a few realizations and major denial

I realized something yesterday, at first while listening to some changes my Research prof suggested I make to my research proposal, and again while being corrected for Tzigane - I've gotten much better at accepting correction and criticism. I guess you could say I've been so used to believing I'm right (and therefore never wrong), that it gets in the way of keeping an open mind. Which explains a lot about why I have the hardest time dealing with my father, why I would get in trouble with authority figures, why I can turn my back on friends and never friend them again, why I had the hardest time deciding what to do with my thesis.

And I realized something else, too. My Research prof's criticism was enlightening - I tend to complexify things. "Complexify" is not my word, I picked it up from Junboy who was describing an ex boyfriend of mine. Actually, he was correcting said ex-boyfriend, who had just said that he liked to simplify things, "You? No way! You don't simplify things, you complexify them!" But I digress.
Anyway, when it comes to me, I realized that I was looking for a meaty problem to sink my teeth into. But the only thing that it was going to serve as an academic, scholarly paper in the Philippines would be my own gratification that I wrote such a smart, complex paper. What good, then, will it be to other people, when only I can understand it? It's mental masturbation at its finest.

I do like to make things more difficult. Could it be that I like the challenge? I have to knock myself on the head the next time I try to take on the world with my bare hands. In the movie, 28 Days (no, not 28 Days Later, just 28 Days), Sandra Bullock's character is in rehab and they hang a cardboard sign on her that says, "Confront me when I don't ask for help." That is so me, that it's uncanny.

I'm fully booked for the summer. I don't know how it happened, actually, but I'm dancing full time, teaching kids' creative movement, elementary modern and stage acting for our studio's summer workshop within the week, starting serious work on my thesis, preparing syllabi for my new other job that's supposed to kick in after summer. Quick, confront me when I don't ask for help. I think I may need a cardboard sign.

Thinking about how hectic it's going to be the next months, I'm going to milk my holy week vacation for all its worth. I would definitely like to start now.

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Tzigane update: we did the entire thing without stopping for the first time today. We've done most of it adequately well the last week but Anatoli would stop in the middle to correct something or we would be dying and he would stop so that we can catch our breaths. Today, we did it start to end. Mostly pretty good, there are some things that need work, but that's to be expected. I think if I do it everyday, I'll soon get the hang of it and do it flawlessly. Just don't ask me to perform it in front of a mass of people.

(Yes, I know performance is what all this practice is for, but I'm in denial.)