A new threshold of playfulness opened before me, a new sense of freedom and vitality, both in practicing the performance meditations and in watching others practice them and create short performances using them.

On Tuesday I had my tai ch’i class and experienced a new ease and joy within that form as well. My attention was able to fan out away from my own movement and encompass others in the class. Realising their individual styles of playing tai ch’i brought me to a new freedom within and enjoyment of my own style – or even the fact that I was allowed to have my own style rather than trying to emulate everything my teacher does.

And on Wednesday I went to contact improvisation, where I spent an hour and a half in pure joy and play, building on the sense of freedom and resourcefulness that I had encountered in my other classes and improvising with others, using my body and my voice, guided by a wonderfully present teacher.

My dream is to offer a week or weekend of embodied imagination, incorporating these physical and playful forms … a week of total immersion in the experience of our bodies and the power the imagination can have to alter and enhance our physical experience and expression.

Authenticity is described as being faithful to internal rather than external ideas and motivations. It is similar to what Deepak Chopra talks of as being “self-referential”. It means referring to your own inner knowing and your own judgment instead of being ruled by the judgments and ideas of others or of society (which are often perceived rather than directly experienced). The philosophy of authenticity is quite an interesting subject.

This seems simple enough – of course, authenticity will make our work original, fresh and personal – but how do we do it? Over decades of education and socialisation we form the habit of pretense in order to please, amuse and succeed. We categorise our own behaviours and habits and decide never to reveal certain aspects of ourselves.

One of the best tricks to finding this authentic material that lies deep inside us is to not think. I mean to not use that part of the mind that wants to control and that is in charge of the judgments and pretense, that part that has decided not to reveal your deepest truth to anyone.

Every good book on creativity or art concurs in this matter. Learn to bypass the controlling mind. There are many ways to practice this: meditation is one, physical exhaustion is another (which I’ve encountered as a technique in physical theatre), and I suppose sleep deprivation might serve a similar purpose, and drug-taking too. A spell of time alone, in nature or in a deeply spiritual place that speaks to your soul may engender a great sense of peace and trust that allows the controlling mind to recede into the background.

The quickest, easiest method and the one that I employ the most is something more like the surrealist technique of automatic writing. It involves moving as fast through a creative process as you can, never giving yourself time to think and always accepting the first idea that comes out without any time to reconsider, hesitate or censor yourself.

Also vital to expressing your authentic truth is trust. All our control, censorship and pleasing behaviour is, of course, a self-protection mechanism, designed to make us more successful in life. Allowing other truths to emerge and (heaven forbid!) revealing them to a large audience, takes trust. And trust, although innate, also takes practice. It is through experience, I think, that you can build on the trust you already have. Every time you create an authentic piece of work and feel good about speaking your truth, your trust will grow. The paradox is that in order to be able do it, first you have to do it. It’s a chicken and egg situation. But soulful and spiritual practice can also aid hugely. I recommend reading Thomas Moore, especially “The Re-Enchantment of Everyday Life.”

Personally, I think this book is only beginning to sink in. One thing that has left me wondering and thinking is the idea that creativity is a subset of play. I think I may have been thinking about it the other way around. Brown’s definition of play is quite broad, including activities that may not at first seem like play: collecting stamps or travel experiences, the competitive aspect of games and sports. The point, of course, is that competition, work, cooking, parenting can all be playful or completely devoid of play – play is individual, specific to each of us. One woman’s play is another man’s poison.

This is something else that Brown has thought deeply about, coming up with 8 “play personalities.” Of course, each of us combines these 8 “personalities” to a different degree, creating our own path through a life of learning and joy. It is very interesting to consider which types of play I engage in, and to start to see how much of my “work” is exactly what I love to do, what I would consider play, from the point of view of the National Institute!

Perhaps another approach if you do want to encourage someone to continue with the work they are doing is to be available to discuss in detail what they have done up to this point, allowing them to lead the conversation as much as possible and asking questions that open them up to new perspectives.

