Talking Therapy - Making It Up as You Go With Jen DeHaan

Transcript

Welcome to the Art Against Mental Illness podcast. My name is Alex Loveless and this is my podcast about the healing powers of art for artists, art lovers, the art curious and anyone with an interest in mental health and well-being. Hello everyone, welcome back. I’m here today with Jen. We met when I put a call out on Blue Sky. This is the first time we’ve actually spoken to each other but Jen kindly responded and agreed to an interview and so here we are. So you’re about to find out about Jen at the same time as me. Jen, over to you. Nice to meet you. Welcome. Nice to meet you. Oh, thank you so much Alex. So nice to meet you. I’m glad we connected on Blue Sky. So my name is Jen DeHaan. I am located in Canada. I live off the west coast on Vancouver Island which is a giant island and it’s where I grew up as well. My artistic background is I actually started off in the arts. I was drawing. I went to and got a BFA in sort of adult education in the arts but I was allowed to take anything. So I did a lot of painting, a lot of drawing, all that kind of thing and then I went to Vancouver Film School and did digital art because I really got into using computers to do art in the 90s. So I went to Vancouver Film School, finished that up, ended up in tech and did graphic design, video, audio, all that sort of thing. Basically the Adobe Creative Suite. I worked on it and worked on all those different products. Left, got into sewing. I got into performance. I did dance fitness. I did vaudeville. So really got into the creative performance stuff and I’ve continued that in a digital sense doing comedy and improv and that sort of thing. Right now I’m continuing to sort of merge all those things, the tech stuff and the performance comedy stuff together and writing and so on and that’s what I do now. That’s amazing. So you’ve done a bit of everything by the sound of it but I guess more generally performance art but comedy, improv, all the interviews I’ve done so far with visual artists. So I was really keen to have someone on representing something different and I didn’t have anything in mind for that but improv was not anywhere near the front of my mind. So I was actually quite… It’s not in the front of many people’s minds. Exactly. Interesting. So do you want to tell us what you mean by improv? I mean I know, I’ve watched Who’s Line, is there any way? And I know about improv, you know, jazz improv and I improv on the guitar a bit and so on but do you want to tell us what it is from your perspective? Absolutely. So improv comedy, I mean you can do it in a lot of different spaces. So Who’s Line is a lot of people’s, my entry point to improv I guess in the 80s probably. I started with the UK version and so that’s one example of improv. It’s sort of improv games, it’s often referred to as short form, sort of another, theater sports is another sort of format of that. So there’s that short form game. The style that I do is called long form. So it’s more, it can be serious dramatic, it can be comedic and you’re basically putting together a whole story as a collection of scenes. So it’s a lot more, it’s scenic in nature as opposed to game form. So improv, you’re just, you’re sort of, you’re obviously, you’re improvising, you’re speaking off the cuff, you’re listening, active listening is a big part of it, you’re listening to your scene partners. They’re giving you what we call offers. They offer something and we build upon that offer, add to the story and make sort of a scene or a story together. So it’s very much a team sport and a lot of aspects. However, you can also do it on your own. I do a lot of solo improv, improv on my own and that can be audio podcasts, it can be short web videos. So there’s a lot of, a lot of flexibility in what improv can actually be sort of, and that’s the creative art aspect that I guess I love about it. Yeah, I love that. And I think I don’t, I do a fair amount of sort of artwork that I don’t, well, I don’t plan a lot of my artwork actually. And funnily enough, the way you talk about it, you know, I guess I’m improving. I certainly improv guitar because I can’t, I just cannot be bothered to learn anything. So I just start whittling away. So are you doing this in front of an audience? I’m not doing it on stage, live on stage right now. I’m isolated. I’m basically, I have a parent that I care give for. So I don’t really go out in big groups anymore because I’m sort of keeping them safe from, from germs and all that kind of thing. So, so I’m doing everything digitally, everything online at this time. So podcasts, web videos, that sort of thing. So you’re doing things online with other people? Yes. Yeah, that’s where I started doing my improv. I started doing stage performance prior to becoming a fully digital entity, I guess. But I started learning improv online with, with groups of other people. And we zoom and we turn on and off our camera and that kind of thing. And, and I’ve sort of moved more into the podcast sense. So doing a lot of audio improv, which there’s a quite a significant history of that through shows like Comedy Bang Bang is a large scale example of podcast based improvisation. I haven’t heard of that. I would check it out. So when you start an improv session, presumably some sort of direction. Yeah. So improv, even though we’re just sort of making it up as we go, has a lot of, I guess, guardrails or rules associated with it. So when I started, I started off just going to free online jams, which is just where we get together. I started off doing the whose line is it anyways, style of improv, where we just do short games. You can drop in, you can have never done improv before. They’ll teach you the