Sometimes being good at the part
makes it harder to see you’re playing one.
Hold The Room is about becoming so practised at managing other people, situations and expectations that the performance starts happening automatically. Every word, pause and reaction is controlled, keeping everything around you steady while creating distance from the person underneath it. The room never sees the effort. It only sees the version that works.
I can feel it when it starts now
Every time I step inside
Something shifts into position
Before I even realise
I adjust without thinking
Tone and posture, pace and breath
Like I’ve done it so often
It just happens on request
I don’t choose it
It arrives
I hold the room
I keep it steady
I stay exactly where I’m meant to be
I hold the room
No one notices
How far away I am from me
Every word lands where it should now
Every pause is placed in time
I can read the smallest changes
Before anyone defines them
I can keep it moving forward
I can smooth it, keep it clean
But the version that they’re getting
Isn’t anything like me
If I stop it
It all drops
If I stop this
What am I not
I hold the room
I keep it steady
I stay exactly where I’m meant to be
I hold the room
No one notices
How far away I am from me