Perspective

As I steadily smooth in to my new life in the Big Apple, fewer things seem newsworthy as I become acclimatised and thus it feels as though I neglect this blog when in fact I feel guilty every week that goes by without a post. So today I am going to share something just for the heck of it. It is not necessarily a New York City experience per se, but this is where I realized what I'm about to share so this blog may still be the correct forum, right? 

So many times, especially as New Yorkers, we can look past the things happening around us because they don't affect us directly. It's easy to walk past homeless beggars on the street and pay no attention to them because once you've come across ten people over time with the same 'occupation', you somewhat become numb to compassion. You don't get angry at this social injustice which is clearly not normal - and definitely not what was purposed for anyone under the sun. You now simply view people as unfortunate. Unlucky. A statistic. A number.

Funny enough, with this distorted view of our fellow human beings we also lose perspective and perspective, I have learned, can change your life.

How is it that everyone believes that the challenges they face are of such diabolical proportions that the world is about to end? How many people ever take time to remove themselves from a situation and look with a new set of eyes? As I said, perspective will change your life. You worry that the economy is going down and you can't afford to maintain your lifestyle when in Ethiopia there is a child who might not live to see his teens because his reality is that he has no access to a basic human right: clean water. Who has the bigger problem?

I can go on the whole day with comparisons, but I won't. I just want to share something my pastor, Carl Lentz, shared with me this evening: "Have you ever thought that you might not need a change of position but a change of perspective?" You see, with perspective, your challenge won't go anywhere. The mountain won't move. But the way you climb it might.

Proverbs 29:18 says that people with no vision perish. Therefore the opposite of that, people with vision greatly prospering, must be true as well. Is perspective, then, not a form of vision?

Have a great week...

On Broadway

Okay so I have seen a couple of shows now and I think it's only fair that I write up a little bit about each of the shows I've seen the past three weeks. 

Every time I get my ticket, in the subway on my way to the theatre on the day, and also right before I sit down to watch a show I realise the great blessing I have to be where I am at right now. There's a lot of things that one learns in a classroom but sometimes you catch so much more by seeing a production as well and this is something I have the amazing opportunity to do around once a week. 

So far I have seen, in order, The Lion King, Rent, Memphis and Spiderman. I was blown away by three of the four shows while the other one just failed to raise the bar. In fact, don't know if it owned a bar.

• The Lion King, as I have previously mentioned was super awesome and it held a lot of symbolism for me for various reasons.
• Rent was the very first musical I ever saw and after seeing it performed live Off-Broadway it is definitely safe to say that it remains my favorite musical. I loved the score, the use of the most simplistic set and the most talented actors. Each one of the cast gave such amazing performances, but I must especially comment on the character of Angel played brilliantly by Michael Rodriguez.
• Memphis was up next for me and this is a show that I had not really heard of before the time so it was very easy for me to be critical on my way in, but that cast is just too crazy for words. The storytelling is done in such a brilliant way and there are constantly great emotional high and low moments throughout the show. After walking out the show I think one feels that they've learnt so much as well because there is also a very strong message of acceptance over prejudice that is beautifully told through the show.
• Spiderman was a little disappointing to me, unfortunately. I'm a real big comic geek and I love the Spiderman movie franchises, but this really didn't do anything for me. Amongst other things, let's just say it felt more like a U2 concert than the story of Spiderman/Peter Parker. I must say that the set design is amazing though and the stunts were pretty cool as well, but take those two elements out and I don't know if there's a leg to stand on.

The "In The Heights" National Tour is going to be going through New Jersey this month sometime and I will have to catch that show. If I manage to score tickets I'll definitely review it as well because I have heard incredible reviews about that show.

There's still a ton of shows to be watched so I'll make this post as regular as possible.