The Vs. Studio Blog

“I used to tell students…the difference between poetry and you is you look in the mirror and say, “I am getting old,” but Shakespeare looks in the mirror and says, “Devouring Time, blunt thou thy lion’s paws.” -Jim Harrison, book Search For The Genuine

Lee: “…Just a sweet kinda suburban silence.”

Austin: “What kind of place was it?”

Lee: “Kinda’ place that sorta’ kills ya’ inside. Warm yellow lights. Mexican tile all around. Copper pots hangin’ over the stove. Ya’ know like they got in the magazines. Blonde people movin’ in and outa’ the rooms, talkin’ to each other. (pause) Kinda’ place you wished you sorta’ grew up in, ya’ know.” –True West by Sam Shepard

Einstein and Shakespeare
Sitting having a beer
Einstein trying to figure out the number that adds up to this
Shakespeare said, “Man it all starts with a kiss”

Einstein is scratching
Numbers on his napkin
Shakespeare said, “Man, it’s just one and one make three
Ah, that’s why it’s poetry” -Bruce Springsteen, song “Frankie Fell In Love”

The best writers really see and really feel. Especially the daily, everyday quotidian moments.

Then, they transmit what they see and feel into words that make us see things we never saw (or took for granted) and made us feel things in ways we didn’t think possible.

Speaking of great writers, read this excerpt from Pablo Neruda’s memoirs (hat tip to the wonderful Poetic Outlaws substack for providing)…

Under the volcanoes, beside the snow-capped mountains, among the huge lakes, the fragrant, the silent, the tangled Chilean forest…

My feet sink down into the dead leaves, a fragile twig crackles, the giant rauli trees rise in all their bristling height, a bird from the cold jungle passes over, flaps its wings, and stops in the sunless branches. And then, from its hideaway, it sings like an oboe…

The wild scent of the laurel, the dark scent of the boldo herb, enter my nostrils and flood my whole being… The cypress of the Guaitecas blocks my way…

This is a vertical world: a nation of birds, a plenitude of leaves…

I stumble over a rock, dig up the uncovered hollow, an enormous spider covered with red hair stares up at me, motionless, as huge as a crab… A golden carabus beetle blows its mephitic breath at me, as its brilliant rainbow disappears like lightning…

Going on, I pass through a forest of ferns much taller than I am: from their cold green eyes sixty tears splash down on my face and, behind me, their fans go on quivering for a long time… A decaying tree trunk: what a treasure!…

Black and blue mushrooms have given it ears, red parasite plants have covered it with rubies, other lazy plants have let it borrow their beards, and a snake springs out of the rotted body like a sudden breath, as if the spirit of the dead trunk were slipping away from it… Farther along, each tree stands away from its fellows…

They soar up over the carpet of the secretive forest, and the foliage of each has its own style, linear, bristling, ramulose, lanceolate, as if cut by shears moving in infinite ways…

A gorge; below, the crystal water slides over granite and jasper… A butterfly goes past, bright as a lemon, dancing between the water and the sunlight… Close by, innumerable calceolarias nod their little yellow heads in greeting…

High up, red copihues (Lapageria rosea) dangle like drops from the magic forest’s arteries…

A fox cuts through the silence like a flash, sending a shiver through the leaves, but silence is the law of the plant kingdom…

The barely audible cry of some bewildered animal far off… The piercing interruption of a hidden bird… The vegetable world keeps up its low rustle until a storm chums up all the music of the earth.

Anyone who hasn’t been in the Chilean forest doesn’t know this planet.

I have come out of that landscape, that mud, that silence, to roam, to go singing through the world.

“That was one of the best things I’ve ever seen in my life.”

It’s what we hope to feel every time we step into the theatre and see your production.

You have the opportunity to give us that. Don’t take it for granted.

Do it solely because you love it. Put your whole heart and soul into every single detail. Strive for excellence and generosity at every turn.

Go make your art.

“A brand is not a logo. A brand is a promise, a story and a shorthand. A brand tells us what to expect the next time we engage with you.” -Seth Godin

“The mission is critical. Once you lose sight of it, everything gets lost. You start doing side projects to satisfy a funder, a customer, an audience member, a board member, a town/city, or a host of other people with other missions…If you think you have a mission, and you are facing some big changes, then ignore everyone’s advice unless it’s mission critical. Unless the advice, or the potential change somehow fits your core mission, don’t do it. But, as you face those decisions remember that mission is independent of a lot of other things -you can change leadership, locations, mediums and formats – hell, what was IRL can be virtual or handled by a bot, perhaps. It might even mean painful changes, but if that is better for your mission, those are the changes you need to make.” -Brian Newman

Your mission statement is what you tell people you’re all about. (Most are too wordy, too vague or too boilerplate. Which is why no one remembers them.)

