Student Blog: A Look Back on the Past Year

I started writing for Broadway World as a student blogger exactly 1 year ago. My mom sent me the application because, at the time, I felt like I had nothing going for me regarding theatre. I was starting my sophomore year as a Musical Theatre major at Otterbein and had not been cast in anything: no mainstage musicals or student-directed productions. It was hard to watch all of my classmates in shows while I was experiencing so much doubt in myself and wondering whether this was the right path for me. If I couldn’t even be cast in shows at the school I was paying to be at, how was I supposed to make it in the industry? 

I decided that I needed to find joy outside of theatre because, at the time, it was not bringing me any. I got back into writing and began this blog. At first, it was hard; I felt like I had nothing worth writing about. Who wanted to read a blog about being a college student studying musical theatre, having a terrible time, and being forced to find ways to artistically fill themselves outside of theatre? But I kept writing every month about whatever was happening to me at that time. Writing about what was going on really made me look inward and forced me to find a positive spin on what I was dealing with in order to write blog posts I thought people would want to read. Even if I didn’t truly believe the positive spin at the time.

As I kept writing, things slowly got better and better; I was really starting to believe all of the positive spins on things I was writing about, and then I booked the lead in the Spring musical. I was overjoyed. It showed me that while there are times that are hard, there are also incredible things just around the corner. I went from playing Ella in Cinderella to playing Amalia in a summer stock production of She Loves Me, to being in the dance ensemble of our fall production of Curtains, to currently swinging the female ensemble in Rock of Ages. In the past year, I found joy in theatre again. Every night going to rehearsal, I feel the same way I did when I was a little kid doing musicals. Now it is at a more professional level, of course, but I am just letting myself have fun.

Looking back on the year and a half when I wasn't cast, it was tough, of course, but in the big picture, it set me up for success. We had an Otterbein alum give a masterclass the other day, and one of the biggest things she said was that the theatre industry is a mental battle, and constant rejection is what causes people to leave. The fact that she dealt with a lot of rejection at the collegiate level forced her to learn how to cope with it when she got into the real world and helped her to be as successful as she is now.

So even though in the last 6 months I have been doing incredibly well and booking many shows, I know there will come another time when I am not doing as well, but now I am prepared for it because of all the work I put into myself and my outside interests. It is incredibly special to be able to look back on the blog posts I have written in the last year and see the progress I have made mentally as well as artistically, from a girl who had to be convinced not to drop out of school and change my career to someone who can’t imagine doing anything else and wakes up every morning excited to see what the day has in store.