game in the moment. Say these are, these are the guidelines, either the rules of the game, kind of like they do on whose line and you just go ahead and you try it out and you just see what happens. So that’s, that was my first point. But then I really, I got into it. I really enjoyed it. So I wanted to learn how to do it. So I started taking classes. There’s classes you can take online where they step through and say, what is yes and what is an offer? What do you do when someone offers you a thing? What do you do with it? And how do you add to a scene and what is a scene structure kind of like? And what’s a game like? What’s the, how do you figure out what the game is? All those things you learn in improv schools. So I went to improv school for a while. I learned that. And then you can drop into these jams. You can know a little bit more. You can start improvising with teams. We all know the sort of the same language. And you can start making sort of shows and stuff like that. So that, that’s one way. You can just go into the jams, not know anything, kind of learn and play along, or you can learn sort of the structure and rules around it and do more basically. Can you give me an example of a scenario that you would use to start on improv? Sure. So there’s an initiation. So when you’re starting off a scene, and I’m talking more about the long form, scenic form of improv, not sort of whose line, but what, what you do at the beginning of the scene is you take a suggestion. So somebody gives you a Douglas fir tree. I just looked out my window, Douglas fir tree, and then that will inspire you. You’ll, you don’t have to make the scene about a Douglas fir tree, but that’s going to be your inspiration for the scene. So what does that tree make you think of? Oh, that tree makes me think of living in the forest. Maybe I live in a bunker or something. So maybe the scene is set in a bunker inside the forest. And so then you give an initiation to your scene partner. And I’d be like, Oh, this, this bunker is, you know, looking a little bit dirty, or it could just be like, Oh, you know, it’s a nice morning to drink a cup of coffee outside the bunker, whatever it is, you know, you’re just sort of initiated into the scene partner. So it might show them a bit how you got to that, that, that word that you’re given. And then they’ll just sort of start adding to the scene. And you build that initiation, that initiation into what’s called a base reality, you’re sort of learning what the who the what and the where is. And you’re doing that at the top of the scene. So you’re just kind of forming that, that idea of a world, right? And then after you sort of know who you are, what you’re doing, that kind of thing, what’s your relationship, maybe to each other, maybe we’re a brother and a sister, outside our bunker early in the morning, whatever. And then you’re going to look for what’s that kind of interesting part of the scene has anything what’s coming up, that’s just kind of interesting about the scene. And that might form into what’s called the game of the scene. This is one type of improv that I do specifically, there’s many other types, but we’re finding out what can we play with that will make it interesting to an audience. So then we’ll work together to make that game and do what’s called heightening that game. So then we’re going to make that game more and more interesting, hopefully more funny, if we’re doing our job right. And then we’ll get to the point of the scene, something big happens, and then the scene will be done. Or we’ll continue on in another related scene and build it into a set of scenes that make a full sort of show or story. And so how long does a show strike story go on for? A typical scene, there’s many different forms, but the kind of that I’ve done the most of a scene might be two or three minutes, sort of an average, they can go longer or even be really short. But sort of an average scene is about two and a half minutes. And you might have a collection of those shows can range from 20 minutes to a full hour, or even sometimes longer. But yeah, there’s a range in there. But usually when you have a show, you’ll have an idea about how long is this show going to be? Is it 20 minutes? Is it 45? And your form will probably adjust for that, whatever, whatever you’ve chosen. That’s amazing. It blows my mind that you can do this. Although I guess, all the while you’re talking, I’m sort of thinking about it going, well, I guess I’m improvising right now. As we agreed before, when we were talking before this, I just wing it. And so I am improvising. So I guess I do understand. And I think one thing that I find with doing that, and we’ll talk a little about neurodiversity in a little while, but I made the HD, so I don’t do planning, really. Which is one of the main reasons I turn up and wing these things because I can and I don’t like planning. But it’s quite a high cognitive load while you’re doing it. Do you find that? Do you find it quite exhausting? Because my guess is, you have to be running high CPU for the whole time. Right? Yeah. So that’s sort of the amazing thing I find about performance in general. So before improv, I was doing dance fitness, which was a very similar cognitive feel. When I made that connection of my brain, my CPU power feels the same as this thing, because I love teaching dance fitness. That was just my joy, my passion in life. When I made that connection that my brain was doing that cognitive load that was the same. It did a lot for me, because what happens when you’re learning these things? When you’re starting off and you’re learning dance fitness, instruction, or improv, or whatever it is that has that kind of structure, those sort of rules around it, it is a lot. It’s