I looked around the class last week and I saw beautiful people, each with our defence mechanisms. To identify a few (the mechanisms, not the people):

• The Soldier, retreats into self, stoic, full guard up: “you will stay outside.”
• The Self-deprecator, undermining oneself before the attack: “I will attack myself before you can.”
• The Jester, works with humour: “I’m scared so I will try to disarm you with humour.”
• The Professional, will perfect the job so they can’t get criticized: “if I get an A+, I won’t face your disapproval.”
• The Mouse, will make themselves small to disappear: “you can’t attack what you can’t see.”

These are all ways to protect ourselves because we’ve been hurt and scared. The defence style may relate to the hurt received, or simply what worked at the time.

Protecting oneself works by trying to remove any genuine connection to the person hurting you. We push them away, we remove their access to us, we give them a fake us to connect with, we try not to be noticed – ultimately, we’re trying to break any genuine connection. If they can’t connect, they can’t hurt. But when we look for connection – in acting, but more importantly, in life – those defences block us. And if we’ve been good at building those defences up, we might not even know we’re deploying them. They’re automatic. They sabotage us and we’re beginning to realize that – there’s a reason 24m people have watched that Brené Brown video and we now all talk about how important vulnerability is. Not just in life, but in art.

What does that have to do with acting class? Let me tell a story.

There’s a room in a corner building on Welch Street that I go to every Tuesday night. It’s filled with people who have shown up to play. It’s filled with toys, like blocks and drums and pieces of paper with writing on them. It’s not a flashy building but it’s warm, it’s comfortable, and above everything else, it’s safe. When I go there, I’m not accountable to anyone – not my wife, not my kids, not my colleagues – only the other people in the room, to whom I promise each week to give my best. For 2 hours every week, I focus on nothing but letting my defences drop, to be present and vulnerable to other people.

It’s supposed to be for something called “acting”, but it’s not really. I don’t think the other people are there for “acting” either. We’re all there to practise, in a safe space, slowly dropping these defences. Because that might make us better actors. And maybe it will. But it will definitely make us better humans.

So each week, I go to learn how to be vulnerable through the practice of acting. 

I love this class. It’s given me so much. It’s challenging and awkward and hilarious and silly and sad and angering and everything in between.

So, thank you. This shit really matters.

Shin

Shintaro Kanaoya

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