An Actor Prepares...

The following is from a recent article I wrote for a Glasgow Quaker magazine, Elmbank Events. A week before I go to drama school it summarises the journey that has brought me to this watershed moment in my life.

“I don't care where an actor acts. It can be in summer stock, it can be over a radio, it can be over television, it can be in a goddam Broadway theatre, complete with the most fashionable, most well-fed, most sunburned-looking audience you can imagine. But I'll tell you a terrible secret—Are you listening to me?…There isn't anyone anywhere that isn't Seymour's Fat Lady. Don't you know that? Don't you know that goddam secret yet? And don't you know—listen to me, now—don't you know who that Fat Lady really is? . . . Ah, buddy. Ah, buddy. It's Christ Himself. Christ Himself, buddy.” (J.D. Salinger, Franny and Zooey)


On Monday 28th September I will leave my job as a school teacher in Hamilton to become a student on the MA course at the RSAMD in Contemporary & Classical Text.

It’s 33 years since I nervously stepped on stage for the first time, aged 16, in Theatre Workshop for Youth’s production of Pinter’s The Birthday Party. And I’ve continued to act in theatre ever since- in literally hundreds of amateur and professional tours and productions. Yet only now, at the grand old age of 49, am I grasping the nettle, investing my life savings and fulfilling a lifelong dream by going to drama school.

And before you even think it- no, this isn't just some mad, mid-life crisis! Actually it's a decision that has been made after decades of prayer, soul-searching and meditation. I was very keen to ensure I wasn’t just doing this for egoic reasons but from a more profound need to serve others. Maybe that's why it’s taken me so long to get round to it. But over the last couple of years since attending my first Quaker meeting the Advice and Query about “living adventurously”, and” letting your life speak” (Quaker Faith & Practice; 1.02, 27) has really spoken to my condition. Having got so used to putting security far too high up on my list of priorities it was high time I started living more authentically, got my inner and outward life into alignment, and trusted that God would support that!

I feel like some terrible ‘luvvie’ confessing this, but increasingly over the years the art of acting has become for me a kind of spiritual quest. In fact it’s really an exceptionally potent form of praise and worship for me, founded on concentrated compassion and empathy- at least when it’s done well! (Quaker Benjamin Lloyd writes brilliantly about the actor as a conduit for spiritual energy in his epistolary novel, “The Actor’s Way”.) And so I am finally going to drama school to learn how to act better! And it’s a quantum leap. Acting utilizes the power of Imagination to effect transformation and transcendence- for the actor AND his audience. A very high calling indeed! Many of my friends (with a small f) outside the meeting- many of whom work in theatre- have expressed concern that I may be taking too big a gamble, that it's a bad time, I have to be prepared to fail, that it will be awfully difficult financially, that I may well be disappointed... and- think of the debt! etc. Well, yes, I know all this; but still I’m determined to remain hopeful and optimistic. I would like to thank Friends in the Glasgow meeting for their advice in this matter. You have all been incredibly positive, supportive and affirming when I have discussed my decision with you.

God makes us custodian of Light, wardens of our talents so they can be used for the benefit others. Of course it would be perfectly possible for me to continue serving Him and sharing my gifts through teaching and in many other ways, but I am now convinced that that would really be a craven compromise. I serve Him and others best when I am on the stage playing characters.

God doesn’t mind so much that we make mistakes (and God knows I’ve made a good few in my time!) but I think He must get very disappointed with our apathy, when we don’t try to do our very best with what we are given. So I take this leap in faith; only He knows what lies ahead. The challenge of living my life with greater authenticity and courage instead of remaining in a cocoon of stagnancy and safe employment feels huge and very, very scary right now, even trusting the promise that God will be with me throughout this time and beyond!

Still, my wife Karen, and I would greatly welcome your prayers at this time.

In Friendship,

Mark Coleman

Dealing with Inner Dæmons (Part II)

I was amused by one friend’s response to my last blog (let’s call her “P.”):

“You don't have so much of an Inner Critic as a case of multiple demonic possession.”

I think P. was half-joking, I hope she was, but this is the same friend who also recently asserted that “Art is exorcism”! But, you know what? I’m just not convinced the exorcism that art offers is what I require right now, since it is my own dysfunctional relationship with acting that fucked me up most of all- and actually using art as exorcism has ultimately made me a much lesser artist. And this is also why I am less and less inclined to give the ego room in the artistic process if I can possibly avoid it. I know that the Higher Self provides me, as an artist, with a much healthier, wiser and more holistic perspective on who I really am and hence the work itself starts to serve the divine. It is this Higher Self that is the real healer, not the ego; and it is the Higher Self I am using now as I write all this. He is far lighter, more lucid, wise and more light-filled than my everyday, ‘possessed’ ego could ever be, and certainly a whole world away from my Inner Critic.. Exorcising ones’ daemons should happen before the artist reveals his work to the world, if the work and its audience are not to become polluted, contaminated. I think this is why I gave this Inner Critic of mine a voice, a look and a distinct personality separate from me because it helps me realise that it isn’t the real me, just a product of a damaged ego, a diseased and deeply wounded lesser self.

My Inner critic tells me that this series of blogs will come across to others as scary and insane, (go away Inner Critic!) but it wouldn’t help me to hide this away any more, that’s why I am putting it out there on this blog rather than reserving it for my morning pages and journal. Sergeant Grouch would love me to hide myself away, in the hope that I will just put this ‘crap’ aside and forget all about it, so nothing ever really gets done and he can undermine me even further, convince me that the next time it rears its ugly head(s) I am even more powerless to drown him out and resist his psychological bullying.

A small part of this inner work I decided to take on in the run up to my going to drama college involved completing some assertiveness exercises from a course my wife Karen completed 7 or 8 years ago for an evening class at Glasgow University. I usually run a mile from pop psychology, self-help exercises like these- they bore me rigid, to be honest. (My Inner Critic objects in no uncertain terms if the book doesn’t have the full weight and substance of serious, pseudo-intellectual, scientific credibility and long words- the more befogging, technical, pretentious and incomprehensible the better!!!).

But one very simple questionnaire in this pack asked how I would react to/deal with a range of challenging situations in my day to day life- e.g. complaining about service in a shop, saying ‘no’, asking for help, etc). It shocked me to find out I was apparently “0% aggressive”, and “85% passive” (leaving just “15% assertive”)!! The conclusion stated I had serious issues with low self-esteem, and probably spent most of my time in “Victim” mode. Ouch! Well, my Inner Critic punched the air when I read that!! But, mercifully, it didn’t stop there. The prescription advice that followed was for me to draft a list of ‘I statements’ as positive affirmations to help reprogram my thoughts and feelings, and thereby boost self-esteem. Well, you know the kind of thing…

Predictably, my Inner critic immediately baulked at this. “What the fuck do you want to do this crap for?… You’re not a baby; grow up… It won’t work… This is too simplistic for a complicated fucker like you… You’ve done this sort of thing before and it didn’t help then,; it won’t now… This is totally pointless, stupid, self-indulgent… You’re WASTING your TIME” (this ‘wasting time’ thing is a pet mantra of old Sergeant Grouch) etc, etc, etc... But by this stage I had begun to glean that maybe my Inner Critic didn’t always exactly speak the truth (understatement of the century!); or indeed, want the best for me! So I decided I would ignore him just for the time being and just give the advice a go anyway. “What’s the worst that could happen?” I told him, and he just clammed up there and then. Sulking- probably. J

I couldn’t have come up with the following list all on my own. When faced with tasks challenges like this I usually lose the ability to focus my thoughts properly and concentrate. My mind starts freezing up, or feels unable to stay with one thing. It try to rationalise but in a really disordered way. I look for distractions, come up with excuses, smoke a fag or five, make tea, look for someone else to blame, etc, etc.