exhausting. You’re thinking about things in a rapid succession. However, that’s wonderful, because I’m ADHD autistic. And I loved that feeling, that rapid, rapid, rapid, like making decisions and stuff. But there’s still the structure and the rules around it, right? So you’re learning how to do these things like, well, face reality, okay, we’re about here in the scene. It’s a lot. It’s heavy. It’s very stressful. Very, like you get out of a class or anything, and you’re just like, I need to go take a nap. Like that was a lot. But what happens is, is you eventually get to the point and all these things where you’re running on autopilot. So you’ve got all these rapid things coming in from you, either your scene partners on a stage in an improv scene or from the people taking your your dance fitness class, because you’re watching all of them and trying to accommodate for that same kind of thing. They’re like your scene partners in an improv scene, if they’re you’re teaching them how to do dance fitness class or whatever. And so you’re taking all these things in, it becomes autopilot, you know, okay, that’s that I adjust immediately. And your brain just has this sort of autopilot thing going on. And you just know how to relax react by your gut. So what happens eventually, is you don’t need to think about all those things anymore, you’re you’ll just react naturally. And all you have to think about is doing what you’re doing right immediately in the moment. And your brain will take care of a lot of that. So eventually, you do get to the point and improv where you aren’t in your head, that’s sort of the phrase that we use, are you in your head? And that’s all that thinking, I don’t want to be in my head, I want to let go. And eventually, you do get to that point where you just you let go, then you just take things in and almost react from your gut. It’s hard to explain. Well, it’s like driving a car, right? When you first learn to drive, it’s like, I’ve got all these things, I’ve got a gear stick on, you know, all these buttons. And, and then like nowadays, I’m just like, you know, you just tune out, don’t you? I didn’t even notice I was driving, how did I get here? Did I stop at the stop sign? Oh, no. Yeah, exactly. Where did this hamburger come from? What? So the neurodiversity thing was really interesting, the way you described this, we’re both audio HD, ADHD plus autism. And one of the reasons I sort of realized latterly, the type of art that I do suits me is because my ADHD brain needs novelty. And I tend to cycle not one of these people that spends ages on the same piece, I’ve always got five, six, seven things on the go at the same time. So I can always get there’s always new things to do. But it pleases my ADHD brain, but it pleases my autistic brain, because I go to my studio at certain times, things where they’re supposed to be, people leave me alone, I construction myself around the things that I’m doing all the time that I’m taking, I know when I do start it, I know when I’m supposed to finish it. And it sits within a framework that keeps my autistic brain happy. And as you were talking about that, then, this idea that, you know, the whole thing around improv is novelty. But you talk then a lot about the structure. And it really struck me, is it’s like you were describing the same thing as me is, you do this because it pleases both parts of your brain. Yes, oh, it absolutely does. And I think that was a lot of the stress in dance fitness, for example, when I started that because it is very when you’re on stage, you’re you’re yelling in a microphone at people, you’re getting that novelty all the time, you have people doing unexpected stuff that you get to react to. And it’s wonderful. But I realized and I loved it, but I realized I’m so stressed out for a while like I and I didn’t really understand that. And what I was stressed out about was, was my potential lack of structure around the class itself, because I was teaching, we’re all sort of independent, we make our classes ourselves. So that those rules and that structure, a lot of it for outside of actually teaching the one hour that you teach can be chaotic until you structure it. And I once I learned I could have my structure and I could do what I needed to do in that stuff before class and kind of control that in a way. I had a very specific way, I had all my little satchels of stuff that I would take and I’d have boxes and the boxes needed to be the right way. And I needed to set everything up in the same order in the same like everything before class, people would offer to help me and I’m like, No, please don’t. There’s a way, right? And once I honored that, and I said, Well, if I do that that way, that alleviates most of the stress, most of my stress is outside of the actual teaching, not the teaching itself and recognize that’s where it’s coming from helped me immensely. So even when you don’t, you can do what you need, including improv, you’re on a team, you’re working with other people. Once you figure out where, where is this anxiety or stress or anything coming from? For most people, it’s the actual performance. But for other people like myself, it’s not the performance that’s causing the stress, it’s the other stuff around the performance that’s causing the stress. So sort of being very self aware of what you need to put in place to help with that can be very important. Yeah, no, I couldn’t agree more. And it sounds a bit paradoxical to some people, especially given that the general I don’t want to say cliche, but the general behavior that people expect around autism is is introversion. I’m exhausted by people. But I come across as very sociable. And I’m quite happy to stand up in front of a large audience and just