“The busy man is troubled with but one devil; the idle man by a thousand” - Spanish Proverb

It's only been a few days but it feels as if I haven't returned to this blog in quite some time. My head spins with all of the things happening right now that I've hardly any time for reflection. For the first time in years, I find myself eager to wake up and get out of bed each morning ready to take on what the day brings. There's a once familiar vigor that has returned coursing through me. Everyday is an adventure learning something new, meeting someone new and better yet...discovering something new in an old friends.

I was approached via ACTS to audition for my first film earlier this week. The role was for the lead in a short that was to be paraded around the festival circuit. After speaking with the producer, I was sent a copy of the script and notified of the filming dates...the same dates that coincided with my upcoming New York trip but after considering that this may have been a great opportunity I responded with my interest knowing that I would have to give up on my trip. Unfortunately, the producers had chosen another actor but if anything is to be learned from this is that I have been tested on my resolve to see my career through. Even just a year ago I would've been much more lackadaisical about this. There will be other opportunities, this is only validation...

Modern dance is incredible!!! Something I've already felt but it took on a new meaning after having our guest artist from Diavolo assist with our Antigone rehearsal on Wednesday. We had sample choreo to pick up and I'm happy to say that I was able to get most of it right away. The choreo itself was just so beautiful and graceful and it was so much fun to make my clumsy body fit into it! It's going to be very interesting to see how this will be worked into the piece.

I spent the day yesterday reuniting with a good friend who has had her own journey since leaving the party scene herself. I had a great time discovering her involvement with theatre at her university. From watching a show there, being amazed at her makeup portfolio, talking about our renewed interests in photography it was great to see these other dimensions of my friend. It had felt as if since announcing my "retirement" from parties I lost many of those who I thought I was close with. It's reassuring to know that some of the great friendships I had in that circle can continue on into something more fulfilling in this new phase of my life.

I was also approached by another old friend who I worked with on a production at USC to train with with his stunt group! They have a practice session going on today that I'm rushing onto after hip-hop so let's hope that this will bring forth new friends and opportunities. Perhaps a fight scene will commence after all!

4 MORE DAYS 'TIL MY AGENCY INTERVIEW!!!

I hope that everyone is doing well out there... =o)

Track of the Day:

Bibio - Lover's Carvings (Leatherette Remix)

Just a quick thank you to a friend for being there with me.  Love from a caring friend though different can be just as powerful as love from the person of your dreams.

Let Valentine's Day be not only a celebration of love between two romantic partners but rather a celebration of love itself.

I hope that everyone is doing well out there... =o)

“All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them.” - Galileo Galilei

I've been blessed to find my new friends in this difficult time. One of the reasons why I had to leave the party scene as much as I love the music and my friends was that there wasn't anyone who I connected with anymore. I couldn't find the joy in it and after losing the one I loved it all seemed so empty. Every new person coming in just seemed to be even younger and I just felt even more out of touch.

How fast over time it was that I became the youngest in my group of friends to being the oldest. Always was I there for my friends and helping them sort things out with advice from my own experiences gave me purpose. But I missed the comfort of having friends who were living their lives ahead of me. They were the ones who could truly understand me because they have lived through the problems I was beginning to face. They were the ones who I could go to when things became hard. Struggling to gain an identity when pursuing your dream, struggling to be financially and emotionally available to take care of the love of your life, struggling to adapt to the world when you feel changes within yourself, struggling to keep love of your life within that changing world, struggling to have that deeper fulfillment. No one from that life could truly understand the toll that it was taking on me. Not even the one who I loved so much. Perhaps everything stayed the same and I was the one who changed so much to the world. As my friends Carin and Michelle would tell me, "You're just growing up."

Never had the scene seemed so lonely, the polar opposite of the unity felt when I first came to the scene ten years ago. I have spent the last two years of my life building relationships in this world that there were hardly any friends that existed outside of it. After the break, there was no family for me to go back to. Friends from long ago have lived such different lives that they were now almost strangers to me. Even with the transitions I was experiencing I couldn't return to my old comforts. I never thought I would ever say this but I'm not much of a raver, gamer or anime geek anymore. I'm still young at heart and love these things that will always be a part of me but I just want more out of life now. Photography, dance, acting, martial arts, video production, traveling, finding a deeper meaning to my life are the things that define me now.

With these passions, it is time again to forge groups to share them with. It will be much more work on my part this time around as there isn't a GS.C type of place for each of these things. However, I'm starting to build hope again as I'm looking forward to the people I've yet to meet and the adventures I've yet to have. As my friend told me yesterday, "You might not believe it, but everybody you meet loves you." It's a promising thing to hear isn't it? I thank her in my thoughts every time I remember that.