The inspiration for completing this final list of affirmations came from asking some trusted and honest friends who gave me feedback on the “What do I do well?” section of that CBT (or Cognitive Behaviour Therapy- yes, more pop psychology! What am I becoming??! Lol) exercise I referred to in Part I (q.v. Part III for the results of this). Also from thinking about what the polar opposites were of the negative shite my Inner Critic uses to batter and fry my confidence. I tend to habitually deflect compliments and praise, leaping straight to the “What do I do wrong?” stuff, but seeing my friends’ positive statements written down removed the option of completely blotting them out. I put the “What do I not do well?” responses- potential sticks for my Inner Critic beat me up with- aside, and began to focus on the things others thought I was good at for the time being.

The results were unbelievable. I felt an unfamiliar surge of joy, love and gratitude sweep over me as I read them- which the Sergeant attempted to crush of course. But the fact that my friends seemed to be saying roughly the same things led me to conclude that they might have a point, and that my Inner Critic’s motives were no longer to help me but to cripple and pound my self-esteem, to make me feel smaller, denser, heavier- as opposed to expansive, lighter, bigger. I decided I would listen to my pals for once, rather than to the bullying Sergeant. I tried to put that Scott Walker lyric out of my mind which goes “In a world filled with friends you lose your way” and sat down and opened myself up to what was good about me, what my soul craved to slake his thirst on. After all, what did I really have to lose by choosing to believe them over the Sergeant? Actually nothing, when I thought about it, and in fact perhaps a great deal to gain!

Here’s what I came up with:

MY AFFIRMATIONS

I am a PHENOMINALLY gifted actor.

I am likable... lovable!

People love to be around me.

I am a generous spirit.

I am extremely knowledgeable and experienced.

I have plenty of time to make contact with myself and others.

I have fun.

I have the answers within me.

I am balanced.

I am patient.

I am so funny!

I have a wonderful, life-giving laugh.

I am confident…

… because I can afford to be!

I can laugh at myself.

I have plenty of time.

I have a sense of proportion.

I am living my life healthily and fully.

I am an extraordinary person.

I radiate light wherever I go.

I have the right to have fun.

I have the right to be wrong sometimes

I don’t need to always follow my rules!

I speak up when something bothers me.

I am intelligent.

I learn much from others.

I teach people how to live and love by who I am.

I am allowed to be child-like.

When I laughing and enjoying myself it is a sign of my good health.
You have abundant joy.

I have the right to be heard.

I bring light, laughter and joy wherever I go.

People lighten up when they are around me because they feel safe.

People admire me.

I am always enough!

Once I’d finished drawing these up I was crying my eyes out, but feeling incredibly good about myself, for the first time in several years in fact. But then very soon all of them started to lose their shine of course, to become untrue, especially when my Inner Critic got his paws on them. He had a way of refuting every single one of them.He laughed and pointe at me and calling me stupid and delusional for even eneteraining such ridiculous ideas about myself . But I know to my cost that listening to him has got me nowhere in the past. These affirmations on the other hand seemed to have a way of making me feel so much better about myself, amnd i am convinced they are going to have a positive effect on my art. They are not arrogant, and they are not delusional. They can be true- they ARE- true! It wasn’t really as if I was deluding myself, as I am aware that many of them come from that part of me I get into contact with sometimes after a gathered Quaker meeting or in deep meditation.

For the time being the Inner Critic is outside of me and he is looking somehow tiny and actually quite ridiculous.

Ah! Progress!!

:-D

Dealing with Inner Dæmons (Part I)

The main body of this posting consists of a long list I have been thinking about over the past few days and then compiled during my long walk home from this morning’s Quaker meeting. It’s actually a list of twisted taunts my horrible Inner Critic goads me with. As you will probably start to understand it’s no wonder I mess up so often! My work may have benefited from this 'inner nag' early on in my acting career perhaps (although this is at the very least arguable. After all, does artistic talent really have to have a shadow side??), but it has had to get more harsh and more vicious with me for it to retain power and control over me, and at what a devastating cost to so many of my friendships and working relationships, my career, not to mention my own mental and emotional health! It strangles and chokes my talent.

It was in fact Michael Jackson’s sudden death 3 days ago which caused me to reflect even more deeply on the shadow side of artistic talent, the perfectionist tendencies and drives of the performer. His life stands as parable of self-destruction and genius as poisoned chalice. Like everyone else I have a shadow side to my nature as the list of inner rules below reveals so painfully; and, although I’m not arrogant enough to believe I have a fraction of the talent Jacko had, I am obliged to own up to having to deal with my own vicious inner dæmons when it comes to my own art. I am at least relieved I didn’t end up a serial child abuser, addicted to plastic surgery and Vicadin and Demerol! With me it's only the fags, although it occurs to me that that particulr addiction is a symptom of a deeper cause perhaps intimately related to my Inner Critic. More of which in a future post...

The ‘rules’ included in this list had their parthenogenesis during my adolescence They goaded me to aspire to genius, whilst constantly reminding me how far short I would fall of ever achieving it! It is this Inner Critic archetype who muscles in on my acting every time I enter the doors of a rehearsal room. So often it is drones on like a white noise in my head (like those things they blow during football matches in South Africa that sound like angry bees) and goes unchallenged, unacknowledged, even flatly denied by me if I am actually confronted by anyone else about my behaviour. Having meditated on this I’ve listed some of the many variations on these dæmon taunts. They are not exaggerated, I promise you, which is actually what makes seeing them down here in black and white even more alarming. I know that the next stage of this inner work will be to replace these taunts and re-programme myself to have a healthier, more positive attitude to the work before I go to drama school. That will come in part II of this blog in a fortnight or so hopefully.

The following taunts have always been used by me as a top-secret ‘extreme rocket fuel’ to try and get the best from myself, but actually they have for a very long time become less helpful and more and more self-sabotaging, until I have come to feel more or less totally blocked and creatively paralysed. Certainly my capacity for taking any real joy from my work has all but disappeared in recent years. This originally potent fuel has a side effect of creating dangerously toxic emissions that will only fuck me up more and more unless they are brought into full light of day and revealed as the preposterous and patently ridiculous rules that they really are. This ‘fuel’ can and frequently does poison the atmosphere in the rehearsal room quicker than anything. In this post I will just list some of the things this dæmon inner critic of mine says to me: in Part II I will draft some affirmations to counter its noxious effects on me and my work.

Before I do that, here is a wee snapshot of what his dæmon looks like. He/she is a cross between a thin, stern ballet mistress and a barking sergeant major sketched by Gerald Scarfe. This dæmon appears in my mind’s eye as a frightfully pale, carping, bullying, perfectionist fire-breathing dictator in a dusty costume armed with rules that don’t make rational sense, and are frequently contradictory. He/she has a bamboo cane in one hand which is swished through the air and is used to whack me across my back when I am lazy, self-satisfied or low. In the other hand he/she clutches in his long bony fingers a small red, leather-bound notebook with a tattered string and small pencil attached in which he scribbles his ‘Rules’. He/she is surrounded by a cloudy red mist that gives off sparks.

This is maybe something I really should just keep for my private journal, but these issues are so bound up with my work as an actor and director, and it will do me good to have this mad stuff out in the public domain because I can’t then shirk, suppress or avoid doing the important inner work of owning and correcting all this ingrained, habitual dysfunctional thinking that has dogged me for so long. I’ve been silent and privately ashamed of this hidden side of me for far too long, and I know I need to get this sorted before I go to the Academy or I am going to let it to sabotage my growth as an artist and my relationships there too. So here it is.

This self-blame is like an addiction to a powerful narcotic that made me feel so strong when I started ‘using’, and then slowly and surely it whittled away my willpower, my health, my capacity to think straight and see things clearly until I ended up believing I’m incapable of doing anything without it. This is not an exercise in self-pity, actually very far from it. This is about owning up to some difficult truths about what a pain I am capable of causing myself and others. For the first time in a long time I feel I am actually getting somewhere.

Here’s that list.

THE DAEMON's RULEBOOK
(or The Inner Critic's Catechism)

“Break any of these rules and you will pay for it.”

“Be consistent, or you’ll look foolish.”

“(raps) Success is your only mother-fucking option. Failure’s not.”

“If you’re planning to fail, forgive yourself.”

