lesson 6

• We started the lesson doing side stretches, following from the exercise we began to discuss what the play is about -morality and being human, from this discussion we got a variety of comments such as Everyman the play teaches us as humans that we will always learn from our mistakes, we should never take anything for granted and always be appreciative and grateful for the things we have, this doesn't necessarily only mean towards physical items but we should be grateful for our lives and know that everything happens for a reason, just because it is bad doesn't mean it will forever remain that way, good will always come out of the bad even if its not easily recognized. being a human we are very easily encouraged to do certain things because its what society is following, but if we know the actions we are about to take could lead to serious consequences then we should build the strength to not do it and not live for other people but ourselves, we shouldn't live for other peoples validation or interest. You only live once and that saying doesn't mean you should go crazy and cause harm to others, you should live your life the way you want it to so when death comes you can say to yourself and confirm that you know you've done all the things you've wanted to accomplish in your life. before starting rehearsals we did an exercise which involved everyone in the class getting into a circle, this exercise is a circle of happiness, we go round in a circle going into the middle and giving a gesture to represent happiness but there is a twist, as we go round we have to get bigger and more happier with our gestures. this was a very fun exercise and it was interesting to see how people would make their action more bigger and happier, by the end of the exercise all of us were happy and that was the objective of the exercise. Ben explained to us that he wanted us to do this exercise first, as now we would be starting an exercise that could get us emotional and could bring back memories for certain individuals that have faced death in family or friends before. He explained the exercise isn't intended to make us remember things but to bring back that feeling we had when the certain event happened, before splitting us into pairs and doing the exercise, he wanted everyone in the class to see an example of what we were going to do. so we understood what the exercise wants from us. Sophia - mother and anya - dead child were in the middle of the circle, Ben put on music to set the atmosphere and gave them the scenario that Sophia is holding her dead child, show us your reaction. He asked from the rest of us to make sounds/ noises of how we would feel if we were in Sophia's position, this exercise went on for five minutes, as a class we realised that its the sounds we made that set the scene rather than the acting and that the way how Sophia used minimal movement was more effective than if she was to hysterical crying and shouting. We then split into pairs, our scenario was that person B was dying in Person A's arms and person A's objective is to keep person B up, this exercise ran for 8 minutes with music in the background. by the end of the exercise a few of us were crying and when asked why majority said it was because it was the struggle of keeping person B up and making sure they didn't 'die' but as person B started dropping it made them feel like they were actually dying, also the hug in the beginning made them feel like they had a connection and made them appreciate hugs because a hug made them feel comfortable and safe. When we came back from lunch all of fellowship ran through the fellowship scene by ourselves and were able to fix things that weren't as strong. this was very productive