How do you treat a baby?

I recently gave birth to a beautiful baby.

I brought a story called "Afraid of Karma" into existence. It began with writing, recording and producing an album of indie rock electro-pop music, and then those songs became the skeleton of my solo show.

During the process, I wrestled with a lot of self-judgment. "I am not pretty enough. I am not thin enough. My voice isn't good enough. I'm not young enough." And after the first performance, I tumbled into a dark place, hating myself and my work, wanting to give up and even resenting the people who had helped me bring it into the world. (Sound familiar to any new moms?)

But once I got a little distance from the show and heard the objective feedback of audience members, I began to have a new understanding. I'd had an unconscious hope, which really was an unconscious demand, that the show make money. And since that didn't happen instantaneously, my mind told me that the show had been a failure.

In reality, the show became its own entity when I birthed it. And as its own entity, it's not my place to criticize it, bash it, belittle it or impose unreasonable demands on it as I often do to myself. (And why do I think it's ok to treat myself that way? That's a blogpost for another day!) Instead, as the show is an infant, it's actually my job to care for it, to nurture it, to feed it, to allow it to grow and evolve at its own pace and to let it guide me. That is how I would raise a child.