Attachment to Roles and Acceptation of Limits

We have heard that change is good although difficult, and we often hesitate to make changes because we prefer our comfort and security. But life shows us that if we get too attached to our comforts, our comforts can turn into bad habits.

I never used to think about change in a good or bad way but I did have difficulty with the concept of attachment and mostly detachment. I've never been attached to things or material acquisitions, nor have I been attached to substances that alter my reality. In fact, the less things I have the happier I am, and the more I am present in life the better I feel.

Those are just a couple of ways we develop habits that can limit the joy and freedom in our lives. Another difficult attachment for many is to people and affection. Attachments, habits and addictions are many but we don't often speak of attachment to roles.

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When I was in my early 20's I moved to New York City to study acting at the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute and at New York University where I ended getting my (very expensive albeit useless degree thank you dad and I'm sorry) Bachelor's Degree. The parentheses actually serves to explain this blog further, for I learned something in those early days of real life living (I had just moved out of my parents home) that would be one of the biggest disappointments in my life and ultimately, the biggest lesson in "how to live in this world successfully but with less joy."

I had no problems getting work and manifesting what I needed even though I was unaware of my inner power. I attracted what I wanted most of the time and saw no reason not to succeed in my chosen field of work. In fact, the art world was my biggest passion, it was everything I ever dreamed of and studying in NYC with some great teachers (including Ellen Burstyn of the Actors Studio) was nothing short of many dreams coming true. However, when I started doing an internship at a well-known talent agency working with a successful agent I started to see how "the other side" thinks - the non artists or the suits interested in the almighty dollar.

I wanted so badly to be a client after my internship and although they were business people, they weren't hard or snobby but very kind and they really liked me and were also looking forward to including me in their roster. So when the agent I was working for started sending me out on auditions reality started to set in for me. The roles I was being sent on were shallow and limiting to my scope of thinking. When I asked my agent why she was sending me on these roles, she said because that's what she saw in me. So I asked her about other possibilities, other types of roles to which she answered, "you can only play these roles."

It was a shock to me as I always thought of the art world as open-minded and free-thinking. I lost most of the respect I had for the acting world that day and I knew my agent wasn't the only one who was caught up in that kind of thinking. My soul had started a slow earthly death thanks to the 3D limitations on this planet, whereupon we are judged by our physical costume and not by our inner spirit. To make things worse, I could not complain since I was considered pretty and had a certain extra something over other less attractive actresses. I accepted it, but I didn't buy into it.

I learned to live with my disappointment and went on to work as an actress for 16 years. Then when I decided to change my life and my job I basically was saying, "you are now creating a new identity for yourself." That self was to become my real self and not the limited self that was imposed on me by show business.

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It was not easy to find out who that real self was after so many years of trying to please the limitations of the film and theater business (and let's not forget society!). I had to turn back the clock and meditate deeply on the spirit that once was fearless and limitless. While I was an actress I changed looks very often in order to satisfy this inner freedom I felt, but it didn't really get me any more jobs and therefore, was useless in the world of show business.You had to play one role all the time. Being pigeonholed gives people a false sense of security that makes them think they know who you are. Change is very threatening!

But having to deal with limits has taught me a lot about control and ego. I have observed many unhappy people wondering what it was that made them unhappy, whilst observing if they were so attached to their so-called role that they felt trapped and unable to explore their inner spirit. Many times I think obligations become heavy and intolerable because we are attached to a role we have accepted and bought into.

I continue to change roles and I do so without any fears. Recently I told my boyfriend, "you fell in love with an English teacher (and ex-actress city dweller) and found out she was a Yoga teacher and spiritual thinker. Now you are discovering the country girl." And he said, "I won't get bored I guess."

When I stopped teaching Yoga in January so I could focus on my retreat center in the countryside of Alghero, I encountered a lot of surprise and bewilderment. It was very difficult for many people to understand how I could "just leave" and move on without a tear. I wondered, "how can you allow yourselves to be so limited?"

When I lived in Los Angeles I remember fellow yogis laughing about George Bush (for reasons other than the obvious) saying, "he thinks he's president of the United States." Basically, what they were saying was, "he has forgotten who he really is." So when I tell my students, "I'm not a yoga teacher," they look at me like I'm nuts but I explain to them, "I am expressing my soul through the practice of yoga, but I am not just a yoga teacher, I am many things." This releases the projection I feel that traps me into a role. Role playing is necessary but if we take them too seriously we will develop an ego around that role even as yogis. Certain roles also have more power than others, but in yoga we teach to empower others not to take away their power so it is even more so important to keep a little distance from identifying too closely with the role.

I have two brothers and I was raised in a paternal family where the men thought that power was their birthright. Unfortunately, with little spirituality power tends to be misused and everybody suffers, be it the men or the women. So there was some of the infamous penis envy that was based on double standards between the boys and the girls. Being a girl I felt an injustice and did not like it one bit. When I was about 13 years old I started to wear leather ties. Of course they were fashionable at the time but I liked them because they gave me a way to keep my power by wearing what was considered mens clothing. I went on to borrow my dad's ties and thought I was being very clever and innovative. Well, my mom thought I was revealing something horrendous and feared I was a lesbian regardless of how boy crazy I was at the time. Role playing will always reveal  more about other people than you'd imagine! All the pink my mother made me wear when I was a child did nothing but turn me off of pink because I could sense it was a projection of her own ideas of what a girl should wear.

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Today I love pink. I admit stripes also repulsed me when I was little and when I thought about it later they reminded me of the old jailhouse clothing prisoners used to wear. The unconscious knows when its being strapped into a role to fit society's expectations and ultimately, limiting creativity, breath and space for the soul to express itself.

Attachment, as Buddha clearly explained, is the root of all suffering. But attachment is a continual study (Svadhyaya- self study) that can help us understand the Self  that is free rather than the self that is imprisoned in a role. Women change their hair styles and hair color and men change their cars to get out of a rut. Even on a superficial level, such changes can help us explore ourselves in small ways. (Unless they become a habit). But the real revolution within occurs when we accept that our limited roles were not meant to be for life but to find out who we really are.

Those who have limited the unlimited Self have committed suicide by putting on such limitations.   Sri Ramana Maharshi

Namastè.