Me, you, or someone you know:

“I don’t want to do it anymore. I’m going to …”

Fill in the blank: Quit, sell it, leave, cancel, give it away, walk, resign.

Photo: Me with the white face in a play called "Dear Gabby" at the Santa Monica Playhouse when I was 11

When I was 11 years old I discovered acting. I became obsessed with it like a magical something I had found under a rock in my backyard, a magical something that was all mine. Once I turned the rock over I had found my little magical kingdom and got lost in it, spending afternoons after school cleaning toilets or sweeping so I could be part of the acting troupe.

Life takes a great many unexpected twists and turns. While some are welcome, others are not so desirable. The obvious negatives are the tragedies that are thrown our way in the senseless or unavoidable circumstances of losing someone or something, through death or divorce or distance. We lose jobs in times of tough economy. We lose houses and vehicles when we default on loans. But have you ever lost control of your entire life, only to regain your direction with a whole new perspective? Have you ever truly lost your concept of self, that you might be found again?

I don’t know about you but I have always been uncomfortable with the word power, especially when applying the word ‘powerful’ to describe myself.

Call it a mix of having been raised by a mentally ill woman who misused hers with the woes of gender and being born a girl, but sadly harnessing my own innate power, the internal blazing ferocity that is part and parcel of our deepest core intelligence, has been work and something that, up until a few years ago, I’ve skated tentatively around.