bullshit around, you know, just say stuff, you know, whatever comes into my mind. And that’s why I do a podcast because, you know, after some I just get to monologue and no one interrupts me, because it’s under control of that environment, right? And but it’s all the stuff around it. Like if I’ve got to go and do like a speech somewhere or something, what stresses me out was that no one gave me the proper directions to the to the place I was supposed to be going. They didn’t tell me what was going to happen when I got there. And then, you know, something wasn’t what they told me it was going to be and blah, blah, blah. By the time I get there, I’m sort of a bit of a gibbering wreck. And then, you know, you push me out on stage. And I’m like, you know, Elvis Presley. And it’s like, people are like, what the hell is going on here? So how do you sort of how do you square that off this idea of the dichotomy of all of this and the idea of performance and being the center of attention? Because I listen to that episode on your podcast about neurodiversity and comedy. Well, what was it about? I wouldn’t say being seen, but that’s not how you put it. Yeah, being perceived, perceived. Yeah, I mean, that for me was it was really validating. Oh, I’m glad. Thank you. Yeah, it’s a it’s such an unusual concept because it’s and I think possibly sort of related to what we’ve been speaking about might might kind of illustrate just this very sort of unusual concept of where we are feeling uncomfortable being perceived. But I participated in a vaudeville like performance where we did sort of sketches and 1920s style local community theater. But it was a fun, fun show. A large cast of 50 very chaotic. And most people, at least it seemed in this performance, were very nervous about going out onto onto the stage to do their their scenes, their sketches. And I was completely nervous prior to going on stage. But because of the social nature of it, we’d all be behind stage, you know, waiting to go out. And I’d be standing there silent because I kind of need that silence control. I don’t want any of the social stuff. The social was what was making me absolutely feel the anxiety of talking small talking behind the stage. And I just wanted to get out onto the stage to do like what you were saying. That’s where I was comfortable because there’s the rule. There’s some structure in the chaos, I guess. There’s what we know how we’re being perceived. We know we’re being watched by the audience. We know that we’re going out there to perform. We know what our job is. Whereas behind the scene, I don’t know what my job is. I don’t know what’s expected of me on that social waiting. Everybody else is nervous to go out there. I’m anxious to get out there. Like I want to go out there. And I think it’s that it’s that sort of, we don’t know what’s expected of us. We don’t know how we’re being interpreted by others. I’m standing there silent. I’m wondering, are they thinking something’s wrong with me? Because a lot of times when I’m in a group and I’m quiet, people are like, are you okay? Do you need anything? I’m like, no, I’m fine. I’m just listening. Like, don’t bring the attention on me. That’s making me anxious. Right? Like, so I think just knowing what to anticipate, knowing how we’re going to control how we’re being perceived. We know what the audience wants. That’s comforting. And I think maybe that’s sort of where that perception is a lot easier for us potentially than being perceived in sort of the chaotic social structures that we have to participate in. Yeah, exactly. I mean, if I’m up there monologuing, oh Jesus, forgive me any chance to monologue. I will come and ask me about one of my, you know, whatever my current special interest is. And you’re going to lose 20 minutes minimum. And it’s like, well, you know, I do that to one person. I do it to a hundred people. I don’t really care. You know what I mean? I’m sure if they’re bored, they’ll make it pretty well known. But it’s a captive audience. I’m like, when else do I get to just stand here and say whatever is on my mind? And you’d have to listen. You know what I mean? Yeah. They want this. They want this. Yeah. But I mean, I’m very aware of other, you know, people who are more just on the autism spectrum, just find that whole concept absolutely terrifying. And so the idea of something like improv is anathema to a lot of people, I think. Do you get all sorts doing this? I mean, is there a type? I would say the types might organize themselves slightly by improv style. There’s a bunch of different styles, ones that are less structured and ones that are more structured and also style of comedy. So I ended up being very attracted to the style of comedy that I kind of grew up with. I loved what is called alt comedy. It’s just like kids in the hall. I’m Canadian. Kids in the hall would be an example of that. I grew up with that. I loved it. But there’s all sorts of other shows that are sort of in that sort of alt comedy sense. That’s ended up, that was what I was watching a lot of. And that’s what I liked doing when I was in art school, getting my BFA. I put up sort of what one of the teachers called performance art. I didn’t say who I was. And I put up all these posters. Jen needs a friend and put all these little things on that people could tear off. I’m lonely. I need a friend. And it’s sort of blurring the lines of what’s real, what’s not. That’s the sort of subversive comedy, that kind of thing. That’s what I liked. Anyways, that’s where I sort of ended up in the improv sense. And I think a lot of other people that like that sort of style of comedy, I find a lot of them in the type of improv that I’m doing. A lot of what might be other neurodivergent people sort of attracted