A Letter to the Creatives of the World

Do you know what the best feeling in the world is? It’s the final night of a show. Being up on that stage, under the blinding lights and surrounded by the scent of sweat and greasepaint, inhaling that exhilarating feel of having succeeded. Before the grief and farewells there is a snapshot in time in which you have reached the peak of all moments. It is the highlight of the whole journey: the months of planning, the rehearsing and remembering, the panic of opening night. In that moment the whole world seems to stop and you stand upon its summit. I challenge you to find a better feeling. And yet… and yet so many people sacrifice that moment in favour of the mundane modernity of an office block and a soul sold to the system rather than Ophelia’s madness. For it is madness, of course. To commit to the arts is to commit to the struggles, the endless challenges to be overcome. As I watch your long fingers play the notes, my heart breaks just a little to know that you will leave it all behind as you don your suit. As I hear the beauty of your voice when you think no one is around, I wish that you would share it with the world rather than believing the myth that all this is not to be indulged. ‘Give up your personality’ they said, ‘be practical’ they plead as you try to make them see. It is with your best interests at heart that they remind you that this is merely a hobby, a fanciful dream, that you must now discard. What is it? What is it that I must do in order to help you see the way? We have come this far. We are in Alice’s country now. What will it take to allow you to trust and take those final steps into the heart of Wonderland? Ophelia’s joy waits for you there. Release these worldly ways and run away with me. Run and run and never look back. All that waits behind you is the reality that your heart has always chosen not to face. As I watch you in that dark corner, tears streaking your face, I know that you are not long for this world if you choose another path. When your fingers are on those keys, the whole world lights up as people stop and stare. The skill that you possess is one that I have never seen before – why would you sacrifice that? If we were all only blessed with a single gift, this is yours. Write yourself out of the corner that they have placed you in, play and sing, scream your confusion and pain into every note. Find the peace that you deserve, pick up the brush again and paint a new Wonderland.