Main Character

I’m sure you all have heard of “main character energy” but if you really think about it, we all really are the main characters in our own story. That’s not to say there aren’t other important supporting characters, but we each are the stars of our own movies while also playing co-stars in other people’s movies.

My character is ever evolving and yes, very deep in the character development stage. Here is the current trailer to my movie: A 25-year-old girl thinks she has her life all figured out (as most 20-something’s do), but quickly realizes she doesn’t. She finds herself as a supporting role in many other people’s movies but never takes the lead in her own. Then, life hits her square in the face, forcing a chronically indecisive girl to make life changing decisions and change her plans – her worst nightmare. She finally starts viewing herself as the main character in her own life and stops holding herself back. She ends an almost 5-year-long relationship resulting in not only the loss of the partner but also of friendships she thought that she’d have forever (and had to be in the same wedding as the ex post breakup because her best friend from childhood was engaged to the ex’s brother – which is a story for another time), makes amazing new friends, starts doing the things she loves, gets more involved in community and group activities, goes to more concerts, says yes to everything, travels more, and eventually uproots her life, dragging her 2-year-old corgi (side-kick and main supporting character played by Monty Siclair) to Denver.

Denver is a fresh new start for her. A much bigger city with so many people and opportunities ahead. She’s starting from scratch – well kind of. Conveniently and unknowingly she moves into an apartment which ends up being located quite literally across the street from a man that she met at a bar and hooked up with once while visiting her brother 8 months prior to moving. And yes, she runs into this man many times and ends up seeing him every single morning while she walks her dog and he drives to work.

And that’s just the tip of the iceberg of what’s happened in the past year. So, follow along if you want to watch this character go through the high’s and low’s of life with all the things that come along with being single, living in a new city, starting new job, and just being a girl enjoying the ride.

I’ve always said I relate most to the character Annie from Bridesmaids (played by Kristen Wiig) while going through the trials and emotions from the previous year. But what really got me through my hardest, weirdest, funniest times was always telling myself, “life’s a movie” because the stuff that happens to me (and all of us) is too much of a coincidence sometimes and just adds to the plot. Life can be heavy and feel so dark, but this silly little saying that I told myself over and over again made me realize that life really isn’t that serious. We are all going to figure it out – or maybe we won’t, but that’s the beauty of it all. Everything we go through adds to who we are. We grow, learn, stumble, fall, cry, fall again, laugh, make mistakes, and make even more mistakes. But for some reason the mantra “life’s a movie” really grounded me no matter what I was feeling. It meant so many different things – hence when something goes wrong I say we’re deep in the character development stage. When something funny happens or when something awful happens, just remind yourself that life truly is a movie and we’re just along for the ride. I can’t wait to see how this movie ends. Grab your popcorn and sit back as the show begins.