to this style. A lot of rules. It’s very structured in how you structure a scene for the improv style of this. And so I think it sort of attracted people like me. But in improv in general, there’s all sorts. There’s extrovert, absolutely the most neurotypical type people improvising with autistic ADHD, right? So it does attract a lot of types, but I’d say probably a slightly higher percentage of people who like structure at least, or like a kind of a lot of rules in their improv might be attracted to the style. So obviously there’s two halves to this podcast. There’s the art and creativity side and there’s the mental health side. And it’s surprising the amount of people who the creative and artistic side is, or at least started out almost exclusively about managing mental health. You mentioned that you’re a carer and I can imagine that comes with some serious challenges. And I know from your bio that you’ve had a few challenges in the past. And so do you want to tell us a little about that and how you think that your artistic and creative side has helped that? I think it has a lot. Like I would consider myself dysthymic, so like low level depression for a long period of time. And I from a very early age would lose myself in drawing. Some of my earliest sort of memories of where it was helpful on a mental health standpoint, we used to go on vacation to the Oregon coast and I would lock myself away in this room that we got in this little sort of vacation rental type place in front of a window with my Sony Walkman headphones on drawing. And that was just my idea of happiness, alone locked in a room drawing, looking out a window at the beach. And that would calm me after this incredibly stressful drive to get there. So I sort of associated drawing with calmness and mental health and benefits from a very early age, which is probably why I ended up going to art school, because it was sort of what I knew. And I found a lot of other people doing the same. They would go find their corners alone with their headphones and doing their art or people that like to sort of roll solo, I guess, which is why I made the joking posters. Chen needs a friend, right, and put them around. So I think from an early age it did, and that’s probably why I ended up in the creativity. It also, I think, for not feeling seen, not feeling like I really have a voice, and I’m very introverted outside of the performance side as well, very, you know, insular, private type person. The creative stuff gives you a voice without needing to say, this is me, this is Jen saying this. I can say it as a character, I can say it through the art, and just anything that would kind of give me a voice without having to point at myself. This is what Jen thinks, which is why my podcast and stuff about it has been one of the most challenging things I’ve done to say, this is me talking as me. Very difficult, because I’ve always sort of hidden behind the art or the characters or stuff, which has given me a little bit of sense of peace and being able to say something. But also, I’d say through that, one of the podcasts I’m writing right now, sort of a combination of scripted and improv, is all about mental health. That’s the whole theme of the show, hitting rock bottom, hitting depression, getting out of depression, and what sort of some of these things that you can try, but told through comedy, sort of a mix of comedy and not. And that, I think, being able to the art giving you those creative outlets of sort of having a voice through the story, through the characters is very, it’s helpful, I think. Do you find that whatever is causing you that psychological friction at any given point in time, when perhaps you’re having a low, does it actually come out in recognisable ways? Do any of the themes come out when you’re improvising or are you feeling angry about something that’s happened? Are you angry in the improv? I think you can through the characters. Some of that will show up. One of the phrases that we use quite often in the improv community is, improv is not therapy. So, improv can be therapeutic, but we’re not using the scene for therapy. That’s the part we want to avoid. But we can absolutely use the feelings that are in there. I don’t think we can really avoid them to a certain extent. If you are feeling this underlying anger, you might be sort of releasing a little of that through the character. So, as long as we aren’t going and turning our scene partner into somebody that is representative of someone in our actual lives, as long as we’re not really doing that and we’re just sort of working with this overall sort of state that we’re in that’s not really damaging or harming the scene for others, then I think that’s not… I wouldn’t really know how to avoid that too much because that’s honest, it’s real, it’s what’s there. Yeah, and I’ve said this a few times on this podcast. You’re there all over your work, right? Because it’s you that’s doing it. And even if you don’t see that it’s coming out and it’s there, other people will. And I agree with you, I don’t think you can stop it and I don’t even try. And I think my guess is there’s a lot of parallels between me being hyper-focused in front of an easel, for example, and you doing some performance in one of the hallmarks as I’m not thinking about the things that are bothering me. And they’re very mindful, but that doesn’t mean to say they’re not there. I think my work reads a lot like a diary. If I put everything on the long line, I’d certainly be able to see a story there. So I don’t think you can avoid that. I don’t think you can either. It just comes out. It’s surprising. Like in the writing in this podcast series that I’m doing right now, it’s like, oh, it’s not intentional. But then you