It sounds like you just want to be an actor.

I am a very ambitious person. I want to do many things with my life. I want to be rich enough to be considered a philanthropist. I want to perform in ridiculously expensive musicals in huge union houses that require true triple threat clout and star power. I want to snatch a seat in Congress and sponsor legislation that helps people who don't know what they can do to make their lives better. I want to travel. I want to write great books. I want to do great things. I want to be great things. I want I want I want. I want to be more than I am. My goals are lofty and childish and largely incompatible. Presumably, I would find more success if I focused on one thing, but it's hard to say if sticking to that one thing would leave me most fulfilled.

As the ticking on my biological clock becomes more and more ominous, the prospect of what I'll be when I grow up becomes more a fear than a hope. I knew I wanted to be an actress when I was six and I've more rejections than marks on my resume. I decided I would be a writer when I was seven and it's all I can do to beat out a coherent blog post. I haven't given up yet, but who's to say that, ten or twelve years from now, that decision will still be up to me? It's a staggering foretaste that my wanting too much will be the principle means of my acquiring so little. Because fear is so often my primary motivator, it's no surprise that my thoughts have steered toward what my principle occupation would be if it came to that.

There were times when, while I was working with one of my tutoring charges or trying to calm a large group of kids, I would think, "I can do this. I could spend the majority of my time doing this if I had to." I've found that I would be "okay" with being a teacher; sharing what I know with eager young whippersnappers on a daily basis and gaining insight into the progress of human nature. I've always been able to see myself in a courtroom. I love the theatrics of the court and relish the opportunity to make a case; to make a difference. I could be a lawyer and make barrels of money fighting or a go into politics and do pretty much the same thing, with a little pandering every four to six years. I could be...could I be a writer? When I was in single digits there was not question, but ever since my junior year in high school I've found myself doubting every time I put pen to paper. Maybe writing will only ever be something I like to do on the side. (But what good is writing if no one reads what you put out? This will require further reflection on another day.) Between my passion for the performing arts and my left-brained disposition, I could totally do theatre. Sure, performing depends on making directors and producers like you, but there's always stage managing and teching and administrative work. I could probably see to it that whatever I do serves theatre in some way. If I look at the things I would like to do, I would like to do them regardless of whether I can do something else. But if I look at the things I have to do...it gets tricky.

For the whole of my theatre education, it's been stressed to me how important it is to be able to do something besides act. Actors get famous, but techies get paid. Actors might not get a part for superficial reasons, but a stage manager's not going to be rejected for having the wrong look or age. It isn't sensible for an actor to be just one thing. Now all of a sudden, it seems it would serve me better to choose. I spoke about how musical theatre is my favorite in a talk with our guest director and, following my explanation, he responded that, "it sounds like you just want to be an actor." He ignored my earlier protestation that I love all aspects of theatre and continued to assure us as he went around the room that the other stuff would come. It was in our best interest, according to him, to find that one thing we wanted to do and do it. This was the thing I took from that workshop. Our teacher charged us before we began to find what came to us in this time that we could use immediately. His revelation came at my like a freight train, but it's been months and I still don't know what to do with it.

"I want to be an actor" makes so much more sense to me than "I just want to be an actor". I don't want to be "just" anything. Bill Gates isn't "just" the founder of Microsoft. Donald Trump isn't "just" a douchebag. People don't find success by deciding that they can only do one thing by not doing anything else. What would happen if I just majored in philosophy and just went to law school and just occasionally did theatre stuff when I found the time? What would happen if I just did my shows and sang my songs and auditioned all the time and just got a day job? What would happen if I just went to work for my mother and just moved up the ranks through leasing and just let my aspirations stop at Candler Road?

I would probably survive. I would probably be just fine. But it would definitely not be enough. I would not be enough. I really don't know how to live without somehow pursuing everything of significance to me. I don't want to survive. I want to live!