You're Allowed to Call "Hold"

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For those of you who are not aware, in the theatre we have this thing where you’re allowed to call “hold.”

“What does that mean…?”

Excellent question!

During the tech process of a show, it is common practice that anyone in the room is allowed to call “hold!” and stop the rehearsal process. This could be due to a safety concern, a missing element (prop, costume, light, etc), something that went wrong onstage or backstage, a person missing an entrance, needing to fix a technical moment, a mis-fired cue…or for so many more reasons.

Basically, you can call “hold” for anything major that goes wrong because everything is a priority.

I want to repeat this.

Anyone in the room is allowed to call “hold” because everything is a priority. And not a single person in that room will (rightly) judge you for it.

“Okay. So what?”

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Let The Sunshine In

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Let The Sunshine In

Lately, I’ve been hearing a common refrain from people throughout my life - friends, family, students, parents, and even strangers and acquaintances on social media…

“I’m just so tired. Everything is exhausting.”

And when exploring this a little further, I’ve begun to notice a pattern. A very common pattern, in fact, and one that I have fallen into many times.

Does this - or something like it - sound familiar?

  1. Wake up

  2. Caffeinate/Eat

  3. Work

  4. Eat

  5. Work

  6. Exercise perhaps?

  7. Obligations

  8. Eat

  9. Obligations

  10. Zombie out in front of electronics

  11. Sleep

Rinse and repeat.

This is a common pattern - and I have absolutely nothing against patterns or routines, I personally thrive off them! But the above doesn’t seem to be leaving much, if any, time for joy.

Now, I’m not talking about carving out big periods of time on a daily basis for “relaxation” or regularly skiving off obligations to instead do something fun. What I’m talking about is finding a way to include just a little bit of joy in your daily life. Just a little bit of sunshine amidst all the necessities.

But how?

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