Caring too much.....

hmmm. so, i went to youtube today, having been invited by some cute fans of mine who created a tribute video to my song and video "flower", it was very sweet! they did the same for "stay" last year. the new one is called "tribute to flower" by a girl named torrie smith and her friends.
meanwhile, while I was there, I thought I'd take a little look at some youtube stuff of my days with shakespear's sister. there was one tv show in the UK we did back in 1992 at the peak of "stay" being a hit. It was a live television show which are always more frightening to do than taped shows because you can't say, "hey, can we do that over again?" and you usually can, just in case there are some hideously blatant mistakes. well, someone made a comment about me on there saying, "ooo, she's really struggling with her guitar on this". Of course, I read something like that and I get upset, stupid me. So, I listened and sure enough, I was struggling with the simplest chord progression of all time on the song ["stay"]! I remember doing the show and that day, I also remember being incredibly nervous for some reason. It upset me that someone noticed, but hey, they were right!!! so, big deal. here's a little bit of info: when I toured with God, I mean, Eric Clapton, there was this one night we were on stage in some huge arena playing to 20,000 people and he was playing this blazing solo. Well, right in the middle of it, he made this obvious mistake, playing a completely wrong note, so much so that you couldn't say, "hey, man that was jazz!" he kind of laughed at himself and played the same wrong notes again on purpose. Now, I thought, he's got a good sense of humor! Even a rock God can make mistakes now that I think about it, so why can't I?
Trouble is people seem to like it when you make mistakes and they want to make sure they let you know when you do. You just can't please everyone, that's for sure. I'm not sure why it bothers me so much except to say that I've always been a people pleaser and I want people to like me, which sucks!!!! I'm dealing with that issue of mine now.
I've always gotten nervous when I perform. I've always looked for some kind of assurance that it was normal and found it often in remarks by the great acting teacher Stella Adler saying "nerves are your talent" and came to my own conclusions that without nerves I'd be dead or less than human so I found comfort in that. But the nerves started getting really bad, almost paralyzing when I was working with Shakespear's Sister. I started having panic attacks on stage, yes, it is not fun, believe me. Something can trigger it and I would just go. And I couldn't just run off stage and say, "hang on, I'll be right back after I take this here little blue pill" so I had to deal with it, fight my demons right there on stage in front of whoever was there. They probably could sense that I wasn't completely there although they may not have been able to tell you exactly what was wrong with that picture. But I knew, boy did I know. I think the reason that my fear and anxiety increased during that time was my partner Siobhan and I were not getting along. There were fights, there was insecurity on both sides; I was encouraged to be good, but not too good. so, it was an outward struggle that became inward. I didn't want her to hate me for being good or trying to steal the show or the band away, which I was accused of quite often believe it or not. So, my deep fear of wanting to be liked, was quite obviously internalized and morphed into this anxiety on stage. it was a feeling of, I feel all this emotion inside of me wanting to get out through my singing, but I better not cuz I'll be a bad girl for doing it. So, many times, I was "frozen" and up until a few years ago, it was really messing with my live performances. I still even struggle with it now and have these showdowns with myself to this day.
some of you may be surprised to hear this from me. I've been told I come off as "arrogant" or "in control". HA! If you only knew what was going on inside me. I just care too much [about what people think of me] is what it boils down to. I can tell you that I've recently performed and convinced myself not to care too much, to not try too hard and not try to be perfect and I had the best time I've had in years. and the bonus was, so did everyone in the audience, much to my surprise. so, that's what I'm working on, not caring so much and not tryintg too hard. And am now trying to adopt the same attitude as the late great Judy Garland: " F*ck 'em!!!"