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"Life is what happens to you while you're busy making other plans." --John Lennon

Once upon a time, and long, long ago, as a then-New York playwright, I was receiving my "fifteen minutes of fame," as Andy Warhol used to say, when my first play, VIRGINIA, received several awards including the National Endowment of the Arts Award. When asked to lecture at Skidmore on any topic, I chose "Art as Process, Not Product" and warned how the commercialism of focusing on product had harmed American culture. I spoke of how the artist must see his life and work as a journey and a process rather than merely a consumer product. Now, twenty years later, I still believe this, for risk and change matter tremendously––to art as well as for the individuation of the personal life.

Louise Nevelson, the noted sculptor, once said, “You pay for what you do and you pay for what you don’t do.” It seemed better to opt for the way of being true to one’s self at every turn, even though what seems right one day may change. I have noticed the greatest lessons tend to come during the difficult bits. Life is a package deal. One cannot order life and ask that the hard portions be left out, please. Security is an inner state, not a bank account.

Some believe that, life after life, the soul chooses what it needs on its continuous journey towards some final realization. If this is so, the outer details of our lives may be less important than the inner evolution of the Self. So much for an impressive resume!

After seeing eight of my plays produced and garnishing further awards, I was surprised at the emptiness I was experiencing. Needing a change, I set out on my own to Cornwall, England, to walk the coastal paths. There I experienced a kind of epiphany. I had just come upon a breathtaking view of the Atlantic and stopped to take in the beauty of it. At this precise moment, a thrush perched just a few inches from me opened its beak wide and began to sing loudly. I turned my head and marveled how this small bird could make such a great and glorious sound. Then, inexplicably, I began to weep. The thrush kept singing, not minding my emotional display. Why was I weeping?

Perhaps because I envied that songbird who sang for the sheer, natural joy of it, not for agents or critics. You see, in New York, I had become a professional writer and had somewhere along the line lost the joy of it, presumably the reason one begins writing in the first place. This small bird had taught me an important lesson. One must be one’s self, heedless of the world’s response. This inner change nudged me to seek an outer change. I applied for, and to my surprise won, a Fulbright Research Award to study the actor storyteller in the south of India. I wanted to go where drama was more than Broadway entertainment, where it carried some deeper meaning for the culture. A single mom by then, I took my son, Christopher, out of school so that he might accompany me to India. My only condition, other than the school lesson plans we were obliged to do, was that he keep a journal (not a diary) of his experience of the year in India. Thus began his own interest in writing. The year in India was full of inner and profound changes for both of us. In fact, I believe now that this time away from life as usual became a foundation of all that was to follow. India is a mirror and intensifies whatever it reflects in ourselves.

Afterwards, I was invited to teach at the University of Texas-Austin for a year. There I wrote my first screenplay, as an exercise––just to see if I could master the form. A few days after I completed the script, I was invited to fly to Los Angeles to accept an award for one of my plays, The Women of Cedar Creek. The actress Julie Harris, presented the award, which was in her name. I asked Ms. Harris if she might read a screenplay I had just written. I added that I felt she would be perfect for the title role. She read it that night and called the next morning to say she'd love to do it. Later, Jason Robards came aboard and “The Christmas Wife” was produced within the year. It was nominated for several awards, including Best Picture and Best Writing. This led to other assignments, starting with writing a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie for television. Writing assignments began to pour in for both television movies and features. My son had by now left for university so I decided to go with the flow. I sold or gave away everything except half of my library and my Scandinavian backless typing chair and left New York City for Hollywood.

I was fortunate and worked a lot. However, after ten years, the feeling of emptiness overtook me in spite of––or perhaps because of––the outer success. Little by little, I was lost in a labyrinth without Ariadne’s thread to find my way back to Self. I returned to India and while there suffered a severe heat stroke, which curiously seemed a predictable extension of the––burn-out––experienced in Hollywood. This began a series of changes in my life wherein the outer calamity (i.e., the heat stroke) became ultimately a blessing in disguise.

For four years I did not write. I could not write. Feeling pressure from agents, I would make sincere attempts, but weird occurrences would stall me. Twice I tried to push the river and force myself to write. The first time, I fell and broke my right wrist. The second time I tried to exert my will, snap out of it, and just do it, my computer (only a year old) blew. By then the message was clear: it was not yet time to write. Something deep within was trying to get my attention. This marked the beginning of what I perceive now as a soul-retrieving inner journey. In older cultures, shamans often heal by re-connecting the person to his soul, which has become disconnected. I suspect this is as true today as when the practice began.

It took three years to recover my health from the heat stroke, and to reconnect to my soul’s journey. I was asked to let go of all self-images, rigid beliefs that no longer served, and, oh yes, my pride. Ever noticed how illness of any kind humbles one in its wake? I began to do community volunteer work, organizing cultural events and various international speakers in philosophy and alternative medicine. Friends became more important. I considered marriage, but shied away at the last minute. I discovered I was a person apart from my resume. In short, I got a life.

My life, like many, has been full of changes. I sometimes think of the various hats we wear as images on a cinema screen. Costumes and stories--even the players are forever changing, yet the background remains the same. The screen is not the stories projected upon it any more than we are what we do. It is the screen or rather the Self that interests me more and more.

I believe in changes. However, I no longer see them as acts of will. For, in the process of my life, I have changed, and maybe that's the whole point. Evolution is inner as well as outer. My "daemon" demanded surrender and a deeper commitment that lies beyond the ego. And this, as the road not taken, has made all the difference.

I have absolutely no idea where my life will lead, personally, professionally, or spiritually. The difference is I no longer need to know - or at least, not quite as much. I begin to experience the wonder of daily life as a series of interconnected moments. It took a heat stroke and four years of wandering in the desert of my illusions to return to life and awakening. From this, I was given a precious gift––To trust once again the process of inner journey. To be open and risk all for the truth of the moment, and, it goes without saying, to remain open to change. One of the meanings of––change––in the dictionary is to transform. What if the intention in life became less utilitarian and more transforming? More open to growth and change. Then whatever it is we do, we do consciously, and with purpose. Rather a nice way to look at it, isn’t it?

CATHRINE ANN JONES, award-winning playwright & screenwriter, films include THE CHRISTMAS WIFE (Jason Robards), and the television series, TOUCHED BY AN ANGEL. She has served on the writing faculty at The New York School (N.Y.C.), University of Southern California (U.S.C.), and the Esalen Institute