Today’s meeting of Company was the last for the 2015/16 school year – or a group that I will remember as Company I. After warming up, the bulk of our time was sitting in a large circle in the Blackbox and “checking in.” Normally, this process takes only a few minutes as students take a quick inventory of their world and shape it into a sentence or two. Today was different. Today we made “Checking In” the main event. We worked through all the seniors in the group and asked that they account for two things in their talk: 1.) Where were they as an artist? and 2.) Where were they as a journeyman? – – having traveled through 12 years of schooling and facing a new road ahead.
It was a very honest sharing that brought our group even closer. At the end of the student’s sharing, I opened the floor up to a few others who might like to add words to the student in the center. And, to hold myself more to the process, I too added a few words from my heart as to where the student “IS” and what I have witnessed in their journey. In that I am normally behind the circle, this was a risk to put myself IN the process. Time will tell on this decision.