Stand-Up Philosophy

Hi. My name is Bryson.  And I started a new art form.

Wow. Okay.  So that's out there.  On the record.

This claim, of course, will require me to explain myself.  Which is good.  I'm excited to, really.  But I've been putting off this post for a long time.  Let's clear this hurdle, and then we'll go to work, trying to figure out all the details.

But for now, here's what's up:  

I started a new art form.  I've been working on it for a little over two years now.  In the last month or so, for the first time, I feel comfortable giving it a name.  

It's called "Stand-up Philosophy."

It's still a very new and fluid thing, of course.  But for anyone interested, these are the core concepts of the art form:

______________________________

The Rules of Stand-up Philosophy

1.  The goal is not laughs.  The goal is growth.

2.  Everything that has ever happened before your set - does not matter.

3.  Everything that will ever happen after your set - does not matter.

4.  A conversation counts as a set.

5.  Never be ashamed.  Only try to understand why.

6.  Make your stand-up better to connect with people.

7.  Connect with people to make your stand-up better.

8.  Listen to your body before your mind.

9.  Rules do not actually exist.

______________________________

Got it?  Cool.  No?  Not at all?  Also cool.  

Like I said, it's going to be a blast figuring this all out, in the coming days.  

Isn't it weird that the other 5 made posters with themselves on the far right?

Best-case scenario?  From now on, people will have a new option of how to express themselves.  At least a few more people will go through life knowing they aren't totally crazy. Or if they are, that they aren't alone. 

Worst-case scenario?  The current art form known as "stand-up comedy" gets debated and pushed forward - propelled by anyone who loves it enough to have a strong opinion about what it is or isn't, or what it "should be."  

That sure sounds like a win-win to me.

Either way, I'm thrilled with how I've spent the last two years of my life, and I'm very, very proud of the risks I've been taking.  I love myself, I love stand-up comedy, and if you happen to be reading this right now, I love you, too.

Bryson Turner, 

stand-up philosopher

Not on purpose. Just next to a window. Sometimes life is funny.

Comedy - WITHIN Life

I haven’t written on here for two weeks. I’m going to be writing on here a lot in the next few weeks.

A lot of what I write won’t be about comedy. Or at least some of it probably won’t be.

I don’t think that’s doing a disservice to this blog, or to its readers. Because comedy isn’t life. Comedy is some shit that happens in a life. Comedy is what I do, not what I am.

Wait, scratch that - it sounds douchey, and it’s not reality.

More realistically: Comedy is what I’m trying to do - not what I’m trying to be.

But comedy is not life. And this is not a comedy blog. It’s a life blog.

No, scratch that too. It is a comedy blog. But it’s a chicken and the egg thing. Comedy is nothing without the everything else that surrounds it. Comedy can’t survive on a diet of itself. It’s like everything else: pretty soon, it needs something else to keep going.

I know people that live and die with every set. Their lives are pretty sad, honestly. From my vantage point, they’re missing out on a huge part of life. Specifically, everything that isn’t comedy.

I love comedy. I love getting to do stand-up. But my life is more than that.

Some comics believe that previous line takes away from my comedy. I, personally, think it adds to it. And it raises the ceiling of what my comedy can become.

I hope I never throw life under the bus for the sake of comedy. I have no problem getting consumed by comedy. I have no problem with comedy “owning” me for stretches of my life. As long as I remember that nothing can own me unless I let it. I’m a person. And as a person, nothing can own me unless I let that person - or thing - own me.

I will let comedy own me. But I hope that I never let comedy own me against my will. That’s something different. That’s when it becomes an addiction. That’s when I’m not in control anymore.

I see comics like that. But it’s not just comics. It’s people. I see people like that. I see people owned by money all the time. And it’s sad. I want to have money. I want to be comfortable. But I never want to be owned by money. I never want money to be the force that directs my decisions. Because at that point, I’m no longer making the decisions - money is. Do you see the difference?

So this point - it's not really about comedy. It’s about attitude. It’s about my “philosophy” toward life. What is my philosophy?

If I let chasing-comedy make my life decisions for me, then I’m no better than someone who lets chasing-money make the decisions for them: neither of us are in control of ourselves. Neither of us are thinking, really. We’re just following a script, at that point.

