A corny meditative exercise

This is, with some changes, the way we began our first rehearsal for LISTEN TO YOUR MOTHER Spokane 2011.  I do this sometimes when I am feeling less than delighted and acting less than delightfully.  But first, I said this:  It's hard to be open to our own emotion and the emotion of others.  It's easy to hide behind attitude, sarcasm and snark (as opposed to humor).  I know because I am the heiress and crowned princess in a long, unbroken line of snarky, emotional abstainers.  So, I'll ask you, and myself, to let go a little. Suspend disbelief.  Let's be dorks together and allow room for vulnerability.

Breathe deeply.

Relax your muscles.

Open your chest and bring your shoulders back.

Open your arms and rest them on the chair of the person next to you. You needn't touch. It's a symbolic openness to connection.

Close your eyes.

I learned from a prominent, local psychologist - and I firmly believe - (and don't firmly believe everything that you learn without question; only learn those things that you believe firmly after investigation) - this:

People long to be delighted in.

In the next few minutes, let's try, together, to understand the meaning of being delighted in.

If you have children, you understand delighting in someone else, but do we truly understand and hold tight those moments in which someone delights in us?

As you read each cue, hold the answer gently in your mind and then set it aside for revisiting.

Ready?  How are you delightful as a mother or father?

Careful now.  Not how do you delight in your children.  How are you delightful in your mothering.  Imagine I'm writing a chapter about you in a book in the third person.  I would write, "Amanda was a delightful mother in that she ...  "

How are you delightful as a partner.  Past or present. Any relationship.  (Same rules.)


Set those aside.  Now.  How are you delightful as a daughter or son?  (Or grandchild. To any caregiver.)



And finally, how are you delightful as a friend?  Picture a moment in which you were delightful or a trait in yourself that makes you a delightful friend.


Set them aside.

I find the stories of women and men, mothers and fathers, people, shared online, delightful.  I delight in your courage, your honesty, the beauty of your words, your humor and your truth. I delight in storytelling and shared experiences.  I've been delighted by the concept of Listen To Your Mother from the first moment I heard about Ann's Madison auditions last year.

I hope, often, that some of you are delighted by some of the same things when you read my words here and I am always delighted when you respond to me.

(Dorky affirmation exercise over. Yes, I can be this obnoxiously sappy if provoked.)


(How glad are you right now that you don't have to sit in my forced emotion circles?  After this, I promise you, we had a normal, funny, delightful rehearsal. We talked and then we ran through the show. And everyone sobbed and laughed and smiled and fought bittersweet tears because it's a damn damn DAMN good (great! astonishing!) show.  I wish you could all come.  If you can come, tickets are on sale here.  This is the thing, the. thing., outside of my family, that I have done in my life so far of which I am the proudest and delights me the most.  That is the most awkward sentence I have ever written and I can't fix it because it's true. xo.)