When it comes to encouraging someone to start the amazing project you’ve spent weeks discussing over coffee/dinner/in bed, you’ve got a harder task in front of you: you can be positive and interested in all the imaginative discussions, allow the space, time and resources for the project to kick off, but I don’t think you can do or say much that will help the person, at this most vulnerable stage of the process, jump into that deep, dark water. That step has to come from their own trust and belief in themselves.

A writer and theatre maker friend of mine once told a class that the key to her success was to “cultivate a ridiculous sense of self belief” … which is often what it takes to go ahead and begin a creative process and to see it through all its lumpy, indigestible bits. I don’t think a ridiculous attitude can help in your encouragement, but if you can cultivate a well-founded and totally consistent sense of belief in your friend, that is the best gift you can give them, albeit often silently, from the banks of the dark pool.

Another useful approach is simply to turn the spotlight back onto ourselves. Is your frustration at the speed of your friend’s development a mask or avoidance of your frustration at your own dawdling, procrastination and fear? Where can you benefit from shining the light of your encouragement on yourself? When you begin to do this, you may find you forget to continue meddling in other people’s processes and fully engage in your own.

Some groups become so tightly knit the bonds between them become stronger than family, others fall apart as their first deadline approaches. What is it that makes it possible to work productively in a group?

The more I think about this topic, the more I realise that I have a lot of learning to do in this area. I have just been reading “Living in Process” by Ann Wilson-Schaef, and she talks about the difference between content (what the group is discussing, working on and trying to achieve) and process (the dynamics, the relationships, the “how” of the work the group is doing) in group work. It has often been easy for me to put most of my attention on the content and only a little on the process.

I have also often been guilty of standing back and keeping quiet in order to create a process that gets to the content goals more quickly. Later, I feel resentful and frustrated that I didn’t speak out for what I wanted: It might have slowed the process down, but at least it would have been a process that was representing and integrating everyone’s needs.

The size of a group also has a great effect on process. The larger the group, the harder it becomes to have a leaderless process. This is where something like Open Space Technology can be awesome. This is a process for holding productive meetings with groups from 5 to 2,000 people where the facilitator has a very small role to play and the participants have a great opportunity to have equal input into every decision made within a structure that minimises time-wasting and circular discussions.

Groups that I’ve been in seem to see members falling into comfortable, familiar roles – a leader or two, some who put a lot of ideas in, some who question everything or play devil’s advocate, some who don’t contribute or simply listen and have one or two things to say when asked. Whatever your familiar role, I suggest you become aware of it and take a playful, experimental attitude to the next group you find yourself in. Can you do things differently? What difference does it make if you focus on process? What are the other members of the group doing, from a process perspective?

We started by drawing with two hands at once. Then did some physical work, moving parts of the body in isolation, followed by lying down for a journey of observation and awareness through the body. Then everyone kept their eyes closed and drew their body, as it felt to them, without looking.

After this, we had 45 minutes of free play. I was honestly not prepared to have so much fun (I suppose because I had been focused on facilitating). It was so freeing to have no rules. For me, this was particularly interesting in terms of interaction and collaboration. I am so used to being aware of other people’s offers and the need to function as a group. It was extremely freeing to choose not to join in with someone else’s activity. I could just make fun on my own, in a corner, or interact in a surprising or very subtle way with another person, with a deeper awareness of how we all effect one another. This allowed me way more spontaneity than usual, because I wasn’t using my mind to control and judge my interactions.

Some of the questions that came up for the group, before or after the play, were:

How is this different from an encounter group?

Is play always fun?

Is this about risk-taking?

What effect does a session of free play have on your life after and outside the play space?

I have no knowledge or experience of encounter groups, but one of the participants had been to one, and said that there is a different goal with encounter groups – a psychotherapeutic goal – and that the facilitator will stop the process in order to focus on one participant’s needs.