read it back after you’re kind of editing it. You’re like, okay, yeah, I see some parallels to my own life here. Yeah. We’re a heroes of our own story, or the villains, maybe. Yeah. So I know that my future me, my future me hates me now. Right? Yeah. Any given time. Oh, for sure. Because past me is a total asshole. You know what I mean? Oh, oh, I absolutely know what you mean. It’s just like, oh, why, why did you do that? Like, that was, that was recommended. Yeah. Now we gotta deal with it today. Yeah, exactly. Right. Because I couldn’t be asked to deal with it two days ago when it really needed to be done. I hate past me. He is the villain of my story. And so you said you’re, you’re a carer. Tell us as much or little about that as you’d like. But you know, that’s clearly a big part of your life. It is. Yeah. So I live, I live on a property that has two houses on it. I’m very lucky my mum lives in the other, in the other house. So help her out quite a bit with, with health, just what she needs, because her health is, is a concern. So, and we’ve had some, some stuff that’s been going on. So just help her, help her out on a, on a day to day basis with what she needs. And, and very, very lucky to be so close by that she lives basically 30 feet from my back door. So. Good. So you get on well then. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. We’re very, very lucky, very lucky to get along and, and, and just, we, I mean, we help each other out too, because it’s, it’s basically, I get to go visit her at a different, at a different house. And it’s quite nice to be able to walk out the door and go to somebody else’s house so easily. So. Yes. And you’ve got a lot of space out there in Canada. Yeah. So yeah, I’m lucky I’m on 10 acres of, of forested land. So get to walk around a forest a lot and have space from, you know, that, that’s quiet, which is quite nice. You find that, because I live in Scotland, I used to live in southeast of England, which is one of the most densely populated parts of probably the world, but certainly of the UK. And I moved up to Scotland because there’s far fewer people up here. And I have mountains and trees and stuff. And, you know, once I, once I got here, I really, I didn’t, I thought, I sort of thought I needed some isolation. I needed a break from being constantly surrounded by people. And once I got here, I think I realized just how much I needed that. And, you know, it’s so easy to find places to shelter around here. Yes. Yeah. That was, I lived in cities for most of my adult life, grew up sort of subdivision, but then moved out in my twenties. So spent about 20 years, San Francisco Bay area and a couple different spots there and Toronto, Calgary, et cetera. And always lived in townhouses or apartments, of course, as you do oftentimes in the cities. And then, so this is the first time that I have ever lived in a single family dwelling, I guess, have four walls around you without, you know, adjoining neighbors. And it’s so quiet. And when I first moved out here, I was just, it almost scared me. And I mean, I loved it and I love it now, but it kind of, it was very unsettling not having so many voices around, but then I quickly got used to that. I love it. So very, very fortunate. I couldn’t agree more. So back to the improv, would you recommend anyone try this? And what do you think the sort of the key benefits are? Oh, great question. I never thought I would enjoy performance. So my first performance was as a dance fitness instructor. You’re going up on the stage with a microphone and stuff. It’s similar in a lot of ways, like that way, the way your brain works. And when I started it, first of all, I kind of ended up doing it by accident, performing by accident. Some friends invited me to go along and help them. They didn’t speak English was their second language and they wanted me to help them a bit with some of the, you know, translations and so on. So I went to support them. And I ended up a teacher at the end of it. So they’re like, you should do this. You should do this. But it terrified me. It terrified me going up in front of a group. Um, I was, I was shaking, but then as soon as I got up there, it was just like this relief and comfort. And I was like, what, how did that happen? Okay. And, and I kept going, but it’s a struggle to start. It’s hard for everybody, no matter what kind of neurotype you are, introvert, extrovert. I had one of my friends in that community was one of the most extroverted people, people, people, person, people. Um, and she was just as anxious as I was, but in other ways. So for everybody, it’s difficult. It’s a huge, you know, it’s a difficult thing to start going up on stage and performing, but, um, it’s, it has brought some of the greatest joy in my life doing it. And it is mental health. It just helped to balance me like nothing else. So it’s worth trying. It’s worth sort of giving it some time to get over that hump. It took me a few months, uh, to feel comfortable going in front of the group and teaching because it takes that long to kind of get things a little bit more automated. So you’re not completely in your head thinking. Um, but it’s worth it because it can lead to something that you love. It might not, and then you can let it go and go try something else, but anything that you’re learning is a hard new skill. You know, improv has a similarities. I, it took a long time for me to learn the rules and learn all those guardrails and have it become sort of more of an automated thing. I’m not stressing and thinking about, and that automation, that’s sort of the way that your brain operates when you can kind of let go and just have fun. It’s absolutely a balancing, helpful thing. It, it gets rid of that stress. You get to