I hope that everyone is doing well out there... =o)

Track of the Day: (It just seemed so fitting with the rain today...)

Wanda and the Colossus (EN: Shadow of the Colossus) - Demise of the Ritual

"We are always getting ready to live, but never living" - Ralph Waldo Emerson

It's amazing how a single day can bring so much hope doesn't it? I had a feeling that this day was different as I had run into my friend randomly on the freeway of all places while she was coming home from a shoot. Today was just a day of positive energies flowing throughout my world.

I received a message from an agent at the Colleen Cler agency looking to set up an interview next month!!! The agency specializes in commercials and print modeling and from the testimonials I've read they carry a very good reputation. I know that this is only a step and nothing is guaranteed but like the favorable response from the casting managers at ABC in December, if feels validating. Further doors of opportunity will open if I'm able to sign with them and if not I'll walk away with a valuable learning experience. I've been very fortunate to be blessed with the encouragement and wishes of other working actors who are at where I want to be and this next step is just further proof that my dream can become a reality. Progress is inspiring!!!

I finally have cable at my place! =o) Adult Swim, Spike, ABDC, G4, Bravo, Discovery...all of which for me to indulge in again. It's a weird thing to be relieved about since I really don't watch television but having it does make the place seem more like home to me. It goes back to when I was little and lived in my house with only my sisters. While they were at work and left me alone, I always turned on all of the TVs and lights in the house to make it seem as if there were people in it. The empty hallways and dark rooms were now full of life and laughter. My room just seems that much more warmer now.

I was also contacted by long lost actor friends from the past that I was happy to hear from. I'm looking forward on having these bonds reconnected and sharing on what our lives have become in our time apart. They bring with them a positive, productive energy which I'm happy to bring more of into my life.

Though all of this pain, I am finally able to feel in my heart what my head knows in that there is still a bright future ahead even if I must take this journey on my own. This new world I have created for myself is finally taking shape. Eschewing the negative influences around me the last few weeks has begun to allow my heart to heal. I've again found joys in the silliest things that make me laugh and the days I've spent crying are becoming fewer. I'm not forgetting the pain but I'm finally putting it in control. I'm one step closer to peace and with that comes even more power to make my dreams into reality.

I hope that everyone is doing well out there... =o)

Track of the Day:

Koda Kumi - Driving

Oh, have I forgetten how to smile...

The world is in a much bleaker state as when I was last in this position. The ripple effect that began with the economic crisis has brought forth tragedies and created situations where life's priorities are seriously questioned. It has created fractures and breaks in the relationships around me and had added further stresses to one I had. It has unearthed problems within individuals once sheathed by a lifestyle of squandering and carelessness for their own actions. I said before that loneliness is ever present now than ever. And it's not necessarily that many around us are without friends, but rather that many of us are without people who we feel could truly understand us and lift our spirits. I was blessed last time to find a community of friends that welcomed me with open arms and brought into my life some of the most wonderful people I have ever met. They had brought me adventures, the gift of dance, the promise of love and a sense of family I've never had before.

However, that group today is shattered. It's members having gone their separate ways and with those remaining splintering further over a character assassination war I chose to walk away from. I found my true friends few in number as I found out that some had their own interests well in mind and inadvertently stabbed me in the back. So many of us have focused so inward to question the demons that haunt us that we easily forget that we aren't only ones in pain. I'm reminded even further by the blog I first mentioned a few days ago that there are others in the same situation as I. I can't stand back and watch the world spin in this direction any further...

Going through my older blog entries, I'm reminded that a clairvoyant friend long ago told me that I'm meant to thrive amongst people. As much as I believe that, I feel like I've forgotten how to. I usually have a very cheerful disposition and I don't like being that person who brings everyone down which brings me to this next excerpt from my entries:

"There is a thing that I have always heard and I have now proven it to be true: Finding happiness and confidence in yourself will draw it out in others... The great thing about that is that it is contagious to a point that once the people near you see those things and draw it out in themselves it will further reinforce your own positive qualities and perhaps bring it out further. It's a mutual exchange that perpetually builds upon itself without end.

The point: Just be happy dammit...and those around will you be too!"


I'm reminded again of my mission and it is clear.


I'm on a mission to capture that fire within my heart again. It's still there. Nary but a flicker at times and others a scorching tempest but I know it's still there. I must capture it with my two hands, take it into my chest and reunite it with my soul. I've always had the power to influence others and the time is needed again for all of us to shine our lights back to the world.

As the clouds slowly lift in this perceived darkness I find myself in every day, I'm starting to find those bright gems again in friends of old and new. Though small in number, collectively, you wield the power of a family to me so strong that I feel the heat of that fire once again.

