Penelope Top

Spent the better part of my lunch break reading this blog: Penelope Trunk's Brazen Careerist

And it's been a fantastic wake up call to what I have and haven't been doing lately. And one of them is not really paying attention...ie being guilty of not being conscious. Working without knowing, acting without feeling and simply going through the motions. (yes, exactly like Buffy)

I mean, I found the site by Google searching, "Penelope Top" - because I was shopping. Less than a year ago, I was spending two hours a night writing and editing blog entries. It's not that the mighty have fallen, but it's more like the mighty have taken to faceplanting into bed at 7pm.

Penelope's quote on what her blog is about:

• What I think my life is about is figuring out how to find success at the intersection of work and life—one happy, synchronized adventure. It's a difficult task, and I don't want to do it alone. My blog is a community where we all do it together. (And my company is community career management on a much larger scale.)

Part of what I feel like we're all here for is to, "know thyself". Did you know that words, "thee" and "thou" are often used in the Bible to indicate the familiarity/intimacy between God and man? And in a much larger sense - that we live to understand that there are parts of us that can touch what we refer to as God on a regular basis, but it takes practice? This is not disrespectful, it recognizes the fact that we as man created a higher power that we could relate to; why else would we?

And this knowledge calls upon us to do things that a) make us happy and b) make us feel like we are contributing members of society. After watching 'Lost' last night - it's sad but true - the revelation has come about that some of the simplest things to do in life are often the hardest, but make our lives so much more richer. Things like, "letting go" or "asking for help" or "forgiveness" can get in the way of real relationships or real connections with people. Even people that we live with, lovers we once thought knew us inside and out or people who refuse to reach beyond surface...because we all fear peeling back the layers to get to what's inside. That we'll find that they'll reflect the worst in us.

But shouldn't we revere those people? The people who are there to show us the parts of ourselves that scare us? Because here's the other thing that I've learned, when you look at the thing that scares us, really look at it - we find something inside that is so scared and unsure and fragile who is just trying to survive. And sometimes the only way it can survive is to lash out. And that doesn't excuse it, but it's also our job to understand that we all lash out. And that it's a sign that something needs to be loved and cared for more...not less.

On a personal note, I'm going to try to catch up on projects this year that have fallen by the wayside for one reason or another.

• a) Finish reading my copy of the "Tienaman Papers" and then write a first draft of my play
• b) Climb more, climb often
• c) Get my local Bay Area Theater podcast up and running. I have a whole list of people I want to guest on there. And they won't be your run of the mill folks. I want to have a stage manager forum, producers, marketing people, etc.
• d) Start to write this blog a little more comprehensively. Seriously. Like this: Don't be a snob about career advice.
• e) sky dive
• f) get my butt out to New York