Blaze Your Own Trail… of Laughs!
Last week while facilitating a workshop, a participant brought up something he had recently read about why a growth mindset is important, “When we walk in fresh snow, we tend to follow the path that has already been established by other footprints and rarely veer from that path.”
It resonated with me because I actually get mad when there aren’t footprints in the snow because then I have to be the one responsible for creating the path for everyone else. When I take my dog out, it’s so much easier when other people already walk through it because it’s LESS OF A BURDEN to trudge through. (Plus it’s less painful on my hip flexors.)
Do you see where I’m going with this? WHAT AN ANALOGY FOR LIFE.
In 2019, I started performing live comedy again after a two-year break. I went back to my old theater and started teaching, directing, and eventually performing with the mainstage. At first, it felt thrilling to get back to my roots and write and perform in shows again. After a while though, it became exhausting. Being a “mainstage performer” was something I loved, but had already experienced. It was fun to go back in time, but I realized it wasn’t something I needed to experience again. I thought it was what I needed to feel “legit” but I was ready for the next thing.
But what does being a legit comedian look like beyond that? Can you even be considered a comedian if you’re not on stage multiple nights a week in front of a live audience? Are podcast hosts comedians, or just podcast hosts? Can you even have a podcast without being a comedian with credits or stage time to your name? CAN YOU EVEN GET STAGE TIME ANYMORE WITHOUT HAVING A PODCAST?
What’s that? I’m overthinking and spiraling out of control? Well, I never!
This past year has taught us all A LOT OF THINGS. First and foremost that NONE OF US are washing our hands enough. Secondly, we need to be more creative in our approach to life. We can’t go to work anymore? Let’s conduct business over Zoom. We can’t see our friends? Let’s hang out over Zoom. COVID cut off access to stages? ZOOM.
Just kidding. (Though, I’ve seen it!) Some comedians turned to Instagram and TikTok. Many started a podcast. Others kept focusing on other parts of acting, like voiceover work, commercials, and TV pilots. People fled back to Twitter. Some performed at outdoor venues. Some gave it all up entirely and moved to the suburbs.
Being forcibly held back from performing showed me that I actually didn’t miss it. To be fair, I love performing! I just don’t like the schedule (late nights) and sometimes the culture. What I love about comedy is making people laugh - and there are so many ways to do that now. Like right here in this outdated medium of blogging!
I used to think that if you weren’t on the Second City mainstage or Saturday Night Live, you weren’t really a comedian. Nowadays, those lines are a little fuzzier and the tent poles keep moving. I mean, if you’re not the host of a killer murder podcast, then what even are you?
But that’s exactly my point. Two comedians started a podcast about true-crime because it was something they were into, and now that’s a whole new path to go down and an entire subset of comedy. We now have the opportunity to follow our weird interests and create our own comedy paths however we want.
One of my friends, Matt, is a comedian and filmmaker and even though he’s basically in every commercial on television, he also fuels his creative passion by making comedy shorts, running a food Instagram, and doing pro-bono film work. Another friend named Matt likes all things spooky scary and records conversations with guests telling ghost stories and has a web series with a puppet. My friend Ash posts videos in character. Other friends released a musical comedy album. And the list goes on. It’s inspiring to just see people create stuff that makes them happy.
I’m so thankful for female comedians like Lucille Ball, Carol Burnett, Joan Rivers, and Tina Fey who followed existing paths and blazed their own trails, opening the doors and making it “acceptable” for women to be professionally funny. Each had their own brands of comedy that they wouldn’t have been able to do without the hard work of others before them. I mean, can you imagine Lucille Ball getting away with what Joan Rivers did?
Basically, we should of course follow in the footsteps of the greats. We should be grateful for their journeys and use them to get started. But at some point, we need to find our own voices and veer off-trail just a little bit. It doesn’t make us any less valid.
So, I’m giving myself (and ALL OF YOU, if you need it) permission to consider myself a comedian even though I don’t have a YouTube channel, or a Netflix special, or a writing packet, or thousands of TikTok followers, or accreditation from a top comedy school, or a screenplay, or a MacBook Pro.
Someone somewhere had to sacrifice a whole lot to make comedy a viable path for me. I am lucky their footsteps are there in the snow, but now it’s time to take a right on an unmarked trail. I’m probably going to get lost, and it’s going to feel uncertain, and it WILL be rough on my hip flexors, but who knows? Maybe I’ll create my own footprints in the snow for someone else to follow.
Or the snow will continue to fall and cover them up and nobody will ever find me and I’ll die in the woods and some other comedian will talk about my missing person’s case and untimely death on their podcast. Fingers crossed!