Finding My Way Back
Laura Riggle performing at her Senior Cabaret in 2021. Photo by Laura Riggle
In the pursuit of “finding myself” this year, I’ve really had to question what my strengths are, and with those in mind, what I actually enjoy doing. Luckily, I chose a beginner’s course in Marketing, called Professional Selling, where we were tasked to complete the Clifton Strengths Assessment. I answered multiple questions to determine my strengths that can be applied to my future career.
My three top signature themes were learner, empathy, and positivity. As an avid worrier, I overanalyze situations, conversations, facial expressions, and mandatory behavioral assessments to the point of exhaustion, so of course I sought for the hidden meaning behind my results.
“Where did these results come from? Why do I function this way? What does this mean for my future?” I realized that these strengths trace back to why performing and musical theatre came so naturally to me. Musical theatre has been something I always come back to, and looking at these traits only reinforces the reason why.
I always appreciated the process of learning a character, a setting, and a story. As soon as I was given the script for a musical I was cast in, or a piece of music to learn, I would dissect it in its entirety, exploring the emotions and motivations of the characters.
I was intrigued with each character’s unique qualities, and I tailored my performance to these small details, making it more authentic. I felt as if I couldn’t do the character justice without this preparation, and I enjoyed filling the gaps of a character’s personality and backstory with my own ideas.
There was something about seeing a character more clearly that allowed me to fathom my own identity. I was able to find a point of relation in every role I portrayed, navigating my own self in the process.
While empathy for others came easily to me, the opinion of others was, in many cases, the only way I gauged my own confidence. The learner in me couldn’t refrain from adding pressure to be better, but with others’ validation, I was able to decompress from my own self-criticism.
Positivity became my coping mechanism in high school. I am easily weighed down by negativity, whether it be intentional or not, and in musical theatre, rejection could not be avoided. I adapted to these negative environments by being the opposite, turning rejection into motivation. I didn’t really have a choice, because without that positivity, I was quick to avoid or hide.
While I credit these three traits for succeeding as a performer, they also led to my downfall. My obsession with learning became exhausting. It came to the point where I felt like no amount of learning could make me good enough, as I was not amounting to my own expectations. My empathy caused me to feel torn between my own passion and the concerns from my inner circle, ending with my guilt and hesitation crushing my dream. My positivity only lasted for so long, and without my support system, it became harder and harder to motivate myself.
Since I’ve stopped performing, I try so hard to convince myself that there is something else that can fit in the void. The learning, empathy, and positivity I possess have a hard time fitting anywhere else. Even if it isn’t my career, there must be a place for it, whether its practical or not. I still hold onto fragments of what I had, and the strengths are still there. When will it be the right time?
