Straight lines are Boring.

I am thinking a lot about the rules. I followed the rules for so long. I am just tired of it. I also have gotten to where I am by following the rules. I followed so many things just blindly and not checking the source. I just took everything any other comedian said to me as law. I applied it and lived my comedy life by it. Then I preached it to other comedians like some comedy pyramid scheme. Now there is some value in this. Rules bring certainty and certainty is nice. It feels good. We all seek certainty. The worst is when we feel like we are making the wrong choice or moving on uncertain ground, just me? Ok fine. I feel there is so much uncertainty in my life that I seek it in my activities.

“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist” Pablo Picasso.

Comedy has become a metaphor for my life. What I seek in comedy is what I seek in life. Purpose and meaning. True deep understanding of who I am. What would happen if I broke all my comedy rules? I have gotten to this point by following them, what point would I get to by doing the opposite? I do not know. Maybe I would fall, maybe I would transcend everything I have done up to this point. I am excited to try that. I am excited to try.

I was watching a documentary Beautiful Losers about a group of painters and Maragret Kilgallen said “My hand will always be imperfect because its human...I think that’s where the beauty is.” The little wobbles and imperfections, this is her favorite part. This changed things for me. I feel like with my comedy I am always seeking perfection. I want to get better but if I am having a perfect performance does it lose some of me? Do those little imperfections make it more me? The more I think on it, it’s a line. I must seek perfection to continue to improve but I must stop punishing myself for when I fall short of it. This doesn’t mean I stop practicing but if I can learn to appreciate the beauty in the imperfections, I can find the humanity in what I do.

I feel like for me it’s to keep at it. Keep getting back up when I fall. I am not going to add imperfections on purpose, I must let them happen organically. I think my journey is to practice self-love. To appreciate those imperfections and stammers and stumbles. Learn to make those stumbles beautiful. Love the stumbles, love the misspeaks.

I believe that following all the rules can only get me so far. At a certain point I must be an individual. If I am following a joke structure or a bunch of rules I lose some of me. I think that like life, comedy must be a personal journey. In life we have teachers and parents but eventually we must break away to transcend them to become who we really are. This is one of the hardest things to do in life and comedy. For me this is important. There is no exact way to do anything. There are things that will help you do it better. But at a certain point one must be themselves.

Finding my voice in comedy is finding who I am. The more I know who I am the more I know my voice. I think that you know your voice when you know exactly what you think about everything. Finding my voice is certainty. It’s when I know exactly how I feel and how to skillfully express that. A strong voice is decisive.

I’ve spent years following the rules, I am excited to let go of so many. After everything I have seen I think I’m going to break some rules. I like rules because they give me certainty, but I do better when I let go and just wing it anyway. I’ve always been someone who walks to his own drum beat, so I’m very excited to see what happens when I let go.

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Thank you for reading, You’re doing great. 

Bjorn RG.