Blank Can Be Fun?

    While sitting here looking at a blank page and after watching the movie “The Art of Getting By” and seeing the main character looking at a blank canvas, struggling to fill it, I began to think about how much life revolves around just filling something that is empty. Be it eating, drawing, writing, doing homework, gassing up a car, it's all to do with taking something that isn't there and filling that space. Even emotionally. People do things because they feel empty inside, they buy this, or try that or do this, to try and fill a void. I mean I just started a job where my main task is to fill any shelf that is empty.

    It's a giant cycle. Personally I kind of like the excitement of nothing. Hear me out. As long as a page is empty, as long as a painting goes unpainted, it can be anything. As soon as there is a mark put to anything empty you take away all of the possible things it could be. I know there is a time and place for everything but I think taking the time to actually appreciate what it means when something is empty is an important step to creating something.

    I know I am guilty of feeling pressure from anything that is blank. I feel like I need to fill it. When I was in school I would stress about answers to an assignment, now I stress myself when trying to find something to write about. But really until homework is marked, the answer could be anything, and maybe it's just because I'm tired but I think that's a really cool way to look at it. Life isn't a finite path set in stone (Sorry Christians) we are making choices and creating our futures. Until you actually start writing your screen play, as long as it is blank it could be the next Citizen Kane. The potential for a blank page is endless and I think it would take a lot of stress off of people to think of it like that.

Now isn't that exciting!?

    Of course not everything we do with our creative muscles is going to be fantastic. Just knowing the possibilities for what we do are out there is important. You have to start somewhere. The start will always be empty. So once you do finally put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) or brush to canvas remember that everyone who ever created anything great lived on this same planet, breathed the same air, they were human just like you and I. There is no reason that you can't achieve greatness, the possibilities are endless, as long as you envision yourself doing it.

    At the end of the day you do need to buckle down and fill that emptiness. You have to do the work. But before that you have to let your imagination run wild.

Thanks for reading,

Phil

The good ol' days

It's kinda funny to have "the good ol' days" as a topic considering I only turned 21 this month, but I am on a new chapter of my life and I think that calls for some reflection. 

I will be having my college graduation (convocation if you want to be fancy and technical) on June 21st. I'm sorry but to me that seems crazy. In a society where all we know is school for the first 20 odd years of our lives, being done with that feels like kind of a big deal. Not being a student anymore means a ton of new challenges and adventures to face. Life no longer will revolve around grades and how well I'm doing in school. Relatives will not longer ask how marks are or how school is going, instead it will be "how much money are you making, where are you working, got a girlfriend yet?" and things like that. Life has always centred around how well school was going, it's easy small talk for people you went to high school with and happen to bump into at the mall one day, "hey" "oh uh hey (avoids saying name since they can't remember) ...how's school going?" This creates the facade that they actually care about what you're doing. *spoiler alert* they don't. The last thing they want is for you to say anything other than something along the lines of "good, you?" Keeps the conversation short and sweet. 

Being done school forces me into the real world and everybody knows the real world kinda sucks. I mean I'm always open to new adventures, but when these new adventures include paying off all the debt I've accumulated over two years of post secondary education it's kinda hard to get pumped about it. I am looking forward to being independent though. I loved the freedom of living on my own while I was in school. It seems a little odd  that after graduating I have to live at home for roughly 6 months and it takes away from one of the biggest positives of growing up; being independent. I know in the long run it will be better. Having no rent makes it easier to pay off OSAP quicker and will help save money to go towards rent in Toronto. 

Anyways, back to the good ol' days. I will admit it, I loved grade school, high school and college. I loved being involved win student council and sports teams in high school, I loved being able to be a kid in elementary, I loved being able to feel somewhat like an adult while in college. But all the best part of all three things is that I had barely any responsibilities. There was always an easy fall back plan. With adulthood creeping up I am reminded of all the things I will be facing as a grown up. I loved being a kid. Looking back I don't like the kid I was but I still have some great childhood memories. I wish I could have been more social as a kid, but having to battle to come out of my shell certainly has made me stronger today. I will miss summer vacation, although I've had a job the past four summers it's just weird this summer knowing I won't be leaving the job to go back to school.  This is the end of summer vacation and the beginning of real life living. Soon I'll be living in Toronto and these memories will be cherished even more. I know the first few weeks I will have Taylor Swift's song "Never Grow Up" on repeat. 

