Being Authentic Not Perfect

Many people in my profession urge me to be authentic more so than perfect. Perfection is overrated and in the end will drive one crazy. Bob Ross even talked about overdoing a painting or being a "mud-mixer." That's when you put so much paint on your painting in one spot that instead of looking like a happy tree or stream,  it looks more like the home of a pig in slop. Sometimes when we muddy the waters of our lives with our thoughts we can feel like a pig in slop. Time for someone to break out the water hose to clean our minds out. 

Most of my life I was in plays and worked in Theater more than film. I majored in Theater Arts with a minor in Communication Arts. As one of my required classes, I remember editing an  old reel to reel tape in 1984 for an audio production class at Appalachian State University. Other than that, I had never edited a film. Thank goodness for today's technology because it's so much easier. But not really if you are a perfectionist like me. See I edited the I'm Your Mum pilot so many times based on what I thought people wanted to see, not by what was in my heart. It is ten times better than it was; however, the anguish of saying to myself after every rendering things like, "The sound here needs fixing," or "It's too short here," or "I included Michael's mom in the shot!" drove me crazy. Thank goodness I got it to where I could accept the imperfections of it and there were no obvious mistakes an audience member could pick out. Well I've not premiered it yet lol. 

So now that we got that out of the way let's try to tackle this Authentic issue. People will tell you to "be real, be yourself," but when you do,  some people get angry because you're not who they envisioned or expected or wanted. I've always known who I am and what I am. But see sometimes when we grow up, we're told "oh hell no!' "You aint gonna live like that here!" "Don't be bringing that weird ass shite up in here!"  Well, if my son had been a satanic devil worshiper then I would tend to agree. "No Satanic worship services here."

Someone at my job years ago took a look at the original I'm Your Mum demo reel and said it was uncomfortable to watch. He said, "it should be call I'm Your Dad because you look like a man in a wig." Then he said, "well, actually, you are a man in a wig." A couple of days later, I had a stalker from a dating website comment on all my YouTube videos and said that, "if a bloke ever got him naked and at home the guy would be in for a rude awakening." He also commented that my British accent was atrocious in I'm Your Mum and that Britain didn't want me. He said If I came to the UK, the UK would send me back. That's why nobody can comment on my videos. I've contacted YouTube and they won't do anything about it. Oh well. He's a guy I met on a British Dating website who was military personnel, not anybody from my Twitter or Instagram accounts.  It hurt because he pre-judged me before he got to know me. I think we all do that at times and we should take note of it. 

So let me set the record straight. Let me be as transparent as possible because there is a purple elephant in the room and it needs to be dealt with. Let me be as real & authentic as I can....(pause) It's none of anybodies damn business! I don't need to explain myself period. If people can't accept me as I am then...well you know the word I want to use. However, for the purposes of casting directors & filmmakers.... I'm a female in every way...well I do need breast enhancement, but other than that I can say this with 100% accuracy. No surprises here. 

So there it is. We need to quit telling people to be themselves. They know who they are. They just need us to back them up every once and a while letting them know we all care. That could be on social media and in public. It shouldn't matter who you love, what you look like or what language you speak or where you come from. We all matter we all count. This is the message of I'm Your Mum. It should be a universal theme and we should all live by it. 
Sile