I recently received a message from a very close and
dear friend mentioning that she was going thru very difficult times and
sometimes when every problem hits you at the same time, it is very challenging
and she was wishing for a tropical island with nobody around.
She added that she needed all her strength and even the strength of her friends to face
those moments of adversity. She ended by saying that live can be a challenge.
Yes life is a perpetual challenge
Challenge for life
Challenge for work
Challenge for family
Challenge for friendship
Challenge for love
Challenge for adversaries
And certainly many others
But the winners are the ones who accept the
challenges and fight, and sometimes they loose and sometimes win, so that hopefully
the outcome will be positive.
That’s life
CHALLENGE FOR LIFE
I was born in a third world country and was part of
a small minority; during my entire childhood I had to deal with many, many
hardships, difficult times and big challenges. We had to leave that country
when I was 16 and arrived in France where life was also very difficult, and
personal tragedies prevented me from having a normal adolescence and also hurt
my first years as an adult; I finally arrived in this country in 1972 barely
speaking English and had to build a life for myself.
Life we believe is not always fair, and some have greater
advantages: better health, better family surroundings, better education, better
intellect, better physical appearance etc… BUT IT IS IN OUR POWER TO TRY TO
FIND WAYS TO REMEDY WHAT WE ARE LACKING.
We have to learn how to respect others but also to
respect ourselves.
Yes, life is a perpetual challenge but ALL OF US must
deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and more experienced.
CHALLENGE FOR WORK
I was recently in my
house in New Jersey and on a wall in the entrance hall there was a poster of
one of my season in Montreal.
The season was
Don Carlo , La
Traviata, Carmen, Manon, …new productions
and
Susannah,The
Consul,La Gioconda
That extraordinary
season 98/99 was not from the last century but during my tenure in Montreal as
general director.
I constantly hear
from most of people that the opera world is in trouble, that companies have lots
of financial problems, cannot raise money, cannot sell tickets, seasons are
always changing, productions are canceled,
I constantly hear that
productions are not what they were, that singers are not as talented than 15,
20, 25 years ago, that conductors are amateurish, that directors are
incompetent, that designers have no idea of what the opera is about
etc…etc…etc…
I hear all day long
that we need something NEW: NEW operas, NEW approach, NEW novelty, NEW
EVERYTHING.
I constantly hear that
there are too many singers arriving on the market, too many young artists’
programs, too many directors, too many conductors, too many this or too many
that.
What happened to the
opera world? Yes, we are in a crisis: new operas that the audience does not
want to see, old operas that the audience has seen too many times with no GREAT
PERSONALITIES to attract aficionados.
Yes, work is a perpetual challenge but ALL OF US must
deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and experienced.
CHALLENGE FOR FAMILY
I mentioned before
that family challenges in any profession could be very difficult…
Challenges with
parents who want something else for us, with children who need more of our
attention, with family who look at us as if we are demented or at best,
strange…We have to juggle our profession and our aspirations under other people’s
scrutiny and the judgment passed by the REAL people who have a REAL job,
according to them.
As an adolescent and
a young adult I did not have to deal with this problem since my family was
reduced to almost nothing, but in adulthood my new family became very important
to me and at last, I had to deal with it just like everybody else.
We cannot ignore our
family and it lasts forever, until our departure to the other world. Even that
other world is not the end, we will live on for a while in their memories, we
will have influenced their thoughts and they will carry some of us with them.
We have to do the
best we can, the best we are able to give, and that is a hard task.
Yes, family is a perpetual challenge but ALL OF US must
deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and experienced.
CHALLENGE FOR FRIENDSHIP
Sometimes people tell me: You must have a lot of
friends after all these years. You are a lucky man. All that traveling and
making friends all over the world. Do you keep in touch with all of them?
Unfortunately my answer is: I do not have many
friends, the friends of my childhood have disappeared in other countries, the
friends of my adolescence have gone into the smoke of life and turned into
shadows of my imagination, the friends of my young adulthood have vanished in
the need for survival and I would probably not even recognize them now.
Do we miss the ghosts of our past that we called
friends? Do they still influence our actions, our life?
Do they challenge us by their absence?
Friendship??? What does that really require?
Somebody who enjoys having a good time with me?
Going regularly for a drink or dinner with the same
people, are they friends?
When we spend all night with some people rebuilding
the world, are they friends?
How can I define what friendship is? Somebody I see rarely but who can be
there for me in difficult moments?
Who are my friends and where are my friends? Who
can I really trust? Who is ready to be next to me when needed?
How can I keep friends when my profession calls me to
different places all year long? Will I spend my life making friends and then losing
them?
Many questions, many doubts, many hesitations, but
understanding comes from questioning and doubting and hesitating.
Yes, friendship is a perpetual challenge but ALL OF
US must deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and experienced.
CHALLENGE FOR LOVE
Love of one person, love of children, love of
friends, love of associates…
Some people dedicate their need of love by loving
pets, fine.
This is an eternal challenge and even more acute in
some professions.
We are supposed to give our love to a chosen group
of people. But too often our profession demands that we give our energy, our
love, our resources of feelings, our need to share, to others, people we do not
even know, that will pump our heart and soul for the name of art… We do it in
the name of art, without thinking, because actually we do it to fulfill OUR
NEEDS and not the needs of others.
But what is left? Do we have enough left for the
real ones, the ones who are really important, the ones we need and who need
us…How much can we still give? Do
we have the right to tell them that we are tired, that we are not in the mood,
that we are empty?
We must challenge this and find the balance, after
all we are the chosen ones and capable of having a heart big enough for all.
Yes, love is a perpetual challenge but ALL OF US
must deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and experienced.
CHALLENGE FOR ADVERSARIES
This is probably the most challenging because very
often we are powerless with our adversaries.
What can we do when people do not like us?
If it comes from bad things we have done, mistakes
we made, bad behavior, lack of consideration for the needs of others, let’s try
to modify our bad judgment, let’s make amend, let’s try to remedy, let’s talk
to the adversary and change his or her mind by new actions, new thoughts, new
attitude.
But I hear very often the following statement:
He/ She does not like me, I do not know why… What
have I done?
Why he/she does not like me?
I did nothing, I am/was just myself. But that is
precisely the reason, some people do not like who we are, what we do, what we
represent, what we say, what we do not say, what we wear, the color of our
eyes, our French or southern accent, the way we walk, the way we eat, the way
we talk, the way we, we, we….
In these cases, we must go on with our life and not
try to change the mind of the adversaries; they are the bigger losers not to
appreciate us.
Yes, adversaries are a perpetual challenge but ALL
OF US must deal with it, and the struggle makes us stronger and experienced.
CHALLENGES FOR ONESELF
NO COMMENT.
All of us have reasons to be what we are, all of us
are challenged by life, by too much experience, by lack of experience, by being
too protected or by being too lonely.
All of us grow too attached to certain necessities
or ignore the basic of anything.
ALL OF US ARE CHALLENGED.
GOOD LUCK