I brought up the question about whether play is alway fun, and I guess it is related to the idea of therapy a bit too. Children’s play often results in tears, tantrums, conflict. As adults, we are very respectful and careful of one another, but its still possible that during play we are confronted by conflict, disappointment, anger etc. At one stage during the play I suddenly thought about my partner’s children and how they would soon grow out of their playfulness, and this made me sad.

(that’s me, my little sister and my cousin in the photo)

I think risk-taking is definitely part of the play, and each participant chooses the level of challenge they want to give themselves. This is a nice aspect to the free play. Because there is no specific exercise set by the facilitator, each person can try out whatever they want at their own pace.

I have been very aware of the change that comes over me when I enter into a rehearsal room or workshop. Through years of experience, I have become open, curious and eager for experience in this context. But not necessarily outside of it! The whole premise of CTP rests on the idea that what we do in play sessions has an effect on how you live your life, your whole life, down to the most mundane parts of it.

So I’ve been wanting to catalogue any changes I notice outside the sessions. The first thing I noticed is that on leaving the session, I put the wrist-band I had been wearing on my left instead of my right hand, where I always wear it. This was unconscious and surprising.

It has been a very busy week since then, but I did notice another change yesterday. I am away from home and I was walking around in downtown Wellington. The day before I had had a wonderful day by myself reading, writing, buying postcards for the kids and wandering around downtown. Yesterday I wanted something different. I felt flat and resentful and boring. For the first time in my life I think, I articulated this as wanting to play, wanting to engage in something creative and fun or else see/hear/experience something inspiring and stimulating.

I considered going to 3D Alice in Wonderland. I started planning improvisations for public spaces to attract audience to the show I’m doing here. I went to look at fabric to start planning a wall hanging for my bedroom. I didn’t really manage to dispel the flat feeling, but it felt like a beginning or a turning point – just to realise that what I wanted was to approach my situation with a greater sense of freedom, spontaneity and play.

I’ve just finished a short and very successful season of a show I’ve been working on as director for over a year. A lot of very interesting stuff has happened along the way, but the thing that is sticking out in my mind right now is that period, for about two days before opening night, when fear, in the form of near-panic, often rears its head. This is one of the times that it can be hardest to say  to the fear “yes, yes, I can see you there, but I don’t need you right now, so please go away.”

All the inspiration, all the hard work, all the wonderful creative ideas and all the structuring, polishing, bringing together of all the different elements, suddenly, when that panic sets in, begin to look like mistakes. For me, usually my main fear is that I have been too optimistic in my naive belief that anyone will think what I’ve made is cool, clever, relevant or moving.

And what can I say about this time of near-panic? All you can do is exercise blind faith. Whatever you have made is a unique reflection of you (this is a scary thing to think of too – all those people coming and looking so closely at this revelation of you-ness), your original idea was inspired and you have worked doggedly to express that idea as beautifully and clearly as you can.

The fear may have immobilised your brain, but by this stage in the process you probably don’t need it as much as you might think. Your legs keep on taking you down the path. Just keep walking, run a little when necessary, get to the finish line and see the faces of the crowd as they experience your creation. Phew. If you can stay open to their experience and what they choose to say to you about it, then you have completed your mission. Take a week or two off and then write down all those comments and have a think over your intention (what did you intend your audience to experience?), what was fun about the process and what you can learn now.

Cage was working with random juxtaposition of elements in live performance. Every night the audience would pick pieces of paper out of a hat and determine what order the pieces of the performance would be done and which bits of music would go with what action etc. This way the “third thing” was something that the artist had little control over. Each night, the audience would see new metaphors created for them and have their own experiece of magical, electric new meaning.

