Welcome to the Clown Workout, daily exercises for Clowns in isolation during the coronavirus pandemic 2020. 

In these turbulent times, to keep myself grounded, I've been retreating to my meditation cushion. It greets me with open arms and holds me while I tune in to where I'm at, let go of whatever's been building up and draw in courage, curiosity and compassion. 

I'd like to share a loving kindness meditation that came to me the other morning. It brought me comfort and ease and helped me feel connected to the human race. I hope it'll do the same for you.

Have you ever found yourself in a supermarket, standing stock still, staring at the carrots, unable to figure out whether you need carrots? What would you use them for anyway? What's the point in carrots? Or food in general? Or standing up? In fact, what's the point of anything that isn't lying quietly in the soft, muffled sanctuary of your bed? Would anyone notice if you were to crawl into the carrots and have a little nap?

Welcome to the Land of Burn Out!

I'm sitting in Paddington station, beaming the happy glow of a play-geek who's spent a full day of contemplating the nature of play with a gang of fired-up play enthusiasts. 

I was invited up to London by the Wellcome Collection, to speak at their 'Perspectives On Play' symposium...

Last week, a recent Intro To Clown student sent me a questionnaire. She's doing a research project about the use of positive feedback in creative learning environments. I happened to have a very long train journey - all the way from Glasgow to Bristol, would you believe? I thought – what better way to pass the time than to joyfully grapple with the subject of positive feedback. I'd like to share some of what I wrote with you, dear reader. I hope it's useful.

After a jam packed 6-months of back-to-back teaching projects, interspersed with book writing in every possible gap, I decided to TAKE THE WHOLE MONTH OF JULY OFF WORK!

Here's what I learned...

This week, I received an email from a student who recently attended one of my courses. Attached to the email, was a document marked 'private and confidential', which outlined everything I'd got wrong and how, if they were running the workshop, they would have done it better. No, I won't be sharing the feedback (I can hear you from here, saying “Gizza look!”), but what I will share, is the reflection process which spontaneously emerged, to help me digest the criticism in order to learn and grow. I hope this will be useful for you too.

7.) RADICAL_CONNECTOR: Active presence and/in motion: Nonlinear dance training for all bodies with Marisa Godoy

This blog is the seventh of a series of blogs, charting my experience as a Theatre Bristol agent at the Global Improvisation Initiative Symposium, May 2019. If you'd like to get a little context, start here. Otherwise, it's time to dance!

Marisa Godoy is a dance... Read more >

2.) Three ways of surfacing: How improvised material emerges and what you have to consider as a facilitator. A seminar by Gunter Losel

This blog is the second of a series of blogs, charting my experience as a Theatre Bristol agent at the Global Improvisation Initiative Symposium, May 2019. If you'd like to get a little context, start here. Otherwise, welcome to theory and practice exploring how... Read more >

Hello and welcome to the Global Impro blogs introduction! There are a lot of blogs in this series (13 including this one), charting my experiences and learning through a 4-day international symposium on improvisation!

This blog will give you some context before laying out a menu of the other 12 Global Impro blogs. There's a mix of theory, practical explorations you can do at home alone or with others and personal reflections. I hope some of what I've written is help... Read more >