What has meaning to you? Anzac Day?

One element of the Meisner Technique that is tricky to teach is called emotional preparation (which I am not going to explain here). When introducing this acting tool I ask actors to think about and write up a list of the things that have meaning to them.

I say 'go to an area of meaning for you.....'

And invariably I stop there as the expressions on most of the faces before me clearly have no idea what I am talking about.

And so I'll say 'think about what has meaning for you......'

And still confusion.  Yes I realise I am using a bit of jargon. I am also dealing with the evidence that many of us are blindly navigating our way in the world without fully experiencing each moment. It's only when the big things happen that we discover what matters to us most.

This is the thing - what matters to you PLUS your imagination is an integral part of the acting process. This will be your fuel as an actor  (and the fuel to any creative). You need to feel your choices in your gut. Working from your head and in a purely intellectual way doesn't cut it in my opinion.

So what has Anzac Day got to do with this?

Today is a day of national and historical significance. For some they have a deep understanding and personal association with this day. For many it is a great day for the game of AFL and for others it's simply a public holiday and a long weekend opportunity to look forward to. So I ask you 'what does it mean to you?' Do you have an intellectual, socialised or politically correct understanding of this day?  Or do you feel emotionally moved by this day?

When you think about Anzac Day what do you feel?  Does your body react in someway? If it doesn't then I suggest you have an intellectual understanding and that's it. I am suggesting that it doesn't have a 'real' meaning to you - not one that will move you into creativity. And why is this important?  It is the key to authentic performance. Everyday, every moment offers you the opportunity to discover what has real emotional meaning to you versus the socially acceptable response that's from your head.

Please know that I am not having this discussion to diminish the importance of Anzac Day in anyway. I am using it to illustrate the difference between an intellectual understanding and a gut meaning.

So what about me?  I could list a number of head responses but nothing really moves me about this day until I see this

And something in me is moved. Both happiness and sadness is awoken. Aren't these women simply amazing?!  There they are sitting outside a supermarket in the freezing cold giving service.  I can never walk past ladies like these without buying something. Yet I do not stop and chat - even though a part of me wants desperately to connect with these women - because I am afraid of the depths of what I might feel. Just look at those faces. Etched with their life story. And gloriously old. Yes they are old and still living among us! 

And more of my truth is revealed. I look at them and wonder.....

what would it be like if my grandmother was still alive today? How can I still miss her so much?  

And I arrive at my emotional truth - the real meaning I feel for Anzac Day. This and my imagination fuel me and I feel incredibly moved. 

Breathe. 

So I ask you to please share your emotional meaning of Anzac Day. And consider that what you THINK has meaning for you may have no meaning at all.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;

Age shall not weary them, not the years condemn;

At the going down of the sun and in the morning

We will remember them.                                               For the Fallen - Laurence Binyon