After reviewing my interview with Kate West, quite a few things came up for me: 1) weighing the pros and cons of being spontaneous, 2) my current method of dealing with perceived judgements from other people, 3) fulfilling needs, and 4) having more confidence holding a pen rather than a microphone.
Kate mentioned how she was always jumping into new adventures and “doing all these crazy things”, as she said. I feel like one could argue the other side as well: perhaps not enough people jump into any adventures. Is there anything inherently good or bad about either tendency? I suppose that maybe for Kate, she felt she was trying to escape a sort of existential crisis, and she realized she needed to slow down to really focus on her relationship with herself. It sounds like she’s still actively traveling and doing fun things, though, so if there were any negative connotations around that part of herself it didn’t completely stop her from doing spontaneous things!
Another thing Kate mentioned was not getting caught up in other people’s opinions. What I’m trying in my own life right now is to let people have their judgements—or rather, allow myself to believe people have judgements about me, and to let myself not put that in the forefront of my mind. That kind of focusing on negativity doesn’t really allow for the kind of attitude that I need to get done the stuff I want to get done. Of course, I still get caught up in perceived judgements sometimes, particularly with acquaintances, or people I care about but don’t really know very well. I just try to not dwell.
I found it interesting how Kate said acting fulfilled her need to be adored, but she can find that in other ways. I like how she didn’t just pretend that that wasn’t a need. That kind of ownership of needs felt very empowering.
It was funny how Kate said she thinks through her fingers, and is better at writing than debating. I am exactly the same way—I’m more of a writer than an on-the-spot thinker. I’m literally reading from a script that I wrote right now. Perhaps with more experience I will try to get away from the script, just to challenge myself a bit. But… You gotta start somewhere, right?
Wise Not Withered 