A new colleague loves to use theatre as a back drop for describing the importance of vocational discernment in the lives of college students. In As You Like it Shakespeare has Jacques say “all the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players; They have their entrances and exits, and one man in his time plays many parts”. I began to play with that notion and there is some truth to be had in these words.
I have played many roles in this life of mine. Some really great starring roles and some as a mere extra in the background. But here is the question I ask myself: why have I not always played a starring role in my own life? I don’t mean that in everything I have to be the star, it is okay to be a supporting cast member to many other good people and I hope a bunch of people would say that I have been. No, what I am getting at is that too many times I have settled for a meaningless role in whatever I was doing in my life. As, I reflect on that I begin to realize that most often it was out of fear and shame. Fear of failure and shame because I have too long believed that I have never been good enough.
So, I think of my students. They come to me, so many of them, from very difficult places, from plays where they can never be the star, never hope even to be noticed. They come to me and I have to teach them how to write a new play for their lives and become the star. They are like me, afraid, ashamed, and feeling unworthy. I have thought a lot about this, why students stay in bed, avoid classes, and generally set themselves up to fail. I was them a bunch of years ago, ashamed to be who I knew in my heart I could be. Terrified and convinced, sadly by many ministers, that I should not be the star of anything and that I was a sinful and unworthy person and, to use a phrase my students will relate to, “who should know his place”. Is that not sad? That ministers in many places preach condemnation and fear of hell to make people behave?
As a Christian mystic, I have learned that the Eternal loves each of us deeply and personally. The Eternal wants me on center stage in my life, playing the lead in a mystery of joy, pain, love, hurt…….LIFE! I think my students need to know this, that they are called to love and be loved by the Eternal. They can and should star in their own play. And me? I need to learn how to be a really good director and producer. My job, my joy is to help them see themselves the way the Eternal sees them: precious, joyous souls with nearly unlimited potential. Stars every one of them.
And what of you? Are you starring in the play of your life? And if you are a parent, friend, lover, spouse, grandparent are you helping all those you love to be a star? And if you are part of a spiritual community are you helping that family to star in their own plays? We have the greatest acting Coach in the universe and it is a true love story.
TMM