Learning Something New

One of the top resolutions is to learn something new.  

Being a perpetual student, I just love to learn. Taking take a hiatus from formal learning every few years, I find myself back in the school environment. This year I started a life enrichment course and thought you might enjoy my journal entry on the return to school. Post comments if you want more stories like these. Hope you are all doing well with your resolutions!

The fog thickened as my car wound its way through the back roads towards Valley Forge Christian College. Just this morning I opened an e-mail announcing life extension courses available to adults and within five short hours I was signed up to take an acting class. The school staff was over accommodating and nothing could be easier than the sign-up process. Within 15 minutes I was a student again armed with campus map and a parking pass. 

For years I have thought acting would be an interesting topic to learn since I love learning about humanity. Acting in a way studies this and I hoped that I could gain some greater insight to the human heart and some motivations.

I arrived at the theater with the doors locked and a eerie misty fog enclosing the night. I have been on city campuses where a single gal standing out in the dark was not a good idea and the fog just made the feeling of isolation a bit more intense. My mind was being filled with a girlfriend who was strangled to death a few rooms from where I was working as a freshman in college some 30 years ago, a thought I hadn't had for ages, perhaps it was because the murder took place right outside the theater. This was not the city and there is very little crime out in this area. Just shake it off, Linda!!!

I started to wonder what I got myself into. Was this lock out a sign I should go home? What was I doing going back to school again anyway? I have six degrees, one would argue six degrees of craziness ... OK, give it a minute. Fortunately, in a matter of a few minutes, a the guard came to rescue me from my own thoughts as he opened the locked doors.

Everyone else was assembled since I was coming in late from a previous meeting I could not skip. They all greeted me with openly with a big "Hi Linda." After going through the syllabus in electronic format we started the class. I introduced myself and learned I was the oldest one in the class even older than the teacher. It definitely made me feel like it was time to chase the gray from my hair again.

The teacher had a high energy and it was apparent she loved teaching. There were about 15 young adults whom I may affectionately reference as kids in the class. We started with some relaxation exercises, went into playing like a child to help us let go and get into roles and them moved into our initial acting activity. 

Some of the play was quite active, especially since I am recovering from an injury. I find I feel extra old not being able to get up and down as I could usually do when not injured ... But that was kind of fun to feel the age thing. I also realized I have a bit of learning gap since I didn't understand some of the references to games and characters. I gathered one character was a current TV actor or popular music personality.

But that was fine. I just got a chance to watch what the others were doing and found they are a bit conservative at least in this beginning stage of the class. There were some sounds associated with the games, but most didn't speak out—it reminded me of some training as a metaphysican where you need to make sounds, it took most of us older folks a few times before we got the hang of being vocal. I didn't want to overwhelm the class with my sounds ... so I kept most of the sounds to myself.

The other thing I noticed was there was a separation of girls and boys that seemed to naturally occur. I notice this happening all over the place, even in my business meetings with much older people. Being raised with brothers and working in a man's industry for more than 20 years this is odd, since I usually gravitate towards guy topics based on my experiential training. It made me curious about the many years of equality efforts expressed by women of past generations and yet we still separate ourselves out when we come into commingled groups. I could see our grandmothers shaking their heads.

The acting portion was to sing "Amazing Grace" and act it out. The teacher gave us some instruction to invoke feelings. I had a lot of fun with this. The first issue I had was the stage lights beaming in my face. I couldn't see the audience and all my previous stage work has been lectures where you identify with at least a few in the audience to make sure you keep connection. This was like speaking to lights. I don't know how that will be in the future, but it was very odd indeed. I had to cover out the lights just to see where the observers were siting to feel comfortable. 

In the end it was a very lonely conversation, not feeling the connection to the audience but doing the work with a different type of connection, perhaps an inner connection to self or one to God. I had to basically get over the fact I can't see any faces.

The interesting thing for me was the topic grace. I've been trying to figure out the deeper context of God's grace. I tend to equate it to God's love. I wanted to understand the concept of Grace compared to Love. I've been praying about it the last couple of days. And just like normal, the Spirit finds a way to help me get it. He happened to use this class to do so.

I left the class refreshed with a few new friends found in my classmates. Did I make a mistake? No, this is the perfect thing to stretch my mind and my heart.

Linda Bender is a metaphysical doctor trained as a medical intuitive. She uses over 20 life coaching and touch therapy techniques from Reiki to personal training to help you reduce stress and pain so your body invokes its natural healing ability. She is at on Church Street in Phoenixville. See www.BenderHealing.com or call 800-706-1354 for more information.