HowlRound Theatre Commons: I lay on the floor, following the instructions of Star Yuexing Sun, the director of the workshop. My breath catches as I search for the sensation in my toe. I used to be convinced that I could feel every part of my body, but right now I have a flicker of uncertainty and start to realize that I can only feel my toe when moving it. I question if I had never felt it before and never truly acknowledged that.
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What I loved reading about the most was the warmups that the actresses did to connect to their bodies and the bodies around them. They ran a lot of exercises that involved being hyper-aware of their bodily functions and the sensations in them and caused around them. This is a beautiful show, highlighting the awareness of Asian beauty standards, especially in women, and also rediscovering how our bodies change overtime. With how hectic lives become due to societal pressures, it’s really easy to overlook how much growth we do, whether it’s physically, spiritually, mentally, or beyond. Within Asian culture, there is immense pressure to act a certain way, almost clone-like. Conformity is a huge stressor, with the ideal woman to look like another. This show, as described, is the perfect balance of addressing the issue, really pioneering to be more of “this is who we are” rather than “here are the problems.”
I’ve been involved in many performance projects before, but When I Look at Myself felt deeply different—almost like therapy disguised as theatre. Lying on the floor, trying to feel my toe, something as simple as that made me realize how disconnected I had become from my own body. It’s funny how we can move through the world every day without truly acknowledging the vessel that carries us. Being part of this multidisciplinary project, which blended theatre, photography, and personal storytelling, reminded me of why I fell in love with the performing arts in the first place. There’s something profoundly raw about using your own body—your scars, your weight, your memories—as both the script and the stage. In a way, it reminded me of immersive or devised theatre, where performers co-create from real experiences rather than a pre-written text. But it also had echoes of visual art and contemporary dance—especially in how we explored presence, gaze, and movement as forms of self-expression. It made me think about how bodies carry stories that words alone can’t capture. Whether in documentary theatre, performance art, or even site-specific installation pieces, the body becomes a living archive. This project made that real for me. And when I finally stepped in front of the mirror and told my story, I wasn’t performing for others—I was witnessing myself.
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