“Isolate yourself to avoid the possibility of infection by the culture of failure and malfunction that spoils all life.”

“Resist being tarred with the same brush as anyone else. Free yourself of all other attachments except your attachment to me, your only true friend.”

“Go silent and remote if you want to become better than all your ‘competitors’ and avoid being dragged down to ‘their’ level.”

“Love blinds you.”

“Love wounds.”

“Love hurts.”

“…Avoid it.”

“You have a right to be moody”

“You are obliged to be moody.”

“You moody, difficult fucker!”

"Impatience is a virtue. It gets things done."

“What do you mean? OF COURSE you can’t be loved! Anyone who says you can is either a fucking liar or a fool. Get used to being alone and misunderstood.”

“Love crucifies.”

“Love is best reserved for the desperate and the lost.”

“If you didn’t have me you would have to give up.”

“It’ll never be perfect. Chain yourself up in your gloomy cave and try, try and try again.”

“Cruelty and suffering are such a wonderful teachers. I am cruel because I care.”

“God punishes you when He wants you to grow. I am his servant”

“Accelerate your learning- help me, your teacher, by hurting yourself, and then suffer in silence and isolation and feel yourself soar higher.”

“Anger is good for your creativity and motivation. Squashed rage is even better.”

“You do not have time to mess around. Get a move on, you retard.”

“You must always stay hungry. Deny your self the sustenance of reward.”

“All the best artists are messed up.”

“It is your job to shoulder all the blame for every mistake. You allowed them to happen.”

“Say nothing. Don’t complain. Be a man.”

“Always obey the director, like a professional.”

“You said nothing. Why not? You’re to blame; you were the one who saw it all going to hell in a handcart in slow motion and still you ignored your inner voice. It’s all your fault.”

“The audience don’t give a damn about your suffering. It goes with the territory. Do your job and shut the fuck up, you child.”

“Keep the personal out of it.”

“Avoid giving yourself the credit. Your successes are down to me. You couldn’t survive without me”

“Other people have their own problems. They aren’t interested in knowing about yours. Don’t waste time and involve anyone else. Solve your own problems and allow them to get on with much more important things- their own.”

“Demand to know from anyone who dares admire you what you did wrong.”

“Never listen to what you did right- you’ll never learn from that.”

“Give it all away… Especially your happiness.”

“You have no right to be fulfilled. That is not why you should be doing it.”

“All or nothing. There be no road between.”

“Don’t let anything get in the way of you being excellent.”

"Don't be offensive. Be passive-aggressive."

“You always fail… That is because you're shit.”

“Humourlessness is proof of your integrity and commitment.”

“Laughter is forbidden. You are not a child; stop behaving like one.”

“Like or (God forbid) love your own self at your own peril.”

"Tolerate incompetence in others until your ears bleed or explode."

“You are entitled to no reward, no matter how hard you work. Except a fag or five in the breaks.”

“Nothing and nobody should matter more than acting.”

“Fuck your own acting! Nothing matters more than the show, you self-involved bastard.”

“If you are not prepared to give up everything then you are an amateur of the worst kind, a fucking fraud.”

“Others are human: their errors are forgivable. But I told you you were failing; you have no excuse.”

“Amateur equals shit.”

“Your inevitable failure is unpardonable.”

“Working till you collapse builds your stamina.”

“Pain and suffering is character building.”

“Refuse to be obsessed and you’re bound to fall flat on your arse.”

“’Concentrate’ means blot everything else out.”

“Flexibility is your fatal flaw.”

“Rest is for wimps.”

“Always hate the results and you’ll keep on growing.”

“Clamp the emotional shutters down or the lesser artists will sabotage and distract you out of jealousy.”

“Never reveal your sickness or weaknesses. They will want to steal it for themselves if they knew its rewards.”

“Blame yourself for everything that fails. Allow yourself no credit for the successes.”

“Never admit weakness.”

“Stockpile and hide all your love away. Don’t waste it.”

“You’ll always need to prove yourself or others will overtake you.”

“Always believe it when you think you might be shit. I, your inner critic, is never ever wrong. Trust me.”

“You are an untrained actor: you are therefore a shit amateur.”

“You NEED me.”

“Helping a fellow other actor is like giving him direction. It is not your job. Everyone will hate you for it eventually.”

“(sings) You’re no good, you’re no good, you’re no good… Baby, you’re no good. Say it again.”

“Live in fear of humiliation and ridicule. Fear it worse than death.”

“All satisfaction breeds laziness, smugness and deadening de-motivation.”

“The audience despise you for failing them.”

“Friends are misguided. Make no friends and you won’t be lied to.”

“You are shit because you can’t repeat your successes.”

“It was good? You got lucky.”

“It was bad? No wonder. You didn’t kill yourself trying.”

“Exaggerate your pain if you want a purchase on transformation.”

“Praise is rarely valid, and never ever useful.”

“Genius is a curse.”

“Your experience counts for nothing. After 30 odd years you are still none the wiser than the first timer.”

“Feeling disconnected, then pull yourself apart and find out why. Quick!”

“Smash the first signs of self-satisfaction into a pulp. It is the enemy of the true artist.”

“And who the fuck are you? What do you know?”

“You are deluding yourself.”

“You will never know enough, that is why I have the right to call you stupid.”

“I would be failing in my obligations if I didn’t keep bullying you.”

“You are thick, slow, clumsy, inept, and wrong most of the time. A self-pitying, nasty, fat, ugly, disgusting, sick, whining, smelly, scruffy, selfish, self-obsessed, shitty little HUMAN.”

“You can’t stop until you are perfect. Which is never.”

“Since pride in who you are and what you achieve and self-love are not valid options without the attendant shame and the inevitable self-delusion, hate yourself with a passion instead.”

“If you cannot be loved by others then intimidate them. Make them scared of you.”

“Make them jealous, secretly resentful of and alarmed by your talent. Make them hate themselves for admiring your work so much even though you are such a shit to work with.”

“In the end it doesn’t matter if you’re a shitty person. It’s utterly justified in the long run if you are creating great art as 'a shitty person'.”

“Hurt yourself. Hurt others if necessary. It’ll be worth it.”

“You are fucking stupid and untalented… But you must do your utmost to hide that from people or you will look weaker.”

“You are an amateur and you will always be an amateur if you look like you are having any fun.”

“You are not allowed to congratulate yourself. Only big-headed, deluded arseholes do that.”

“You are not loveable. You are not even likeable. To think you could be liked is a sign either you have fallen for lies or they have. Deflect and dismiss it if you value your integrity at all.”

“But if you cannot ever allow yourself to be liked or loved you can at least be respected. And if not respected then feared. And if not feared then utterly despised. Anything but fall for empty theatrical blandishments.”

“If you give up these rules then you will kill your will and your right to work at the highest level. And you will disappear. Folk will not remember you and will never want to work with you again.”

“Be remembered, even if it is for being a difficult bastard.”

"You always have to be the most grown up.”

"Martyr yourself."

"Be Mr Spock when you drop your character."

“The work is punishing. Get used to it. If you can’t take it then kill yourself because you’ll never be good at anything else.”

Scary, huh? But I feel much lighter and freer for having done this though!

A few days ago I asked 3 or 4 close and trusted confidants (I do still have a small loving and hyper-tolerant band of close friends left, thank God!!) who have agreed to help me complete a CBT (Cognitive behaviour Therapy) exercise that asks the following questions:

What do I do well in the rehearsal room?

and

What do I not do so well in the rehearsal room?

My thanks to those kind souls (You know who you are!) who are helping me with this. You are truly precious friends. When the feedback comes I will compile and compare the results and draft some conclusions and, yes, change!!!!

Hopefully I’ll be able to include them in a Part III. This is to be my homework during the summer hols.

Phew.

:-)

Natural High

So much has been happening over the past few weeks, both inwardly and outwardly, and I suppose I have been living very intensely. I wish to reflect on things a bit here and maybe tie it all together, if I can, before I return to teaching on Monday. Forgive me if any of this comes across as self-indulgent, ignorant or naïve- or all three!