I don’t know what I want to do with comedy. But I want to do it within a life lived well.

I don’t know what that means, either. But that’s part of why I’m doing comedy in the first place. I feel like if I can be funny enough - if me and other comics can find a funny that no one has found yet - then it could be a clue about how to live a life better.

Carlin did that. He didn’t decide what was funny. He was more humble than that. He searched for funny.

What did he find? He realized the funniest thing in the world was that some people cared more about which words we’re saying than which countries we’re bombing.

He wasn’t trying to be funny. He was pointing out things that were so not funny -- it was funny.

Some of the funniest things I’ve ever heard? Are the things that are the least funny. Pryor’s points about race. More recently, David Cross’ thoughts on 9/11, and our response to it. Louis C.K.’s points about love and divorce.

Go back hundreds of years. I know this is giving myself away as a nerd, but I swear to God, Henry David Thoreau had some hilarious points about what a bunch of shitty hypocrites our Founding Fathers were. They started a bloody, murderous revolution because the English were mistreating us by taxing our tea, but then when we started our “more perfect union,” we kept their policy of owning other human beings as property.

Really? The tea was their deal breaker?

That’s what funny is. Something is so wrong, it’s funny. And something is so funny, it makes us realize we’re wrong.

It may sound like I’m dismissing comedy that’s just silly, or stupid, or doesn’t seem to have a “point” to it. I’m not. Sometimes, the best point a comic can make is just that we’re taking everything way too fucking seriously.

A comedian should never feel bad about being silly or stupid, if that’s what feels right to them. They’re probably making a way better point - by doing what feels right - than the comic that goes up next and tells a joke about labor unions, with no joy behind it, just because that’s what they’re “supposed” to do.

Here’s the thing: I can act cocky all I want, but I have no idea what I’m fucking doing in this life. I really don’t. I can probably convince some people that I have my shit more together than them, but I don’t. I just don’t. I might be doing this whole thing all wrong.

But I’m going to try. And since I have no way of knowing one way or the other, I’m going to do my absolute, very best - to have a fucking blast along the way. Don’t get me wrong, I’ll try to help others, and try to encourage other people to be happy, too. But I’m going to really try to have a fucking blast.

More soon. I’ve been in Pittsburgh, with my family, the past ten days. I can’t wait to get back to New York, and back to comedy. I love it, and I love what I’m doing with my life.

I wrote this on the 2nd floor balcony of my brother’s new home. It’s a little cool, but nice enough to write outside. I’m sitting in the driver’s seat of an old car he used to own. It’s slightly reclined. Life is good.

Damage Control, aka Days I’m a Piece of Shit

It’s 1:30 in the afternoon. On a Monday. Monday, March 19, 2012.

So far today, I’ve been a piece of shit.

I don’t have a job, but I woke up by around 8 or 8:30. I watched a few TED Talks, and then I had a good breakfast. I even took Adderall, which usually means that I’m going to do something productive and focused with my day. At 9:30, it looked like this was going to be a great day. The beginning of a great week.

Then it all fell apart. I started playing an app on my iPhone - a mind-numbing, repetitious video game app.

And then it was 3 hours later, before I looked up. And now it’s 1:30. I haven’t done a damn thing today.

And you can’t start a day at 1:30 in the afternoon. 9:30? Yeah! 11 in the morning? There’s still time to build momentum. But 1:30? When the day is already more than half over? When you haven’t done anything except be a lazy bum so far?

No. Come on. Who am I kidding? The dye has been cast. I’m a shitty person today. And since it’s Monday, that probably means I’m going to have an unproductive, pointless week.

And, it’s already the 19th! It feels like March just started. God damn it I’m a piece of shit. What have I done this month? I haven’t read a book, I haven’t watched a movie, I haven’t done any amazing shows, I haven’t gotten into any clubs. What have I done, in 19 days? Nothing.

And honestly, at the end of March, we’re already a quarter of the way through the year. Seriously? A quarter over? I’m still writing 2011 on my checks! Or I would, if I ever used checks.

What have I done this year? Honestly, what’s different now than my life 3 months ago? I’m not making any more money. I’m not in at any clubs. I still haven’t been on TV. I still haven’t cleaned my room, for Christ’s sake. What the hell is wrong with me?

