- Janet | Interview
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- I've been blessed with beautiful friends.
Those friends have become
my family.
My friends have helped me stay steady and sane.
Along with my
fans , they've been there when I've needed support.
In these past three
years since The Velvet Rope tour I've gone through changes.
A Lot has
happened. I'd Like to share with you something of what I've learned.
I'm not
an expert on anything except trying to be the best me I can be.
All I can do
is report from my own life lessons.
Sometimes I Think fans get an inflated
impressions of the entertainers they like.
Maybe we entertainers add to the
inflation by trying to look flawless and act perfectly.
When you breack it
down, we're faced with the same kind of fears most everyone has.
At least
that's true for me. My fears are pretty simple :
I'm afraid I'm not a good
enough dancer,or singer, or actress. Some might think that sounds silly,
since I'"ve had success. But,to me, no fear is silly-not yours and not mine.
For much of my life.
I was ashamed of my fears,and that only made it worse.
Stuffing fears only seemed to strengthen them.
Now I'm trying to give myself
the right to be human, the right to be afraid. I don't mean I go around shaking
and trembling, but when uncertainty pops up, rather than hide it, I admit
it. I talk about it.
I gather my friends around me and discuss it. I tell
them just how I feel. When they need me, I try to be a good
listener. My
friends are honest about their feelings, and I'm honest about mine.
In my
mind, the bravest act is honestly?
If I tried to live up an image of what I
should be, I would be in trouble.
When I'm just being myself, I'm fine.
Then there's romance. As you may know,my long term relationship ended.
That was something else that made was afraid-
Afraid I'd never get this
relationship thing right, afraid I'd never find another soulmate.
It was
another area where the public
had to forget my image and remember I'm just
another human being.
When It comes to love, I can make poor choices ;
I
can fall too hard, become confused, lose my way.
I might have been playing
out a pattern begun by my mother of my mother's mother or her mother's mother.
Who knows?? Whatever the case,I had to break the pattern, face the fear and
move on.
Finding myself has always been my challenge. Maybe that's true for
all of us.
Finding myself has taken 35 years, and I still haven't
completed the task. I began as a child who was privilegied and sheltered ;
I was introduce into show business when I was still a baby.
It was an
environment in which self-knowledge was never stressed.
How do others view
you??was the key question- never. How do you view yourself ?
Maybe it was
just an exaggerated version of what everyone goes through:
we go through
life worrying about what the world thinks of us.
That worry can turn into a
nasty critic who keeps
whispering in our ear-you're not good enough ; you're
doing it all wrong; you'll never get it right.
How do we handle that nasty
critic? I'd like to kill off the critic, but that doesn't work.
He-or
She-has been there too long to disappear
onvernight. So I try to accept it
as part of me.
The more I accept those parts of me I don't like and the more
I work on changing them,
the less pronouced they become.
I'm writing all
this to you because I have a feeling that, although we're different,
we"'re
also the same. We're all fighting fear;
We're all triying to take better
care and be kinder to ourselves.
For me, finding that kindness depends upon
believing in something greater than myself.
I believe in determination and
heart. I believe that, despite our doubts, we do what we have to do. We press
on.
We get up and go to school, go to work, deal with our relationships,
learn what needs to be learned.
We work toward our goals and pursue our
dreams. We don't let fears stop us.
I believe in your uniqueness, in your
special gifts, just as I've come to believe in mine.
I also believe in God.
God as a source of strength and protection against negativity,
God who lives
inside us and guides us into the light of learning. God-the loving spirit
within-is how I wake up
in the morning and face the task ahead.
In my
work, in entertaining you with the music that reflects the passion of my soul, I
find joy.
I hope you feel that joy in my songs and my show. That joy is all
for you.
I thank you for staying with me all these years,and, in so many
ways,encouraging me to be true to myself.
I can only wish the same for you.
Love Janet
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