I have spent the last 2 days taking part in a voice workshop led by the inspirational expert Nadine George. It’s her work that provides the foundation methodology for all voice teaching done with students at the RSAMD over the past decade by among others my friends Bill Wright, Susan Worsfold and of course Ros Steen (who was also in attendance, along with five other voice teachers from drama schools all over England), and now internationally- in the national theatres of Scandinavia, France and Brazil. Nadine’s ideas challenge many of the dogmas about the use of the dramatic voice, such as “ adequate support” and “misuse” propounded by the likes of Linklater, Rodenberg et al. By the end of the first day the majority of my fellow workshop participants looked very worried, as if Nadine were some kind of antichrist spouting vile heresies. But by the end of the two days I know we all felt immensely grateful for the way she had managed to liberate us from many of our received notions and prejudices, and had re-inspired us. I am left feeling immeasurably courageous and hopeful, aware of the possibility an infinite number of choices which I thought had been closed off to me as an artist long ago. My God, if that was just a wee taster of what I can expect to get from the Masters in acting at the RSAMD I am going to be in paradise next year!

She made me confront the notion of what an incredibly good actor I am. I have become increasingly hardened in recent years to any kind of adulation, blandishments or flattery about my work. Instead I always seek to know how I can do better, and have always felt I can do this only when I am criticised. My dear Karen often berates me for always being much more interested in getting feedback from all and sundry about my flaws and in the process making myself completely deaf and blind to any admiration from others.

But Nadine George was so inexorably positive and affirming. She somehow correctly intuited my ingrained resistance to her “Amazing!… Extraordinary… Absolutely tremendous… Bloody marvellous!” comments. My intrinsic scepticism is a peculiar manifestation of my very English, and yes egoic fearfulness of any kind of praise. My somewhat unreliable bullshit-detector was sounding its alarm bells. I have had some very ugly experiences in the past at the hands of people who have flattered my ego and then used it as a tool for manipulating me, and eventually turning against me. I have come to suffer from a deep suspicion of any kind of congratulation or commendation about what I do. I immediately suspect the motives and even the taste of people who say I am good- as some people have in the past ended up using that as an insidious form of control over me, and my feelings. So you can perhaps imagine my reaction when, after performing my Aegisthus speech from Ted Hughes’ translation of The Oreistia, Nadine showered all this praise on my ‘embodiment of the text’. It made me feel extremely uncomfortable, though I adopted what I thought was a convincing mask of gratitude. She had similarly eulogized everybody else’s progress so when she said I looked like I didn’t believe her I apologised and blurted out that I had some doubts about the reliability of her feedback.

I said, “It’s really fantastic how you provide such a supportive and lovely atmosphere in this class, Nadine. It's great, but I’m not used to it! Surely if everyone is wonderful and special then in the end nobody really is. Never mind the raptures, what I want to know is what isn’t wonderful... and what must I work on to improve it.”

She became very serious and responded very slowly, “Improve?? Mark… Mark. You want me to tell you it was shit? It wasn’t shit, Mark! It wasn’t shit. That’s the fucking understatement of the year! Christopher-bloody-Columbus!! Do you not know that? You need to have a clearer understanding of what you are, Mark, what you are capable of, my darling… I love you! I adore you!! You were wonderful. Wonder-ful. You need to know that about yourself, Mark. You are an extraordinary actor. A wonderful actor! I mean it. Do you see? Do you get me? Christopher-bloody-Columbus!!” etc…

Eventually at the end of this rant she held my gaze and leaned forward, adding quietly, “Listen to me; if you work from a level of love then miracles happen. Do you get me?”

The scales fell from my eyes.

BINGO!!!!!

Suddenly I felt like all the various strands of me came together- like the fireworks of some ecstatic religious/ or exquisite drug epiphany!

Hearing just those words chimed with so many, many things that have been percolating and bubbling below full consciousness for me about the art of acting, the art of being, for a very long time but hadn’t really pierced me as deeply until that instant. I felt my heart and mind explode and expand at the speed of light- un-chained, utterly liberated. The feeling hasn’t gone away.

Deep changes will inevitably ensue; Nadine predicted this for us all in our own unique ways. She’s no guru, she says that herself. She's just a wee woman. She’s not interested in abusing her power or manipulating anyone.

But as she said I was present at that workshop for a reason. And, my God, was she right.

The experience was quite literally unforgettable.

Nadine’s work draws on primeval, animalistic forces, the archetypal male and female energies in the voice, body and spirit. It’s not bollocks. Of course this workshop made me hyper-aware of the profound importance of all of this to Titus, and occured at precisely the right time for me as I launch myself back into acting after a year away from the stage. A divinely meant encounter, I’m sure of that.

The character of old Titus has such a disproportionate Yang imbalance, and he has to undergo the emotional and physical torment of hell, similar to old King Lear, before he can move into the Yin dimension. The voice work I did wth nadine will feed into that. But much much more than that, I know the implications of this Easter-time experience will not just embrace Titus but extend into the rest of my life work from this time on. And as completely naff as it’s likely to sound… fuck it, this was a genuinely heart, mind and soul-altering experience for me. I can’t be the same ever again. So thank you, Nadine… And thank you, God.

Regular readers of this blog will know I am, and have always been, attracted to the spiritual aspects of acting, but more and more so as I age. And having become a Quaker in the last 18 months I am convinced in my heart- in ways I can’t really begin to justify in words- that the theatre really has far more in common with religion- specifically mysticism and the sacred- than it does with ‘art’ or ‘entertainment’. Both are about the ritualistic dissolution and transfiguration of the Ego, and the reconnection with the Divine. It is not about the pursuit of joy or tranquillity- if it ever was- for that goal too has to be transcended eventually. For me it is clarity, and above all Truth that is the Holy Grail. And paradoxically I seek the path beyond the ecstasy of transformation into a state of oneness and universality where notions of human identity and uniqueness become worthless and immensely precious at the same time. That is what religion does too. (I know, I know, this sounds like wank. I can see my pal Mark Westbrook banging his poor fists off the computer screen as I write this!! Sorry, Mark!)

Actually I wonder if this is why so many actors and artists get sucked into using drugs and alcohol, because they long to experience that sense of otherness- a sense of joining together- on a regular basis, even if it is only a chemically-induced illusion, and lasts just a few hours. But somehow to me that particular way of living has always struck me as terribly selfish, a form of cheating and- not to put too fine a point on it- bloody dangerous. And the results- because they don’t actually serve anyone else but the substance-user himself- can’t ever be sustained. It’s like that analogy my old history teacher Chris Wilshire used when talking on this subject: like getting the fuel to soar in a helicopter to mountaintop rather having the determination, guts and the spiritual strength to climb it step by step under your own power. Any lasting sense of achievement, ownership or meaning is absent from the person who gets there by assisted means. Sorry but I can see nothing real about that dummy-sucking, ‘PLUR’ world, no matter what anyone says. It’s a kind of sordid and treacherous fantasy life of happiness without any true fulfilment or purpose. I’d be the last person to deny anyone their bit of fun, but when it starts to become a philosophy you think is worth defending, well then your life is spirally slowly into the pit. Thir work becomes shit. I’m old, and it’s a tragedy I’ve seen repeated more times than I care to remember to some of my most gifted and talented friends and colleagues.

But then again many have said exactly the same thing to me about what I do as an actor. "Just escapism from feelings of insecurity! For children!" So there you go! Fie diddly dee!

Other stuff to look forward to in the near future includes my production of The House of Bernarda Alba at the Eastwood Theatre, opening next week; returning to school on Monday for my last full term of teaching (ever!), developing Mamet’s Duck Variations with comedian-actor Ian Watt and director Mark Westbrook of Spartan Productions; a forthcoming audition for a major TV series set in the legal world of 1780s Glasgow; playing Titus in the mammoth Titus Andronicus opening at the Ramshorn in 6 weeks time; organising and speaking about worship at the sereis of weekly Glasgow Quaker Quest evenings, starting May 6th… Oh and of course, last but by no means least, drama school starting in September. :-)

But right now…? Right now, I am living in the blessed Nowness of the Now.

