An Authentic Mess
Pictured: the many faces of Kate — falling through a chair in Delray Beach, FL (2024)
Pictured: the many faces of Kate — Carrying an absurd amount of gear and water jugs, running on caffeine and adrenaline, with my producing partner in Sweetwater,TN (2024)
Pictured: the many faces of Kate — Dolled up with a Getty Image at the Jagged Mind premiere in Miami Beach (2023)
When I was in college, I wrote a 20 page epic poem -- in lieu of an honors thesis paper -- entitled, Thou Shalt Not Know Thyself (ahh, art school)...
That mildly-blasphemous A minus paper is now decomposing on a half-corrupted hard drive in a landfill. But the theme of that decade-old project has been revisiting me lately.
A few weeks ago, I posted about integrating the various parts of my life into my public-facing persona. It's a nice and tidy little carousel that was a solid first attempt at being open about my making a living and a life from the various crafts I practice. But, like many of my aging millennial attempts at 'the social media,' it fell a little flat. An authentic attempt at public-facing authenticity. Here goes another one:
Pictured: My now-husband and me at Halloween, pre-gaming in my Union Square dorm (2012).
A mildly-rambling manifesto, my thesis was a rejection of defining one's identity. My central argument was that, in seeking to define ourselves, we actually trap ourselves deeper into self-made prisons. This was actually quite prophetic (if I do say so myself), as this was written before social media became a real fixture of the public sphere. But it also was hypocritical, as I was the biggest offender of putting myself in boxes.
The more I learn about my OCD, the more compassion I have for myself on this front -- but I have spent a large portion of my adolescent and adult life trying to figure out what parts of myself were "good" and which ones were, well, inconvenient. I invested a lot of time into trying to adopt behaviors, ideologies and identities that I thought would get me ahead, make me loved or simply "fix" the not-perfect person I was. Now, I don't fancy myself alone in having these feelings or behaviors. But between the acting school, the completely-ignored neurodivergent disorder, and the angst-filled mind of a 20-something year old artist trying to keep her head above water in the entertainment industry within a gigantic city, my identity crisis was dialed the eff up. I authentically tried to be the most inauthentic versions of myself, and I knew it was bullshit. I wrote a 20 page poem on it.
Setting the cause of my behavior aside momentarily, this labeled, branded "authenticity" is highly rewarded. Consider the workings of a social media platform: a user creates a post with the intent of sharing something about themselves that will cause a reaction in the viewer -- a like, a comment, a share. Some things don't get much attention, but sometimes, something lands. That like button gets pinged and our little monkey brain gets a dopamine hit. They like me, they really like me! and voila, we are hooked on an algorithmic cycle of selective validation. We see what version of ourselves gets the most engagement, and we put more of that self out there. The follower then only sees this version of the poster, an association is established, an impression made, and now, this is the only you they get. Interesting.
Now I'm no fool; I know image-based marketing existed before the advent of Facebook and was used to mythologize many a Hollywood star. But I can't help but think of my thesis when I see articles like this. Recently, Maya Hawke made some controversial statements that dominated industry discourse: that producers only fund movies with actors that have large social media followings.
Whatever one's stance on this, the things that struck me most were the questions implied about connection and authenticity in the Internet age. Does the number of followers someone has lead to 'butts in seats'? In terms of the art and craft of acting, are we hiring someone based on their ability to portray authenticity behind the mask of Hamlet (as my late, great teacher James Tripp used to say)? Or are we hiring the brand ambassador of Whatever Actor® to play the popularized version of themselves? If art helps us reflect on the nature of selfhood, then what does this approach say about where we are collectively?
One of my favorite movies of this year's Oscar season was The Substance. Demi Moore gave the performance of a lifetime as an aging starlet who trades her lifeblood for a chance at being a younger version of herself. It's a gory depiction of the same idea I was circling around in that NYU thesis a decade ago, one that the ancient Yogis and Buddhists have been saying for thousands of years: attachment to an identity -- especially one that is based only on external validation -- is the ultimate form of suffering.
In the spirit of being multi-dimensional and boundless, here is what I've been up to lately. Some of it glorious, some of it frustrating, some of it downright boring. But all of it was authentically me...whoever that may be.
Love, Kate
After three years of dedicated practice, I received my blue belt in Brazilian jiu-jitsu. I still know next to nothing, but I feel more body confident and capable than ever before; and that is a priceless, precious gift.
I produced this branded narrative short film-turned film tourism campaign alongside Amelia Bartlett and a/b studios. I'm incredibly proud of the work we did, and the impact has been incredible!
I have been averaging a 10 minute meditation, five days per week. I probably "meditate" for 18 seconds on average per session. The rest is spent catching myself thinking about nothing in particular or fixating on how my right side feels tight.
Between January & February, I put 38.75 hours of unpaid labor into my business. This includes auditions, website updates, practicing monologues, writing grants, bookkeeping & content strategy + management. Guess how much work I got from it so far? You guessed it -- ZIP. Such is the life of an actor.
I have become quite good at making a papaya salad. Here's the recipe I got in Thailand. I substitute daikon radish or cucumber for the green papaya, use green beans instead of long beans, replace the tamarind juice with lime juice and omit the eggplant (my stomach does NOT like it, though my taste buds do).
Recipe courtesy of Aromdii Cooking School