Your brand is what people actually believe you’re all about.

Hopefully the two are in alignment.

If not, go back and adjust one or both if need be.

P.S. – This excellent Seth Godin post and this newsletter from Brian Newman’s always superb and on-point, Sub-Genre.

“Attention is the most basic form of love.” -Tara Brach

“In the West there is a loneliness, which I call the leprosy of the West. In many ways, it is worse than our poor in Calcutta…We can cure physical diseases with medicine, but the only cure for loneliness, despair, and hopelessness is love. There are many in the world who are dying for a piece of bread but there are many more dying for a little love.” -Mother Teresa

“A Rabbit Noticed My Condition” by St. John of the Cross

I was sad one day and went for a walk;
I sat in a field.

A rabbit noticed my condition and
came near.

It often does not take more than that to help at times-

to just be close to creatures who
are so full of knowing,
so full of love
that they don’t
-chat,

they just gaze with
their
marvelous understanding.

Anywhere and everywhere you can, help people feel a little less lonely.

It’s not that hard. Start by noticing them. Give them your full, undivided attention. This is love.

Let’s give ’em something to talk about
Let’s give ’em something to talk about
Let’s give ’em something to talk about
How about love? -song, “Let’s Give Them Something To Talk About” by Bonnie Raitt

“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.” -Teddy Roosevelt, excerpt from his “The Man In The Arena” speech

After the play, on the drive home, they might talk about how great the production was and how great you were in it.

Or, they might also talk about how bad it was and how bad you were in it. They may even have a good laugh at your expense. That’s their prerogative as an audience member.

Either way, just remember, you were the brave one. You were the one out there on that stage, in that arena, taking a risk, putting it all out there.

You were the one who gave them something to talk about.

Go make your art.

“How short-lived the praiser and praised, the one who remembers and the remembered. Remembered in some corner of these parts, and even there not in the same way by all, or even by one. And the whole earth is but a mere speck.” -Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

When you seek praise, even if you get it, the praise will never live up to your imagination or expectation.

When you don’t seek praise and instead focus solely on doing the work for the work itself, you might get it anyway. And if you do, because you didn’t expect it, the praise you get will be better than you could’ve ever imagined.

“Show me the incentive, and I will show you the outcome.” -Charlie Munger

“Incentives: the most powerful force in the world. When the incentives are crazy, the behavior is crazy. People can be lead to justify and defend nearly anything.” -Morgan Housel, book Same As Ever: Timeless Lessons on Risk, Opportunity and Living a Good Life

“Incentives matter…People respond to incentives, not to mandates or regulations.” -Gary Becker

Before you “follow the money” as Deep Throat advised Bob Woodward in All The President’s Men, you should first, follow the incentive. You’ll then get to the money.

Nations, communities, companies, organizations and individuals, whether they are aware of it or not, are ruled by their incentives.

If you want to change the outcome, change the incentive.

P.S. – This FS article.

“Dance like nobody is watching; love like you’ve never been hurt. Sing like nobody’s listening; live like it’s heaven on earth.” -Mark Twain

Consistently making deadlines that others set for you (i.e. for your job) is a very important quality. It shows you’re reliable. You can be counted on to come through.

Consistently making deadlines that only you set for yourself. When no one is watching. Where nobody cares if you do or don’t come through. Where the only person you have to answer to is you…That’s next level.

P.S. – Hat tip to my friend Robin for inspiring this post.

“Ease is a greater threat to progress than hardship.” -Denzel Washington

“A blazing fire makes flame and brightness out of everything that is thrown into it.” -Marcus Aurelius

“We don’t rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training.” -Archilochus

“A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor.” –Franklin D. Roosevelt

The trials you face today will lead to your training. Be grateful for them.

The trials you face in the future will test the level and quality of your past training. They will reveal if there’s more or different work to be done. Be grateful for them.

Most highly successful people will underestimate how hard they worked at the beginning of their careers.

Just like it takes an enormous amount of escape velocity to get a rocket to leave the earth’s atmosphere, the same holds true for any passion project, let alone building a career.

Putting luck and circumstances aside, it takes a monumental amount of effort, you will make a ton of mistakes, have a lot of self doubt, and there is no guarantee you will make it to your intended destination.

It’s hard to remember that when you’re now floating in orbit.