To my friends Carin, Mark, Andrei, Maria, Wilson, Tina, Michelle, Vance...you guys give me strength. May I rise again and have my light shine with your own. Together, may our hope become the needle to penetrate that cynical fabric laying over the hearts of the people. We will weave with the hearts of our friends and family a future as bright as smiles we fight to put on now.


Here's my quote for the day:

"The worst situation is when you want to win but you're afraid of losing. The best situation is when you want to win but you never fear loss." - Liu Guoliang

And my track of the day:

Utada Hikaru - Sanctuary

Yesterday was my first day back to work since everything had happened. I still had a tough time controlling everything. I've never been so distraught to the point where I could not keep a cap on my emotions. Even going through that period that I was suicidal a few years back I was able to at least hide my pain from everybody. I guess word had got around about my behavior last Wednesday. But in that I was appreciative of the support I have received from everybody, even those that I thought did not care so much.

The strength of having your own network of friends is something that I feel like I have neglected during my course of time with Andrea. Andrea was my best friend, but I noticed that everybody else surrounding me were not necessarily my friends but her own. When we separated, I lost more than the best friend and lover that she encompassed to be....I lost an even larger circle of friends as they were all tied to her. What happened at Armin can attest to this as what WILL happen at Tiësto, Lovefest, Monster Massive, Together As One, any CASA event etc...etc. It's hard to go onto a site like Facebook and MySpace and find yourself not included in something you very much were a part of. It's not as if I can shut these things off so easily. I use this as a main resource of reaching out to my own friends. The same falls for the GS.C community, our interests are so intertwined that even apart the world will still be small.

Without properly maintaining a life of my own I had nothing to come back to except for a career than I was trying to distance myself from to begin with. I have been doing whatever I can to reach out to anybody and everybody, but at the same time I feel as if I'm wasting their time in a way. They would have to go out of their way to console me. Why should I have to ask more than what they are already giving? However, I heal best by sharing. I'm a social healer in a sense...being surrounded by people...exchanging with them. (Sounds like I need to be back in the rave environment again). After realizing that, I sensed what it was that I do not like about my apartment. It's too quiet. I've always lived with somebody or at least around somebody. This is the first time that I've actually gone out and had my own place. While there are pros...it's spacious, clean, safe, close to work....the only con strong enough to override everything is that it is lifeless...soulless. Your place is what you make of it and life was brought in whenever Andrea would stay with me on the weekends. I loved being there when she was, it was our own place secluded away from everything where we could be together. Through this, my apartment truly become a home. With this loss, now it has become almost a source of pain itself.

I've begun to see if any of my friends were looking for any roommates. An idea that came up was of Jamie, Peter and I moving in together. Obviously, living with roommates is more economical but more importantly I will be surrounded by family again. With us together, I imagine our place being one full of life...one of shared fulfilling experiences that I ultimately can be very happy with.

Thank you Maryanne if you ever see this for helping take my mind off of things yesterday. I've lost touch with being able to use my imagination to give myself peace of mind. Even though it's been years since we've talked, you have helped make me feel the most relaxed I have been in a long time.

Well, as I was ready to start a fourth nonsensical post when I decided to hit up AIM to see if anybody was up. I saw a fellow GS.Cer was online. After telling him that I really needed to get out of the house, he invited me over to chill and I am really glad I did. It felt good talking to him about everything that has happened since he has got a good head on his shoulders and I trust his advice.

However, it wasn't until he simply said "You know that you're going to get over this right?" that I felt really calm. This statement is something that I already do know (in my head, not my heart) and it's been told me many times by others. But the way he was able to say it so nonchalantly and matter of fact really made my heart realize that, "Yeah! This is only going to be a small bump in the road of life." There are so many problems out there that I could be experiencing. Hell, there are so many more problems that I would not be able even to imagine yet! Don't get me wrong, I'm having the worst time fighting off the tears but I'm feeling more optimistic that this will be better in the end.

Thank you Paul if you ever read this. Hanging out today has helped more than you really know... (And the steak was awesome!!! I will be the Wushu Flavor hahaha)

I really want to get back into dancing, not just for glowsticking's sake but just for the stake of expanding and growing. My ex and I are really big into learning funk styles of dance. However, I have to admit that I've never told her in our two years together that I've always wanted to learn since I wanted her to feel that it was her own thing and I didn't want it to seem to her that I was liking it only because she liked it. Not only that....with these styles of dance come a higher competitive element than I care for. The only person that I like competing with is myself. Opponents of all sorts will come and go, but with yourself...it becomes harder and harder to challenge yourself since you know yourself so well! And the distance that you take yourself though these battles is so much greater than bettering yourself just enough to surpass the person before you. Yet, I have had these talks with my friend Jamie about taking classes for a long time. For now I will just have to pick up on some of these things on my own...