Reverb12 Day Twenty Seven: Hidden Talents
Daily Angst again for this one.
Do you have a hidden talent? Dazzle us.
I’m a bit perplexed as well as fascinated by the concept of a “hidden” talent. What makes it hidden? How many talents are such that one sees them being utilized on an everyday basis? Or an every minute basis? Wouldn’t any “hidden” talent of mine that people witnessed in my cease at that moment to be a “hidden” talent? Does hidden mean “unexpected”, and if so, what sort of reasons might one have to expect or not expect any given person to posses a particular talent?
All of this aside, I’m not sure how dazzling I can be.
Let’s go with the off the path an not often mentioned talent, just to make this more fun.
I do an excellent Elvis Presley impression.
I don’t look like him, obvious, and I don’t dress like him. I’m not an impersonator in the traditional sense of trying to portray Elvis for parties and such things. (Though I do bust a few dance moves that are Elvis-inspired.) Mainly though, I sound quite a bit like him when I sing his music. That is at least according to virtually anyone that has heard me do so.
I’ve listened to Elvis music since I was a tiny child, and I imagine part of my ability to replicate his voice and cadence to the extent I am able is due to a lifetime of exposure. That can’t be the only thing, however, as I can’t sound like John Denver no matter how hard I try to do so, and I’ve been listening to him just as long.
Perhaps my “wiring” in the music and rhythm part of my brain is similar to that of Elvis. You can’t really sound like a person without talking at their tempo, or in this case singing. But going back to John Denver I know his rhythms as well, and can sing his music in my own voice quite well. So it’s a voice quality thing. Maybe.
But probably it’s just a “who the hell knows?” thing. Perhaps that’s why it best qualifies as a hidden talent for the purposes of this prompt. I only know that became famous for sounding like Elvis in high school. Then, after a voluntary performance of “Winter Wonderland” as the King at a college Christmas gathering, the knowledge of my hidden talent spread to more people. (Included one of my best friends who loves Elvis more than most things ever.)
After college, I became famous for the impression after singing “Blue Christmas” as Elvis at a cast party for a Christmas play I was in at a theatre. In fact, anytime I have been in a Christmas play since then, somebody seems to know about the impression, and requests a performance.
So yes. If you don’t know much about me or have just met me, a nearly “dead on” impression of Elvis’s singing voice is probably a talent that remains hidden until specific circumstances arise.
But if history is any indication, if you know me, the day will come when somehow, somewhere for some reason you’ll see me do it.
Reverb12 Day Twenty Six: Carving Out Time
How do you intend to carve out more time for the things that are the most important to you in 2013?
My daily life is an unusual one for any number of reasons, the biggest of which is probably my status as a freelance writer. Without getting into whether or not I’ve achieved as a freelance writer what I have hoped to achieve yet, I can confirm that much of my time is spent at home alone, doing various things both related to and not related to writing. (Sometimes, looking for non-writing jobs to supplement my income. But that’s another story.)
One of the more common misconceptions about my situation is that I live some kind of life of leisure because I’m home all day most days. Wrong. While I’m more in control of what I’m doing any given hour of the day than would be a person who worked at a company, I don’t lounge about every moment of every day.
I spend much of the first few hours I’m awake answering emails, researching jobs (writing or otherwise), catching up on my reading, (fiction as well as non-fiction as both are crucial to what I aspire to do), the actual writing, marketing, and any number of other things pertaining to the achievement of my career/job goals. How good I am at doing those things is not material. The fact is I dedicate time to them.
Aside from that, because I’m at home all the time, I also must dedicate specific time to domestic activities such as laundry, cleaning, picking up the place, sometimes cooking. Mowing in summertime. Shoveling a bit of snow on winter days. Grocery shopping. You know, life. I try to regiment it via “to-do” lists, and they help a great deal. But if I don’t keep moving some days, I don’t get everything done on said lists. And often what get left off are the things I simply want to do for non-career me. Or plans that are career but more long term and less tangible at present. Brainstorm and such.
At times I let myself believe that I don’t have the right to spend this hour on a short story or on editing my novel, because any given freelancer or career person would spend that hour networking, or making a query, or any number of other things the world at large would call “productive”. So I spend more of the time and energy I have on any given day trying to mark check marks on the big symbolic wall in my life called “Protestant Work Ethic.” To get done whatever things I have on my list any given day that are most closely related to straight out work. Before I know it, it’s late, and when it’s late I am usually not as well prepared to do certain things. So they are moved to the next day’s list.
I hope to sell my fiction someday. But I can’t if I don’t write it and edit it. I can’t perfect a craft that I let myself judge as extravagant, or lower on the ladder. In fact if I am ever to break into fiction as I wish to, I must make the creation oas well as the consumption of fiction a priority. Which means, in short, in order to find the time for it, I have to insist that any given hour working on the novel, finishing a short story, or reading a collection of someone else’s short stories is a solid investment of my time. The more I do those things, the better I become at writing fiction. And writing fiction, though not my career at this time, is important to me.
In short, in order to carve out more time in 2013 for the things that are most important to me, I have to grant myself the right to consider them important.
The same goes with theatre, or my exercise routine, or anything that isn’t filed under the “sweat of your brow” classification. I have the right to take the time to do those things, and more, simply because they are important to me. I don’t have to justify that to anybody anywhere. My situation and my personality are unique in many ways, but even if they were not, I shouldn’t have to justify to society how I need or want to spend my time as my life is right now.
So that is how I will carve out more time for the real things in 2013. I’ll simply allow myself the right to do so.