And loving it.

Actor Agape

1979

...At the tender age of 18, lounging in our back garden and learning lines for a college production of Turgenev's A Month in the Country. It occurs to me just how much (-not just my physical appearance but) my methods for creating characters have changed since those embryonic days. I find the work so much easier, and it's so much more enjoyable now than it was then.

And even more so since I stumbled across Michael Chekhov. And I like to think I am better at acting too! Oh, how I used to torture myself- to the point of making myself thoroughly ill with overwork and ridiculous levels perfectionism! The afternoon my mum took this photograph I was covering my comprehensively 'Unitted & Actioned' script with a plethora of 'Given Circumstances' marginalia in different coloured felt tips! God!


Yes, the work was all about the Stanislavski system then. Now 30 years on, having come through so many different phases as an artist, my preferred method is a mishmash of so many different influences and I suppose it has eventually evolved into a combination of my own creative imagination, the psychophysical ideas of Michael Chekhov with a healthy dose of the purely instinctive. Still a lot of studying and armchair work of course but nowhere near as intellectual.

And hopefully nowhere near as ego-driven either!

Acting has always been an incredibly potent, and intimate tool for my personal and spiritual growth from the very moment I first discovered I actually had some talent for it at 16. In fact I have often said that for me acting is a form of prayer. It is certainly about faith- a very practical faith, to do with the manifestating and embodiment of the ineffable. There have been long periods where acting has been more important to me than literally anything else; but as I got older, slightly wiser and hopefully better as an artist, my work slowly took on a healthier objectivity. Still impassioned, yes- but much less obsessive. I definitely feel my life now has a larger purpose than acting. Acting is a means, a very imporatnt means but no longer the be all and end all. Directing and writing have both helped me to achieve this perspective of course, but more importantly Life itself, and the lessons of relationships.

But perhaps more than any other single thing it was rediscovering the spiritual ideas from theosophy that were woven into the creative philosophy and exercises in Michael Chekhov's To the Actor 8 years ago that was the major turning point for me. I remember first reading Rudolf Steiner's Knowledge of Higher Worlds in Sutton library in 1976 or 77 and somehow sensing even then that if I had the brains to fully assimilate and comprehend the ideas contained in the book then they might well be adapted for use by the actor. What put me off at the time was all the Eurythmy, Hindu and Buddhist 'guff'. Everything I read was about acting then, including Nietzsche, Fromm, Dickens etc, and all the Romantic poetry I devoured. But I simply wasn't ready to fully grasp Steiner's occultist notions of the Higher I at the age of 17. They scared me a bit at the time, if I'm honest. So you might imagine just what an amazing synchronicity it was to realise many, many years later that the same book had been such a huge influence on Misha's life and work- especially the concept of the Higher I as the actor's inner creative treasure. I get what Steiner was going on about now, and am overwhelmed with gratitude for Chekhov making it relevant to my own artistic process and spiritual work.

I hope I am a better person than I was when this photo was taken. My obsession with acting for many years caused so many problems and much unnecessary confusion in my relationships with directors and fellow profesionals. I suppose I became what's known politely as "a difficult actor". A bloody good one, but difficult. I am sure my manner put people off working with me. Somehow I had programmed myself to believe that if I really cared about the work I wouldn't let anything stand in its way. I had to focus soley on that. I couldn't allow myself to get close others, especially to my fellow artists. It was more important to me to keep my distance from others and keep my head down. To stay lonely. I couldn't allow myself to be put into situations where I was somehow inauthentic, sentimental or weak. It took me until I was nearly 40 to finally grasp that perhaps the main reason I had never really had the recognition I felt I deserved as an actor- while many who were often far less talented but ultimately much nicer, kinder and more approachable colleagues had ended up doing so much better than I-was because (not to put too fine a point on it) I was a withdrawn, impatient, egoistic passive-aggressive, taciturn arsehole. Chekhov's book revealed to me that the reasons for my deep inner restlessness about my work, my sense of creative isolation which I had hitherto thought was an unfortunate byproduct of my 'genius' (ha!), were because I had forgotten the most important thing- namely Love. I had always stupidly dismissed it as an irrelevance,- impractical. I had taught myself to be cynical and closed off.

with Ann McTaggart, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (2004)

I have since become a bit of an evangelist for this "Love thing", and quite unabashed in my conviction that it must be Love that lies at the very heart of the artist's process, at least if he is going to work at the very highest level.


It is vital for the artist to be honest and authentic in life, but that does not mean being selfish or cruel. It is also vital to be committed and focused, but not competitive or offhand- working with such a focus that it is at the expense of one's relationships with one's fellow artists.


Kindness and compassion must come first.


You have given all of your adult life to the theatre. Pathetic, but it was always becuase of love. The love of the process of acting. But the larger reason for this devotion to acting is finally nothing to do with gaining recognition or power. It is about exploring and communicating the practicality of a belief in the power of inner and outer transformation of the actor and the spectator in the Eternal Present where Love lives.


As I embark on this new year of 2009 these are some of the thoughts that are buzzing round my head. Many others are unborn right now, and difficult to articulate. But I do sense very strongly that my soul is undergoing realignment to experience amazing encounters and deeper, more spiritually challenging work in this new era of my life.

And all I want to say is... BRING IT ON!

:-))

A loving , peaceful new year to all.

with Eric Robertson in Tango (2008)

"What do you believe that you can act like this?"

Message on plaque at the main gate of Dartington Hall

"Artists are specialists in the spiritual sense, otherwise they are puppets and nothing else.” Michael Chekhov

George Shdanoff: Misha, what are we doing here in Hollywood? We did not become involved to make better actors for Louis B. Meyer.

Michael Chekhov: We are not making better actors for Louis B. Meyer. We are helping people to grow spiritually, George, to become better human beings.

“Spiritual values are more concrete than concrete things”. Michael Chekhov

I love that apocryphal story about Michael Chekhov who, having just finished the first night performance of Hamlet, was pursued by crowds of Russian people as he rode in his carriage through the streets of Moscow, yelling after him:

“What do you believe that you can act like this?”

I long for my audiences to ask the very same question. That said, I am not in the least interested, nor have I ever been, in religious propaganda, a la Riding Lights etc. The artist is not a catechist, as Thomas Merton would have it. But I want the practicality of Love to make such an impact on my process the spectator is awe-struck. I long, through my work, to inspire in him a deep hunger for more knowledge about how to expand and express his own divine potential. I aim to heal, to in-spire and en-courage with my acting; and then to entertain and enlighten. Now I can continue to try to do this through my teaching, but I know I do it much more effectively through my acting.

Of course I do still retain a lower ego as an actor that fights for attention with its silly aspirations and vanities, its desire to be noticed and feted; and it continues to insist on getting in the way of my higher purposes despite my best intentions. But my aims have notwithstanding deepened since i began meditating- and they have begun to embrace a larger, more universal intention since I saw that plaque outside Dartington Hall (above) back in 2005. And as part of this deeper awareness and 'spiritualising' of my acting process these aims have become more refined and clarified. And of course part of this process in reconnecting with my divine purpose as an artist is my decision to apply for drama school- ideally (idealistically!?) to go much deeper into applying the lessons in a concrete way which I have been learning through my reading, meditating and writing in the abstract these last few years. I have always somehow known that an actor must train to develop the ability to grow spiritually. The two things have always been inseparable for me in fact, even though I have for one reason or another (usually inspired by fear) gone through lengthy periods trying to deny it. It's actually this symbiotic union that attracted me to acting in the first place-. It was always the most powerful means for exploring my spiritual potential, for tapping into higher levels of wisdom, being and compassion. Was it Artaud who said that the actor is an apprentice god? This is territory the lecturers, tutors and directors at the RSAMD will never go anywhere near of course! It will be up to you to take care of this core aspect of your development as an artist, as indeed it always has been your own private responsibility. Yeah, they'll teach you techniques and methodologies, but that is the end of the story as far as they are concerned. They cannot give you more talent, or make your soul grow. That must remain your own private business. Thankfully your own Inward Light can continue to be your own private tutor, your personal acting coach and guide, on call 24/7. It is this inner light which is the primary source and access point for your creative power as an artist. It offers the gift transformation, the promise of transcendence. No-one else can give you this beauty, nor indeed can they take it away. At least at MA level, where you are much more responsible for your own learning, you can continue to nurture this Inward Light by meditation and psychophysical means as part of your own daily discipline, and your Quaker faith, without interference from them- embodying the infinite potentialities and inspirations offered you by your Higher Self whilst the college lecturers suggest ways to apply it. Your inner guide will be a reliable way of sifting and organising the help they can give you, and selecting those teachings that may be used to help you become a better performer, and discarding those that will not. The RSAMD is an educational institution: they assess and grade students by empirical, objective means. This is of course total nonsense, but they have not found a way of measuring artistic success, or managing to give it a credible, quantitative evaluation. Because acting is primarily a qualitative, intuitive, non-intellectual activity when it is done well, they will never be able to teach you anything profoundly helpful. They cannot give you this. Their job is to offer students certain techniques and methodologies. It is then up to me to take these means (or not) and use them as function of the Holy Spirit.