I liked the idea of the “third thing” so much that I had this picture of Tenniel’s from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland tattooed on my left shoulder. Throughout Lewis Carroll’s provocative children’s book, very surprising items are juxtaposed with brilliant effects. I’ve always felt that Carroll used the ridiculous and absurd images and ideas in his stories to open children’s minds to the unexpected truths of the world, rather than allowing them to believe the school-day message that “1 + 1 = 2″ and it will always be so and that is how the world operates.

I love the liberation that is inherent in the very act of creating and receiving metaphor. Two things are known. The third thing is the unknown, the field of infinite possibility, the hitherto uncharted brilliance of your own mind, the scope of human imagination.

Not finishing books, not wanting to go to classes every week, loosing enthusiasm for projects, I’ve been labeling myself a dilettante.

So I was very pleased last night to finish reading a book. And not only that, it was in a genre I have never read before – a graphic novel. Wow. I’d seen so many graphic novels that teenagers read (and tried to read them a few times) and some amazing ones in the adult non fiction too. I think I was very lucky that I ended up reading this particular one, even though it is number 5 in a series.

It is David Mack’s “Kabuki: Metamorphosis,” a richly layered, beautifully made graphic novel with a wonderful combination of comic-book action and philosophical (think quantum physics, spirituality, stephen hawking and taoism) musing.

In terms of creativity and expression of ideas, this book (or probably any in the series) is well worth a look. I was impressed how Mack expresses character, plot and concept within an aesthetically diverse and beautiful form.

At the same time, it is being largely recognised that the legacy of the industrial revolution – a world full of good workers, highly skilled at following orders – is no longer serving the needs of contemporary society, let alone the needs of the individual and the family. Creativity, intuitive and individuality are valued more and more highly in an increasingly wide variety of contexts, both corporate and social, and are vital areas of skill and awareness for the survival of humans and the environment they live in.

The star system is no longer a useful model for social awareness, political change and ‘relevant’ theatre and arts. No matter what content an artwork contains, the static audience viewing the “master’s” work are not being given the opportunity to experience their own power to enact change, to create and communicate.

We live in a millennial age – everywhere we turn we are provided with images of a future in which the weather has gone awry, resources are scarce, animals and plants are struggling to survive in dehabitated environments and the human population has outgrown its own ability to feed, clothe and nurture itself.

This is not a time for adding further images and stories to this glut of pessimistic information. This is a time to speak of what is possible and moreover to create experiences for people of what is possible for them.

While gardeners, builders, economists and all manner of people turn their crafts towards creative problem solving and community building, the arts have an important part to play. Just as the arts have always served to support both social cohesion and the direction of social growth/change, now the arts begin to find a way to support this time of transition towards self-sufficiency and community strength. A large part of this is re-educating people in the processes of creativity and group interaction.

Creative Transformation Process chooses not to create performances in which some actors demonstrate to some passive spectators the situation as it is now, or as it was in the past. Instead, CTP gives all players the opportunity to be the artist of their own story and their own life. In play together, we come together as a group, a community, in whatever shape we find together. We find out what we have to offer and how we can accept and receive from others. We learn to trust ourselves and others, to know our limits, when and how to ask for help, and also how to grow past those limits at the pace that is comfortable for us.

CTP offers both relief from the seriousness of life and an empowering experience of your own creativity. Creativity is an aspect of yourself that is engaged in such a variety of everyday activities, underpinning so much of what you do. CTP invites you to develop your creativity, creative ways of communicating and interacting with others, and the ability to play like a child. From this follows the joy and freedom of a playful and spontaneous approach to life, vibrant interactions with other people and the transcendence of fear of failure, boredom and despondency, guilt for ‘wasting time’ and so on.

CTP may engage with other bodies of work that have similar goals – The Theatre of the Oppressed work of Augusto Boal and Playback Theatre are two examples. CTP will also develop its own form of happenings, free play. These follow guided exercises that encourage participants to trust their own creativity, to give over individual responsibility and become part of the whole/group, and come into the present, experiencing their body, voice and imagination more strongly than their analytical mind.