Evaluating Soul Purpose

tony and i spent a good few hours talking about the state of soul purpose. we talked about its strengths, its weaknesses, and ideas about what needs to be done to take the team to the next level. both of our observations and analysises are pretty much in agreement as are our ideas for possible solutions.

so far, the solutions don't look good but most intensive surgery doesn't. in order to make something better, in order to heal something, sometimes you just need to break something first. wether it's just complaceny on the parts of the members or what, but group is just very otiose.

one of the solutions, which i think is the least desirable, but will also be the most effective, is to split the team into two groups. one team, the veterans and the others, the green. this is not to say that team g is bad or their skills are wanting but rather they need more experience and need to be taught the basics. at the same time, team v needs to be challenged and pushed forward to the next level. as it is, team v is picking up bad habits and losing the things they have learned already.

soul purpose as a whole won't like this decision. as most people don't like the decision for surgery. but some things need to be done in order for continual health and growth.

a solution to the problem that will invariably arise is to have the groups recombine for larger exercises every once in awhile. or to spend half the time in the smaller teams and then the other half as a larger team.

of course, this is just a patch until next season. some sort of long term plan needs to be instituted in order for the team to be self sustaining.

as of right now, it doesn't look like we'll be abe to put on a decint christmas production. partly, it has to do with the fact that they told us about it so late. if you consider that a good script will take about 1.5 ~ 2 months to turn around, from conception to final production, we were only given 1 month. by the time we finish the script, we will have less than 2 weeks to memorize, block, and practice. this is, of course, if we didn't have the internal issues at hand.

part of me, the selfish part, wants to attempt the christmas production dispite all the warnings and red flags. i want to see it fall and burn, crumbling under the weight of itself. then it would show us the fruits of our labor. it'll show us how terrible we have lathargically become in the last few months. and hopefully, in the long run, it'll make for a better perspectives production.

our focus and passion needs to be resolved. we need to remember again why we act and why we perform.

in the meantime, i'm thinking up plots for pat and vincent's piece of perspectives. so far, i have a few plot ideas, but nothing really jumps out at me. luckily its not for me and i don't have to perform it, therfore taking some of the pressure off.

here's what i have so far:

• a boy has set the house on fire by accident. he thinks about how this practical joke will be funny, but doesn't intend to burn the house down. while a little boy thinks about all the stuph he lost and wonders about the future



• two brothers who were playing w/ fire inadvertly burn their house down



• two brothers, one hates his step-father because of what he does to his mom and tries to set him on fire while he slept. but the fire got out of control. the other brother who is younger is just thinking about how he can no longer do anything with his dad cuz he's now dead.



• two teenage boys are walking down the street. one sees the fire and thinks about how its so cool and how i he likes the fire truck. the other boy, who knows the family that lives there frets at what happened to those inside.