If acting were that simple to quantify, then they could bottle the magic that great acting generates and put it in the college water supply. But acting is not a science. Because educational institutions attempt to appraise and calculate it in this absurd manner it is easy to dismiss the merits and value of such establishments, but as an artist who is hopefully on the threshold of entering its portals I need to accept and understand the limitations of their tools for assessment, and chooses to work within them. I must remember that all human measurements of artistic talent or 'worth' are flawed and inadequate. As Michael Chekhov said: "Acting is meditation". It cannot be measured. Knowing this makes me feel even less nervous about going higher now, because it is not my lower ego making me do this. God is. I am ascending because the intention is to take the work into the wider world. (I did not say my work- I said the work.) I am merely an ambassador, a humble channel for this stuff- a servant, a messenger. This is no false humility. The drive to act emanates from the divine, not from little 'Mark Coleman'.

King Lear (2006)

These past 4 or 5 years have been about gradually breaking free of this small-minded bondage, the impure intentions of feathering my own egoic nest that had corrupted my work for so long. In place of the mediocre aims of getting rave reviews for my work, or simply nurturing my own inner growth as an artist in order to become more impressive- what might be called politely art for art's sake, but is really art for my own sake!- it has become more and more about His sake- the desire to share something authentic and enriching through acting, to create better, more compassionate characterisations and so inspire other human beings in the audience- to herald the arrival of a kingdom of heaven, if you like, where people understand the true power of faith, imagination and belief to alter their reality. To, in the end, say something that will survive me. I have begun to grasp that the function of art- my function- is so much wider- not just in a token , intellectual sense- but so much more on a macro level, making a contribution to society and the wider world, to the soul development of Mankind. This is why I want folk to be moved to ask the same question that the crowds asked after seeing Michael Chekhov perform Hamlet.

And what do I believe?

It can summarised in three words:

All is Love.

with Cathal Quinn in Keats in Limbo (1994)

A simple message of course, especially when expressed in such bald terms- no doubt a fatuous one when written down or spoken aloud, but it is a message that keeps engulfing me (!) and all other voices in my daily meditations, one I can't ignore. And it is a call from a non-space of non-action to act authentically in space and time. I instinctively know that from this one perfect gift of divine wisdom is spawned everything else needed for the abundant life of creation.

Love as compassion. I am yearning for my audience to hear this silent call to embrace their fellow man with infinite, unconditional compassion. Meister Eckhart said "God's best name is compassion."

The actor's art is the Art of Compassion. I can think of no better definition. The actor enlarges his talent by seeking processes that enable him to embody compassion more and more... and more fully.

To make the ‘Inner’ content outwardly manifest- faithfully and authentically, to embody through the actor's psychophysical means Love into the world- through giving, giving, giving.

This must be your mantra as you prepare to study at drama school:

To give...

to give...

TO GIVE.

Don Juan in Don Juan Comes Back from the War

(Odon Von Horvath) (1993)

"It takes 20 years to become a master actor"

So said Sanford Meisner.
So the Master Actor is… what?

He is the actor who is connected to his Higher Self.

Prospero in The Tempest (2008)

The next question then is: How do I become this Higher Self?

This question has been one that I have spent the last 18 months trying to answer, certainly since Anna Karenina, and in some senses way before that- perhaps for as long as I have been alive. I can remember sitting in the Razed Curtain meetings trying to come up with a sanitised, acceptable version of what I think our work should have been about but I felt embarrassed to share my spiritual focus- for fear of not being business-minded or ‘realistic’. I made every effort to make my own version of the mission statement sound less wishy-washy but I could help but feel it just came across as vague and unfocused anyway.

I wouldn’t have the same problem now.

Much of the spiritual and artistic journey to becoming one's Higher Self consists of asking the right questions. Michael Chekhov would sometimes admonish his students for asking what he called "unborn questions", and I guess that for most the last 30 odd years I have been acting I have been asking unborn questions. It was only when I hit upon the Sanaya Roman books about Spiritual Growth and Personal Power that I began to realise that I had been barking up a series of wrong trees, seeking inspiration in the wrong places, putting too much faith in the guidance of others and not enough in my own inner wisdom for a start. The question how do I become my higher self strikes close to the one I really need to be asking when it comes to my acting; for if it truly is my vocation, or at least helps me to access the higher realms, then I have to open myself up to the answers such a question might reveal in order to align myself with and hopefully connect with the Divine Source.

And the first answer I got to this question was quite unexpected:

You already are your Higher Self!

It is the self, the Me that unifies all the limitless and infinite aspects of your divine soul, all the possible combinations and outcomes that are inherent and implicit in you, and could potentially communicate with the universe. The Higher Self is the access point for an infinite number of soul dimensions. With the right inner work this Higher Self can be made manifest in your work. But what then is “the right inner work”? Well first and foremost all this depends on you believing the incredible truth that this Higher Self is a reality, and not just an imaginative construct. As an actor you are used to attributing the imaginary circumstances and characters you inhabit with as much truth as you can so that they become true to the audience. It is about paring away the unnecessary, so that the higher values and qualities are revealed. Acting is a spiritual process that has much in common with the mystics journey of discovery which yields to a shocking and revolutionary principle that all notions of personal identity on our plane of existence is maya: illusion, that despite the apparent flaws in or nature we are each of us capable of being perfect channels for the divine, and allowing that Self to explore those selves through visualisation, imagination and the embodiment of the Ultimate in order to enlarge one’s sense of who one might be at a soul level. And the point is not so much what you do in your daily life or which profession you have. Whether you are a road-sweeper or a doctor, an office clerk or a waiter- well, it makes no difference really. What really matters is your “state of being,” the energy that you send forth, the energy that you are. It is not what you do but who you are that is the source of transformation. And as an actor you can be all these people and more.

Acting is one of the most effective tools available to mankind for channelling those inner, transcendent dimensions in an intensely creative and deeply inspirational form. It works on the same principles as the law of attraction we have heard and read so much about in recent years. Potentially, we are all nothing less than beings of gargantuan spiritual power, able to download extraordinary levels of wisdom, beauty and sublime insight. You can plug yourself into that power and download whatever you require for your journey- like a Blackberry with infinite memory. The responsibility is so scary that many cower and run from it: they pretend to themselves and the world they are mere artisans, and as Marianne Williamson says they choose to shrink so that others won’t be intimidated or humiliated, our deepest fear being the realisation that we are powerful beyond measure. But the power I am talking of does not humiliate other souls- though it may scare their egos into realising they have settled for far less than their divine inheritance! No: work that is generated and fuelled by this light gives other souls as Williamson says “permission to do the same”.

So how do you do this then?
Let me try and make a list. I love and loathe lists at the same time. Lists are made by the intellect, and tend to encourage a ‘ticky-boxy spirituality’: i.e. Do all this and, hey presto, all will be well. But there are no real shortcuts to this though, because your soul depths already operate by these rules. The trick is to align the spirit and the heart and the mind to all operate according to the same principles- only then can the power be made manifest through the following means. So then- the list:

What you must do with this power is...