I have definitely grown up a lot since I was a kid and I am definitely happy I did. The growing up in that song is different than the way I have grown up. Maybe I've matured, not necessarily grown up. I know when I have to be professional and seem like an adult but I can still act like a kid when I want to. I love embracing my childish ways. I love acting like a goofball. I even love the fact I still sleep with a teddy bear. I like to be youthful. I've grown up in the sense that being called names doesn't bother me, I won't run around the playground crying because the girl I like started dating someone. (My low point of my elementary school career and one of the most embarrassing things I've ever done) 

So the good ol' days of being care free are behind and I believe some truly amazing days are yet to come. It's healthy to reflect but I'm not one to dwell on the past. I will jump into every challenge that is ahead of me and face them knowing they will make me a better person. I will never stop learning. After all, this is my life...in training. :)

Thanks for reading (it probably dragged on) 

Phil  

My Own Personal Paradox

     How about a Phun Phact about Phil? (See what I did there?!) ….yeah, feel free to slap me next time you see me. It’s warranted.  Anyways, here it is: I absolutely love attention.  I’ll throw in another fact for free! I absolutely hate attention.  It appears that I have discovered I am my own walking, talking, shy, and attention loving paradox.

     In school I was taught that acting is in fact full of paradoxes. So I suppose it should come as a relief and of no surprise that I have discovered one about myself.  It just really doesn’t make sense and both sides do battle valiantly with each other.  I mean, what is more terrifying than having a room of people listen and hang off of every word you say? Nothing! Yet what is more thrilling than having a room of people listen and hang off every word you say? Nothing!  If I can find a way to make a room of people laugh at something I said I feel like I’m in heaven, I really do.

     

     I think this is a fight that “attention lover” has really began to take the edge in.  Don’t get me wrong I’m not someone who will say something bad about myself and hope people respond to me with “Oh no! You’re great; don’t say stuff like that about yourself.”  I am someone who will do my best to make people laugh, or I will work my butt off to get noticed and praised.  Yet that is where this wonderful paradox kicks in the most. Praise is the worst. I hate being complimented. It just makes me feel bleh, uncomfortable.  That’s the proof that I will never say anything fishing for compliments.

     As an actor it would be dangerous for me to be too far on the shy side.  How could I ever act if I was afraid of talking to groups of people, or afraid of people seeing me on a screen? I think two years of being taught to dive in to everything in life has certainly helped me keep the shyness at bay.  *Flashback* The year: 2005. Phil Hoffman was in grade 8! Grade 8 I was too afraid to even socialize with girls!

Yes. I used to look like that.

      *Return* The Year: 2020 …..Woops! Too far. I need to figure this time travel out a little more…

     The year: 2013. That’s better! Welcome back to 2013! Well that was an adventure.  Little insecure Philip was adorable….and pathetic. But here we are in the wonderful year of 2013 and I am a confident, young man! I went from not being able to talk to girls to many of my good friends being girls! It’s amazing how high school, life, college, and reality can all transform someone like me!

It's like I'm in thought or something. I'm sooooo deep.

     So here I am. 21 years old. Shy. Attention loving. The battle between the two will never end. I’m still uncomfortable meeting a new group of people. I’ve just gotten better at tricking myself into thinking I’m not!  But if people are willing to give their attention I will always take it from them gladly. 

Thanks for reading!

Phil

Throw back

First things first. I plan on updating this at least once a week from now on. If I set a deadline for myself I will be way more likely to do so. So lets say new post every Thursday! (Arbitrarily chosen because today is Thursday) Now that we have that all settled here is what I got for you:

Last night when I had some down time at my rehearsal I decided to read some of the old poems I knew were in my notebook.  My old poems are pretty bad and follow terrible structure. (I guess they reflect my life more than originally thought!) This one kind of stood out to me though.  Don't get me wrong, I don't think it's very good. There is just something about it that I like. Yet at the same time I hate it. That happens to be my relationship with most of my writing. So here it is. For the record the way I have arranged the lines right now probably aren't how I imagined it when I wrote it. I can't remember what my thoughts were in 2010!

I want to be a star

Don't we all just want to go far?

If I could write a catchy tune

That's all I'd need to do.

Maybe if I could crack a joke

Then maybe I wouldn't be so broke.

All these stars making it on nothing.

Who needs talent with a body like that?

I want to be legit, but all I got is this.

These days it seems

People make it off of each other's broken dreams.

Ya these days it seems

To make it you need a 6 pack or double d's

With all this fuckin' trailer trash

Trading their skin for cash

We see real talent thrown to the street. 

Least favourite line: "I want to be legit but all I got is this"  (I'm sure 2010 me thought it was clever or something.)

Favourite line:  "These days it seems people make it off of each other's broken dreams" (I find this one the most relevant line. The main reason the poem stood out.) 

Now don't get me wrong, stardom is not something I am interested in. I guess when I wrote it I was "trying to make a statement" about the current state pop culture was in. Or something lame like that. Anyways thank you for reading!

Phil