you lemons, make lemonade." Taylor Swift tells us to just "shake it off." You can also turn your pain into comedy. Sam Wasson in his book, Nation writes, "That's what so much of comedy is - problems." But you may say, my problems are serious and certainly nothing to laugh at. As we go through our life problems they can, indeed, seem overpowering. Well meaning friends may say things like, "one day we'll all have a good laugh about this." That may be a hard thing to...