You know what’s really messed up? I’ve never had a clean room. It’s 2012. I was born in 1984. I’m supposed to be a 28 year-old man right now. Some days, that’s too hilarious to be sad. But today, that’s too sad to be hilarious.

I can barely see my bedroom floor. There are 3 glasses next to my bed, because I bring a new one in every night and never bother to take them into the kitchen the next morning. I know that’s a little thing, but the little things add up. Flossing? I’m lucky if I remember to brush my teeth half the time.

I haven’t had an hourly-wage job in 4 years. I say I love stand-up, but how often do I write during my days? I say I work hard, but how often do I choose a girl, or a conversation, over what I claim is my life’s passion? Am I any more disciplined than I was when I finished college and was trying to do this when I was 22? The things that took up my time - watching sports, playing games, chasing women - am I any better at living my life now than I was then?

No. That was six years ago. What has changed - really - in six years? My lifestyle is almost exactly the same - I live in an apartment, I eat pizza, and I go do open-mics at night. I never work out with any consistency, so my body is almost exactly the same - right around 150 pounds, like I have been for the past decade. My work ethic is the same - I go to plenty of open-mics, but I don’t call clubs, I don’t e-mail bookers, and I don’t work off-stage to tighten my jokes.

Sure, I’m a better comic now. But not because I’m actually any different. I’ve just been doing it for longer. Is that really a reason to get excited?

I’m the same person I was six years ago. You know why? Because of today. Because I’ve had six years of days like today. Where I wake up. And have a chance to not be a piece of shit. And then I fuck it up.

I feel bad that I didn’t do anything from 9:30 to 11. And no matter what I do the rest of the day, it won’t be as much as I could have done. So I spend 11 to 12 avoiding getting started, and facing that reality. And then I feel even worse for the next hour-and-a-half, because I know that clock is ticking forward.

It’s bizarre. It’s almost like I’m thinking if I live a day shittily enough, it won’t count.

Every year, Major League Baseball has a “Home Run Derby,” where the best hitters try to hit as many home runs as they can before they get 10 outs. So somebody throws a pitch, and if they swing and don’t hit a home run, that’s an out. And you just count how many home runs each guy hits, before he has 10 swings that aren’t home runs.

The thing is, if they don’t swing at a pitch - and just wait for a better pitch next time - then it doesn’t count as an out. If they don’t think it’s a good pitch, they can just let it go by, no penalty.

That’s kind of how I live my life sometimes. It’s like every day is a new “pitch,” a new chance to hit a home run. But I’m so terrified of not hitting a home run, that most days, I just end up not swinging at all. I end up taking the pitch.

It’s so stupid. Logically, I know that. Because that’s not how life works. In real-life Home-Run Derby, we get a certain number of pitches (God damn it, I’d like to get through ONE POST on here without turning into a motivational speaker. Christ).

I don’t know what my point is. So I’ll just go back to the one I planned to make when I started this an hour ago:

That was the mentality I fell into, for most of the first half of 2011. Last year, when I first moved to New York, I just got into a funk. I didn’t go to any open-mics the first night I was in town. Or the second night. And then all of a sudden, it was the first week. Then, I’d gone out 5 nights in 3 months. It just snowballed. I avoided facing the present, because to do so, I had to admit my past.

So far this year, I’ve been doing a great job of limiting the damage. Sometimes I’ll have an unproductive day, but I don’t let it become an empty week. Today isn’t going to be as productive as it could have been, but it can still be something: I’m writing this blog, which is something. And I still have time to head out and get some open-mics in.

But I gotta get going. And keep going. I’m a fuck-up. Oh well. Part of the game.

The Point of Stand-Up

There are basically two kinds of humor. There's the kind of humor that distracts you. And there's the kind of humor that makes you more aware.

Stand-up is about finding the second kind.

“Oh come on illegal foreigners,

Come and get dem green cards,

And learn some damn English,

And den how to drive.

-- Daniel Whitney

“...and a voice said to me, it said, ‘Look around - what do you see?’ And I said, ‘I see all colors of people doing everything,’ you know? And the voice said, ‘Do you see any niggers?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And it said ‘You know why? Cause there aren’t any.’” -- Richard Pryor (after returning from Africa)