1. Trust the universe, the divine will always support you, making your path lead ever higher. All you need do is believe.
2. Believe that help is given to you the moment you ask. Learn to listen for that voice. This is what your life has always been about, and you are so very close to the critical mass point where you explode with love. And ‘the semen of your being will come into the cunt of the universe’, as you once so eloquently said to Derek Pryor 25 years ago while high on lager, sulphate and magic mushrooms!
3. Develop the talent for listening to the loving thought as opposed to the fearful one.
4. Choosing honesty over pretence.
5. Root yourself in the heart of intuition and love, rather than the egoic, thinking mind
6. Feeling your own soul’s understanding of beauty is always preferred to society’s understanding of it. Always.
7. Access your playful inner child and lure him out of hiding.
8. Use your intuition with grounded discernment. Often it will tell you things that seem… well… obvious. Enter the imaginary body and feel the psychological changes imbue every cell and seep into your heart, mind and spirit.
9. Know that you really do create your own reality
10. Remember to connect to the divine source on a daily basis- meditate, pray, say hi and say thank you
11. Think always of service to others, rather than yourself, because you will otherwise remained mired in illusions and egoic thinking.
12. The goal is to live your highest life as highest self and you cannot help but serve others
13. Your goal, your higher purpose is to heal, to enlighten and encourage.

But our souls are immensely powerful- so potentially awesome in fact that we have created an illusion and then lived it as if it were real in order to accomplish larger, much more noble goals for ourselves. It doesn’t tend to work though because we become divided and separated from the Truth of Love which remains invisible.

A faithfully embraced and fully-committed heart-relationship with your higher self is required. When the connection with your higher self is at least as important and as real to you as any of your other relationships, once you trust it enough to follow and obey its guidance faithfully, you will experience “critical mass.” You are closer to achieving this than you ever have been in your life. The universe is starting to cooperate as never before as you align yourself to your inner connection to truth. Meaning and opportunity abound and multiply. Connection happens when you act on your vow of devotion to higher service- to the healing and enlightenment of others, rather than trying to accrue praise, money or nourishment for your own ego. When the Universe then trusts it can rely on you real transformation occurs. You now discover your hidden gifts and realise your astonishing untapped divine potential by logging onto that inner programme that’s been around since the universe’s beginning–your Soul. Following through on your inner guidance helps you become aware of incredibly precious and beautiful gifts that have remained buried in the secret corners of your soul from the beginning of time.

All actors- all souls!- have a common, universal and divine purpose (to learn, to grow, to serve etc.) as well as a specific purpose based on individual identity (to act, to make people laugh, to heal, to inspire, to comfort). This suggests that the individual, the personality or “ego” should not be “negated”, but actually accepted- and yes!- accentuated. You have been ashamed of the apparent “selfishness” of being an actor in the past. Your response to George Docherty’s email which had been intended as a message of support for applying to the RSAMD but which you interpreted as a reminder of your selfishness, illustrates better than anything else how much of a tender issue this is for you, despite all the inner work you have done to get you this far.

After all, the bridge between this world and the kingdom of heaven that many of us yearn for lies with each of us fulfilling our own life purposes, using our individual gifts and talents. Your gift which you have devoted your life to developing, Mark- your extraordinary, divine talent- is for acting. This is not selfishness though, because your soul has always known that despite the praise you get for it, despite the joy you get from doing it- it liberates and inspires others. How heartening it was to come across a review of the last play I performed in (Tango, in May) yesterday.

“The situation is saved by the stunning Mark Coleman as Stomil, Arthur's father. His relaxed acting and lovable wackiness makes him stand out among some indifferent and tame performances.” The Skinny

Stomil in Tango (2008)

You have worked towards seeing from the soul’s perspective for a long time now, Mark- and your spiritual vision is to sharpen still more. This review was a wonderful encouragement to keep on developing my talent along spiritual lines, especially after I had been feeling at a discouragingly low ebb these past few weeks, wondering why no one appeared to be offering me any acting roles. I loved the fact that I managed to make such a flawed and arrogant character “lovable”. But actually this is not really about ego (well, not much!), actually it is more about recognition that I am not wrong! and that somehow God has been working with me on this role all along. I committed to applying deep, spiritual principles learned and expanded from Michael Chekhov about the Higher Self and Love to my work on that role, and that it happened to amuse and thrill one other person- in this case a young Polish girl who happens to write for a freebie magazine. It sounds disingenuous I know but in the end that one response really does make that work all worthwhile. Her words filled me with pride- but a good pride; with a humble gratitude to God for her encouragement that I am travelling on the right road. It’s not selfish to feel this way. If it were then it would please me to have Marta’s direction and the other performances in the production slagged off. It so doesn’t. It really upsets me, in fact, and I think it must have upset Marta too. That is why I perfectly understand why she preferred to keep the review’s publication a secret from everyone involved in the production for the last 7 months.

This time ahead as you apply for the RSAMD offers you such amazing opportunity, as an explorer and a vehicle for truth and freedom. I am already thinking deeply about writing my dissertation about the Higher Self and its practical use to the actor. This inner power, the soul’s power based on love, is what will turn this planet around. The spirituality of acting is such an important area of research that many of the academics prefer to ignore. They are throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

The time for this ‘new’ way of being is NOW. You as an actor are to be part of this movement and ascension up to the next evolutionary level of the art and the society it influences and helps to change. You will go as high as you can imagine. Everything you can imagine becomes real from now on.

But still, your own emotional body is very sensitive to fear, to anger and aggression and to all strong sentiments which easily pull you out of your centre. This was illustrated in the way you responded to the Anna Karenina debacle last year. In trying to unravel exactly what went pear-shaped then you have been required to stop blaming others and instead take responsibility for the emotions you feel, examining them and following them back to their source(s). In this process of internalization you do not search for the cause(s) of your problems in the outside world anymore but you look for them within yourself. Thus you take responsibility for your own energy and that is one of the most important things you have been learning in your spiritual life and will continue to learn through your acting, teaching and directing too.

Prospero in The Tempest (2008)

There are 3 danger-areas for you.

Firstly- Spiritual anger (if that isn’t too much of an oxymoron!).

In the past I have interpreted this as a creative energy, a drive for perfection, but actually unless used in the correct way it can so easily become very destructive! The desire to help and change things often contains a form of spiritual anger although this may go completely unnoticed. After all you seem to simply “want the best” for other actors or for the audience. But surely there is anger inside you when you feel inclined to force somebody – no matter how subtly – to change their behavior or their emotions. You get very impatient and it takes you out of your centre, away from the creative source. Often you do not notice that the time is not yet ripe for change.

This inner rage and itch for perfection feels like inspiration but it takes you away from your soul. There was a secret meaning behind the suffering incurred during this time. Each person involved- Dean, Sarah, me and all the others were there to unfold, to express and to learn more about what it is to be human and spirit at the same time. Each one of us proceeded according to his or her own path of development. And I was being asked by God to respect this, to take a step backwards and to concentrate entirely on yourself, on your own light. Instead I banged my gavel in judgement. You vibrated hate and rage for what they were doing wrong. You took on the responsibility for being their moral and artistic compass because you didn’t trust that they had to find their own way. There was no need for you to stand on the barricades. There was no need for you to fight. You should have walked away when you realised it was happening, instead of staying out of a misplaced sense of loyalty, and egoic preservation of your desire to be proved right.

Roverini in The Talented Mr Ripley (2005)

It’s strange but even though acting should be about actions, the emphasis your way of working has is really not about doing but being. When your spiritual energy is in balance, the healing energy you send forth to others flows easily and effortlessly, without physical or mental exertion. It feels light and smooth, not exhausting to you. You find your flow. Things, ideas, inspiration and people show up as if by magic on your path and turn to you for healing.