Reverb12 Day Twenty Five: Traditions
Do you follow old traditions or do you work to create new traditions? What role has tradition played in your life over the past year? Are there traditions you hope to create or embrace in 2013?
There are certain traditions I follow, or have tried to follow for much of my life. Many of them, (appropriately enough for day Twenty Five) have been related to the celebration of Christmas. Many of those traditions have, however, become difficult or impossible to maintain int he last few years, given the shift in the nature of my family dynamic in many ways. So while I have throughout my life tried to institute new Christmas traditions here and there, (with varying degrees of success), I have in the last few years, as pertains to Christmas given more thought to the creation of new traditions to make a part of my holiday, and that of family, going forward. Traditions that will fit into the new dynamic. At least until that dynamic changes into something else.
Yet whether it be Christmas or no, I am drawn to the idea of old traditions, though if you exclude that holiday, I can’t think of many old ones of which I am a part personally. The more I think about it, the more surprising that is to me. I am sensitive, introverted, and nostalgic. I long for a degree of stability that is at times sorely lacking in my life. As a writer and actor I often make use of symbolism, and routine is sometimes one of the things that keeps me grounded when I tend to fly (or maybe the better word if “float”) off of the tracks. Old traditions, at least of the solitary variety, should be all accounts be a part of what I do and who I am. And yet, with the exception of the previously mentioned Christmas-oriented activity, I’ve not seen old traditions take root.
That is perhaps one reason why the idea of creating new traditions appeal to me as well. The creation of something that both hearkens back to the past but appeals to and prepares for the future. A reminder for me when I am afraid of the temporary nature of existence, (something of particular concern to me lately) that things have gone on long before me, and will continue to go on long after me. And that by latching myself, and others onto traditions that I create, I am in a sense, allowing part of my essence to live on well beyond my earthly years.
The appeal of living on is not about immortality or fear of death. Rather a fear of insignificance. Fear of having not made an impact on something. By starting a new tradition that is adopted by others with me, and at some point after me, I am making a demonstrable dent in the universe.
The prompt asks me what role tradition has played for me in the last year. The answer is ironic twice over for reasons I have explained above. Despite my being drawn to the idea of timeless traditions just as much if not more so than I am drawn to starting my own successful tradition, tradition didn’t play a huge role in my life in 2012. (Unless one is to note the significance of it’s absence.) A few of the Christmas traditions have survived, and there are indications a few of the newer ones will take hold for a while. But otherwise I’ve allowed tradition to slip away in a sense in the last year.
To counteract this, I do believe I will try to establish more traditions in 2013. I’m not sure yet of the details, but I think starting a tradition, if only with myself, (though it’s more satisfying when others are involved) would do me some good.
As wood perhaps finding an old tradition and starting it up, thereby joining the many unseen brethren of the whatever who also have partaken in same said old ritual for countless years. Perhaps I could even dig into my own past and reinstate an old tradition I used to follow but have abandoned.
Yet, tradition can, and should play a greater role in my life in 2013.
(By the way, Merry Christmas, everyone. Don’t end the celebration just because it’s no longer the 25th!)
Reverb12 Day Twenty Four: New Habits
What is the single most important habit you intend to cultivate in 2013?
I can’t claim that I have given specific thought to habits for 2013. That isn’t to say I haven’t given thought to what my goals for it will be, but until this prompt showed up I hadn’t considered plans in light of establishing new positive habits.
That being said, I suppose there are certain aspects of how I am approaching 2013 that could be distilled into particular habits. Though I am still ironing out the details I’ll present a likely new “habit” for the new year.
I want to get in the habit of thinking of three approaches to any goal or task I will undertake in 2013.
I’m a firm believer in plans. I don’t fly by the seat of my pants for most things, and I’m sure I take at least twice as long as most people in similar circumstances to come to a decision and take action. I suppose I may be one to at time over-plan, if you will. My mind can conceive of about 1,000 potential obstacles on the road to a destination, and can do so faster than a lot of people can process ten. Paralysis by analysis is something of which I am quite guilty at times.
The thing is, I don’t apply that scenario-building super power to solutions as often as I do to problems. (Potential problems.) If somehow upon meeting with a road block or facing a failure I could train my mind to go into its mega-dissemination mode in pursuit of solutions, alternate routes and different perspectives on the way to achieving a specific goal, I theorize that I may well be more success more often in more aspects of my life.
This approach could take many forms. One way would be to, upon each failure come up with either three alternate methods to attain the stated goal, as well as determine three factors that contributed to the demise of the plan. Right now I tend to make an elaborate well thought out plan, consider that the lion’s share of my preliminary labor, and conclude that if after all that I still fail to achieve an objective, it wasn’t meant to be. But what if instead of doing that, the automatic response to failure or at least to road blocks was to step back and come up with those three solutions and those three reasons?
It might sound elementary to many of you, but for a man who will plan something for months, only to have it crumble in a matter of days, (which is what happens to almost all projects involving more people than myself), it could just be the sort of new habit most needed to break into the next level of getting things done.
This, I think, would be a habit well worth cultivating in 2013.
Reverb12 Day Twenty Three: Letting Go of Things
Name three excuses — stories you tell yourself that are holding you back — that you are going to let go of in 2013.
These prompts are more effective when elaborated upon. And since the prompt requires no elaboration in the answer, here are my three excuses I hope to leave behind in 2012.
1) I don’t have the money.
2) I’ve got no network.
3) I’m too eccentric.
Ty Unglebower 