escape from your thing. That’s why, you know, hyper focus can be so wonderful. It’s kind of that same hyper focused feeling in a lot of ways. And that is a mentally balancing thing to have happen. You can also of course meet people, people that are kind of like-minded and that can be very helpful as well. Um, yeah. And like, and like we are kind of maybe feeling some of those feelings that we need to feel to help sort of process things. And even though it’s not therapy, um, you’re not treating it like therapy, it can be therapeutic in that nature of sort of helping you process some things. Maybe after the scene you’re going, huh, maybe I should think about that thing a little bit more. Maybe something a little bit came up in the scene that you’re like, ah, maybe I need to process that. So yeah, there’s so many benefits. It’s going to be different for everybody. Sort of how it works out and what stresses you need to sort of resolve in the beginning, uh, to get over that hump. Okay. I can really relate to that. And, um, especially with the whole, um, alexithymia thing, uh, for those who are not aware, who are listening, alexithymia is, um, I think, I think anyone can have it really, but it’s, it’s very common in autistic people where you can’t, you don’t recognize your own emotions. You don’t either, you don’t recognize that they’re happening. So, um, you might be really, really, really stressed, but just not notice it. You might be really, really, really hungry and just not notice it. And then suddenly, bam, out of nowhere, like, wow, how, why am I so stressed? How did I go from being perfectly fine to being literally steam coming out the ears? And it took me years to, to recognize that this was going on with me and people, I was a surprise to everyone else when like, alex, two minutes ago you were fine and now you are losing your shit. What the hell happened? And I’m like, I don’t know. Um, and, uh, it was because I was stressed. I just hadn’t noticed. Um, I’m getting better at that now. So I can really imagine it just comes out, right? And you know, maybe do you think it helped you, um, label those emotions and so the, the after a while you sort of see it and you act it out and then when it happens again, you know, IRL, um, you know, that you’re like, Oh, that’s what that one is. You know what I mean? And help you recognize the emotions when they pop up. I don’t think it really helped me label them. And the reason I say that is we do have a lot of exercises in improv where a labeled emotion will be given to you. I also have alexithymia. Um, and so labeling those emotions even well after the fact, I couldn’t do, I didn’t really know why I couldn’t do those exercises. Um, I also didn’t realize that I had alexithymia at all until I got into improv and had no idea how, what, like, what is that really like how, and I’d have to sort of jump back to previous memories that I had processed to kind of get an idea of how to even handle that in the scene. Um, but I figured out my own way to sort of handle that sort of thing and how to, how to, I don’t need to label it. I can just do a rough approximation and then what that means to me, right? Like that will still work, but I haven’t really noticed being able to label them better. I think it’s just, I’ve had to kind of shift how I do the improv to handle some of those things and recognizing it after, I think I’m still going more by the feeling than an actual word label. Um, but there, even, even if you do have, it’s completely, I just, I should say you could still do improv. You just, you figure out your own way. And one of my favorite scenes was I knew the other person in the scene quite well. I knew that they had alexithymia as well. And we were doing an emotion scene where we each given the label. And so I made some little comment just kind of knowing my scene partner and my scene partner picked up on what I meant because it was the actual exercise. And we made the whole scene about alexithymia without using the word alexithymia, but we knew what we were talking about and it gave me so much joy. I felt so seen and we just laughed after the teachers like, what’s going on? I don’t know what that’s all about, but yeah, you can, you can still make these things work, but yeah, I haven’t really on the labeling thing. I don’t think I’ve, I’ve noticed much of a, of a shift for me, unfortunately. So, so, but in general, do you feel like, uh, your experience, you know, through these various types of performance, do you think it’s changed you or do you think that you, you know, you’ve, you’ve just brought out something was, was naturally there underneath? Yeah, I think, I think a little bit of both. Um, I think, yeah, I think something naturally has been there because I’ve done a lot of alt comedy things that I hadn’t realized even were comedy. Um, even when I was doing dance fitness, I didn’t even recognize it as acting or performance. Um, a friend of mine said, oh, but you are performing, you are an actor. I’m like, no, I’m not. What are you talking about? And it turns out, okay. Yeah. Now I see my friend was right. Um, but so I think it was, it is something that was brought out that I didn’t know that I could kind of almost in a sense, label. Um, okay. This is performance perform, you know, and I, oh, that was comedy. That was alt comedy. This thing that I was doing just as myself in real life. Right. Yeah. I can imagine. I’ve been dancing around. Um, I haven’t been dancing around two things I don’t do. One is dancing and the other one is acting. Right. So, um, uh, and I think the dancing one, particularly, even if you go into a nightclub and I was paying attention to anyone apart from, you know, people trying to hit on each other. Um, and, uh, just being