Each time you lock yourself in your righteous indignation and anger, even if it concerns injustice or suffering that you find unbearable to witness, you need to have the courage and patience and wisdom to just step backwards and move into the center of yourself. A state similar to the one you get into when meditating. Enter the silence and accept that things are as they are. Accept that everything completes its own cycle and has its own development, including the people who are dearest to you. Set them free, as the Kinks song says. Trust that it is enough ‘just’ to be there.

You ended up being blamed for the fall out during Anna Karenina, but your desire to be right was what alienated everyone. Sarah accused me of trying to force my spiritual principles onto others. It was a humiliating realisation but many months later I was able to come to the realisation that she was damned right even though I had been appalled at being blamed for this at the time.

So much for Anger.

Then there is Melancholy.

Feelings of depression or gloominess originate from low self confidence. Intellectually perhaps you may understand perfectly well that you carry a spiritual light within, that you are a sensitive, compassionate and wise soul. But the wounded 3 year child inside you, still standing at the top of the stairs looking down at his mum, still yearns for recognition and appreciation from the outside world. You cannot deny that there is a part of you that craves external attention and safety. The trouble is you can never get enough of this. You can’t find the sort of recognition you really seek because you are different. Others can’t recognize the real you and therefore cannot acknowledge and nourish you.
Your wounded, inner child will never be healed by something from the outside but only by yourself, your own power and wisdom
You are very prone to this kind of spiritual melancholy. The answer is to rekindle your Inward Light in order for the heavens then to fan it into a raging fire again. This is where the Quaker thing has really helped you. The Quakers remind you you are light.

And the third obstacle after anger and depression is plain old Fear. Particularly the fear to do with a lack of trust in your own inspirations, feelings and intuitions. If you doubt your own feelings, you worry a lot and you invoke a whole series of emotions which take you further and further away from your centre
Fear blocks the actor’s intuition. When the intellect and the emotions gain the upper hand ican easily create stage-fright and chaos. The intellect and the emotions need the intuition, the heart as a foundation. Only then can they serve you in a useful way when you’re acting.

Pedagogus in Electra (2004)

Set yourself free from worry and to go back to your heart. What do you really feel underneath all those restless thoughts and confused emotions? In breathing calmly down to your base chakra you are able to go back to your foundation. Then you may feel a relief valve deep within, a point of silence beyond thought and emotion. You may then choose a certain thought or emotion.
…
Every time you make contact with this inner center and take a step backwards you will find a renewed clarity within your soul- something changes at a very deep level- however imperceptable. From there you can observe your feelings and emotions without being absorbed by them or attached to them. You can watch your anger and send it love. You can observe your depression and offer yourself a healing hand. You can see the smallness of your fear and send it the energy of deliverance and transcendence.

You have now an armoury of tools for countering the negative energies of anger, depression and fear. For instance, the silent worship of the Friends’ meetings, your spiritual reading, your prayer and meditation discipline, your spiritual journal, your acting, your teaching (Yes, incredible as it may seem…teaching- But working with teenagers alerts you to all three of these spiritual pitfalls, and forces you to face them and overcome them. At last this time is coming to an end and you are going to conquer the limiting ideas of having to be a guy named “Mark”, of being anything somehow less than perfect, of being just material or thought energy. You can be Love and Light).

This is all heavenly nourishment you have been given just in the last 2 or 3 years.

It may be a cliché but there is much truth in it: as an actor you have access to the soul’s multidimensionality and in fact live many, many lives. At an early age you adopted the personalities and tics and habits and gestures of those closest to you. Your mother worried that you seemed too easily influenced, that you appeared not to have a strong enough sense of who you were (In actually fact she was saying that she was afraid I would never make an impact on the material world if my ego as so apparently swayed by the influence of others. She would say, “What’s the matter with you? Haven’t you got a mind of your own?”) But people like me are in fact powerful once they find their niche at least because they are not quite so trapped in their identity. I could morph, and this scared your mother, because she didn’t realise who you were any more. She identified the Mark she knew with the everyday Mark and not the soul that inhabited his body, the larger and universal energies that could take up residence within his energy field and transform him into many different people. Some of those energies were acceptable to her and others were not. But you were able to learn that you can shed your own egoic attachments when necessary- even for a little while- and can glimpse and show others something of the human’s potential to be Godlike and become anything they imagine themselves to be. In time you learned how to shed those energies once they had served their useful purpose. This is an incredibly powerful gift, and it is often really only a glimpse that is given, as if by flashes of lightning if you’re lucky, but then it is through acting you are able to gain far more access than many others, who are not able to live a life where they can connect with their own true life purpose and see it from so many different perspectives. In your case, as an actor you live many lives, inhabiting many dimensions, many hearts and minds. It is a tremendous privilege and it IS what you came to this earth to do. Teaching has been about trying to show others how to do this, but this coming year you are going back to actually doing it. You have done your time, serving others through the dense fog that is teaching and we in heaven have now seen that the time is now right for you to go back into the profession. But preparing for all of that will involve you going to college for the foreseeable future, getting training.

So then, how can you be the truly multidimensional, spiritually protean actor God intended you to be? How does one employ one’s multidimensionality in such a way that one can move freely through the many dimensions and levels of being and yet not lose touch with one’s divine spirit?
Being multidimensional from a place of wisdom and awareness: that is your chosen spiritual destiny. It is your destiny to become a fully conscious multidimensional creator with God. This is the path of the mystic.
Release the illusion of linear time and become more than just your body. Your purpose in this regard is fulfilled through acting. Do not be ashamed of this.
Acting gives you the opportunity of being consciously multidimensional.
But when you get stuck in holding limiting beliefs such as “I’m not good enough,” “That isn’t done,” “This’ll just go wrong,” etc., you sink into the illusion of separation, the earth-bound oblivion. You are trapped in the quagmire of linear time, the illusion that you are a body, the illusion that you are separate from God. In this way, the soul gets temporarily “stuck” and then in the habit of dwelling in the lower realms of creativity. Settling for less. The soul forgets about its true origins, its divine freedom... and begins to die.
Acting is your way of remebering your own divinity.
You become an aspect of God.
An actors using his higher self is not so much a person as an energy vortex or pattern with an individual flavor.
The Holy Spirit externalises and expresses aspects of Himself in this way, driven by the sheer joy of creativity.
And your Higher Self makes the CHARACTER a unique soul.
Not even God can be entirely sure of the results. I like to think this is what He craves of the actor: not to know everything he will do, but to experience something new! You become a co-creator with Him, stepping into an empty space, , a space of potentiality, a space of unending possibilities.
The actor finds out that he can create many forms and live in them. Every form you inhabit as a conscious actor has a certain angle or perspective to it which enables “unformed consciousness” to experience things in specific ways through the embodiment of the imagination.
At this very moment, there is a layer of pure divine energy inside you, a layer of pure Light. There are also layers of confusion and fear inside you. But you can choose, at any moment, to be the Light self, the angel that you are. This is not something you need to develop, it is simply a part of who you are.

You are beginning to realise you no longer need to look up to spiritual masters, guides or angels. There is not one authority above you. You yourself become God and angel.

The easiest way to get in touch with your Light self is through connecting with the layer of pure Spiritual consciousness within you. And you now know hot to do this- by becoming silent on inner and outer levels. This silence is always present within you; you only need to become aware of it.

You are what some spiritual writers would call a lightworkers, working towards a greater awareness of oneness with Spirit. You have travelled into duality a very long way in your youth, and now you can hear a voice calling you, telling you you are ready to come back Home. And Home is not a static place of bliss, but a dynamic, creative reality of divine, multidimensional life filled with joy and light.

Keep your longing and determination alive- trust that impulse, for it will bring you Home.

You are a lightworker. This is better than being a journeyman actor. It elevates you, and lifts you above the thick fog that has often surrounded you in egoism, fear, anger, weary despair and the desire to prove yourself.

Sculpt with light and feel the love!

Acting reminds you of all the levels we exist on and how they come together to create what it is to be in this miracle we call life.

King Lear (2006)

The Master Actor first teaches himself, and then teaches his audience the law of attraction the truth that the light of faith combined with the compassionate will to Love can and does move mountains.

A long blog this, but I'm buzzing at the moment

:-)