seen dancing. I just feel like such a like, so like one giant, like embarrassment, like really worrying what people are going to think of me. So I’ll have to be off my head, you know, drunk massively at which point I can’t dance at all. Um, so I don’t, I don’t dance. Uh, and I’m like 50. So there’s a, there’s a drama group locally. I’m sort of peripherally involved with simply because they’re part of the same wider arts group and they, they perform next door to me. So I’ve been toying with, uh, joining them because, uh, and actually there’s some of the stuff you’ve been saying, you know, I think I’ve always thought, well, I can’t act, right? I’m so bad at it. And, and not, you know, the more I sort of think about it and hear what you’ve said, I’m like, well, actually, I don’t, I don’t know if I would be a good actor. Um, I think I can probably be a lot better. And I think I do a lot more than I think, especially when I think about autism and masking when I’m acting all the time. I have to act like a normal human being almost 24 hours a day. So I should be able to act like, you know, other types of human being. So maybe I should take up something. Absolutely. Yeah. A lot of this, a lot of the acting is just sort of finding parts of yourself that you’re, you’re accentuating and you don’t have to, first of all, like an improv, you don’t want to try to be funny at all. Like you’re not trying to be funny. You’re sort of starting from a very grounded sort of natural place in a lot of these and finding the funny. A lot of people play it super close to their chest. Like they’re like themselves almost all the time. And they’re finding the humor through a point of view, which we all have more points of view. So that’s where you’re finding it. You aren’t being this, this big character. But like you said, like my friend, like when she said, oh, but you’re performing, you are acting. I had no idea I was. So that’s a big thing that we learned sort of getting into this is that there’s many, many different ways to approach it. And you might find that you like doing voices and big characters after you never, you never know what’s going to come out sometimes. Well, exactly. Well, and I guess the other reason why I wouldn’t mind doing it is because, you know, I think it would be great for my podcasting. Oh, yeah. And I’m finding my feet with this stuff. And I feel like there’s progression. But I can imagine, you know, doing either improv or acting or anything would really sort of help me. Oh, for sure. But I’m going to bring this to a close, because what’s going to happen is I’m just going to sit here getting advice from you for another hour. And everyone else is going to switch off. So I should probably, I should probably not. And you probably try and charge me for it. So I won’t do that. No, I love talking about that. That’s the thing. I could info dump for another three hours if you want. Maybe we should. Because I have so many questions, but we shouldn’t. So I’m going to draw this one to a close. Do you want to just tell us about your little podcast empire? The teeniest, tiniest empire you’ve ever seen. Yeah, so I do I released my podcast on what’s called stereo forest. So it’s stereo forest.com blue sky YouTube, same name. And then I do sort of my own videos, sort of side videos and stuff on pensive antics, blue sky YouTube. Anywhere else we can find you or any what your plans, anything else you want to tell everyone about stuff you’re doing coming up? Sure. Yeah. And just I’m working on another couple new podcasts that haven’t come out yet. So they’re very improv based, but within a structure. So a very structured show. But I’m improvising within it with other people. And then I’m just going to keep going on making audio dramas that are mostly scripted, but also include improvised elements within them. So those will all be at least linked on stereo forest. I’m not too sure exactly where they’ll end up elsewhere. So I’ll stick a link for stereo forest in the show notes and basically go there to find anything else about you. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. And it’s a great website, actually. It looks really good. But that’s your other job, right? Making websites and stuff. Yeah, that’s what I started with in the 90s with all that tech stuff was doing all the web design and all that kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah. Me too. But then I stopped doing and now I seem to find my help. My life seems to be I’m a content creator, right? Who knew that’s what I would end up doing. Yeah. Why not? I never thought I’d put my face on the internet. I started with video early on and then I never until improv thought that I’d actually put my face on video on the internet. But here we are. I know. And it’s quite daunting. And then you do it and now you can’t get enough of it. So I record any old crap these days and stick it on YouTube. Why not? Oh, right. Well, maybe, maybe we’ll try this again at some point because I feel like there’s a ton of stuff we can drill down on here. Maybe like you, I’ll have a little podcast empire because I keep on coming. I’ve got, I’m starting another new podcast and I was walking around today. I had another idea for a new podcast. It’s literally like Alex. No, no, no, you can’t do more of these. I do the same. I’ve got a list of ideas and I’m like, well, I’m going to be busy. Yeah. Welcome to ADHD, right? Yes. But yeah, so it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you for joining me. Thank you for having me on. Good luck with the rest of your, your, improv adventures. And if I, if I do any performance stuff myself, I’ll, I’ll let you know. Maybe we can, I would love to. That would make me very happy. Amazing. Thank you. Great. Thank you.