Living in human bodies in contemporary society means all of us have to engage with gender in some capacity. Woman, man, trans person, non-binary, gender-free… moving through the world means navigating and/or disrupting societal gender norms. And how cool would it be if we could all walk around feeling not just comfortable with our gender but downright euphoric about it?!
Today’s guest helps us think about gender with a bit of playfulness and a lot of curiosity. Performer, theater artist, educator, and clown Ania Upstill (they/them) shares their experience with gender identity, perfectionism, and the radical value of being deeply present.
They also share how clowning can be a practice for life for mental and cognitive health, and as a form of mindfulness infused with childlike wonder. What’s not to like about that?!
And! The sticker giveaway continues. Leave a rating or review, take a screenshot, and send it to me at cate [at] settlingisbullshit.com, and I will send you stickers!
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Visit their website
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Resources, References, and Links
“Transhumance: A clown’s journey through gender” – Ania’s performance at the Kennedy Center in June of 2024. Highly recommend. Well worth 55 mins of your time.
Trans – latin root: “through, across, or beyond.”
Commedia Dell’arte. In case you want a more detailed explanation:
Lecoq School. The physical theater tradition that Ania mentions.
Shakespeare at Winedale. An original practice Shakespeare in performance program outside of Austin, Texas where Ania and I met in 2009.
Pronouns! As I was editing this episode, I got an email from someone in the Portland Parks & Recreation department who had a link to this article included in her email signature – which both made my heart happy and seemed like a nudge from the universe to include it in the show notes. “Why do I list my pronouns?”
Laughter Yoga (is apparently a totally real thing!)
Botox. Without going too far down a rabbit hole, I did actually google what Botox is, and I’m just going to leave this quote from the Mayo Clinic that the core component of Botox “is made from the same toxin that causes a type of food poisoning called botulism.”
Gender affirming care. What it is and why it matters.
Transcript
Note: this transcript was generated by AI. Please forgive any malapropisms and misspellings. It’s the robot’s fault!
[00:00] Ania Upstill: There’s a certain innocence or naivete to the clown, I think, that allows us as audiences to discover our world a little bit anew or have a new perspective on the world.
[00:14] And I think that’s what’s so valuable about looking at gender through the lens of clowning is because, as you say, it’s really easy to exist in the world and just not necessarily see the way that gender is being taken on or performed.
[00:28] But as a clown, you’re like, I don’t know what’s going on. So I’m going to try to figure out this structure that everyone seems to somehow be participating in, and I’m going to try to figure out if it’s right for me.
[00:46] Cate Blouke: Welcome to Settling is Bullshit, a sweary podcast about claiming your joy. If you are an adult human craving healthier boundaries, a greater sense of purpose, or an increased capacity to feel at ease in your own skin, then you are in the right place, my friend.
[01:03] I’m your host, Cate Blouke, and I’m here to offer you practical tools and playful encouragement to help you step forward and be your most awesome self. My hope is that each episode will leave you feeling a bit more empowered to make brave choices and claim your joy.
[01:22] Hello, my friend. Today’s guest is Ania Upstill, theater artist, educator and clown whose performances celebrate LGBTQIA artists with a focus on gender diversity. Ania has performed all over the world, New Zealand, Edinburgh, New York City, Washington D.C.
[01:44] and many other places in between. Ania is based in New York City and in summer of 2024 had the opportunity to perform their one person show transhumance at the Kennedy center in Washington DC.
[01:56] And thankfully that performance was recorded and is available on YouTube, which is how I ended up inviting them to come talk to us about that performance and their unique clown’s perspective on gender, gender identity, trans identity, what it is to have a gender in this crazy 21st century that we live in.
[02:20] So this is just such a fun, interesting conversation that applies to each and every one of us because we all have some relationship to or experience with gender, whether we are particularly aware of it or not.
[02:33] And while this may have come up previously on the podcast, I identify as a woman and use she her pronouns. I am also cisgender, which is a term that you’re going to hear us using on this podcast.
[02:45] And if, if you’re not familiar, it means that my internal sense of gender corresponds with the sex that I was assigned at birth. So I was assigned female at birth and I identify as a woman.
[02:57] That makes me cisgender. Ania is going to talk to us about some of the other terminology that comes up in conversations about gender, but we didn’t specifically define that one, so I wanted to throw it up here at the front.
[03:07] And this is an episode that is about gender, but it’s also about clowning and how that particular perspective or framework can be a really fun and interesting and playful and mentally healthful perspective to take on the world.
[03:24] So whether issues of gender and gender equity are particularly up for you or not, this episode is a really delightful experience and I am happy to get to share it with you.
[03:36] I also just want to throw out there that I am still giving away free stickers. If you leave a review after you listen to this episode, take a picture of your rating or review.
[03:47] Wherever you’re listening to this podcast, email it to me@KateettlingIsBullshit.com and I will send you stickers in the mail. And I’m going to run this until I run out of stickers, which.
[03:57] Which will be a little while. So leave a rating or review and enjoy this episode.
[04:09] So do you identify as trans?
[04:12] Ania Upstill: I do. I identify as trans sometimes. I also add non binary. I have a lot of feelings about how people generally associate people being transgender with medical transitioning.
[04:25] And I personally prefer to think of it through the lens of like the Latin root trans, which means through, across or beyond. And that feels much more appropriate to my personal feeling about gender.
[04:40] So I like using transgender and I think some people assume that there’s a medical transition component when people use that term.
[04:48] Cate Blouke: Right.
[04:49] Ania Upstill: So also also I’m like non binary is also correct. And maybe I also just like resisting categories, which is kind of the whole point.
[04:59] Cate Blouke: Yeah, I mean, right, that’s. That makes sense. Yeah, I’d love to hear a little bit more about that. Sort of like Latin root trans across and beyond and kind of what that means to you in finding your gender journey, you know, where you have found yourself.
[05:15] Ania Upstill: Yeah. I think I was very lucky to be raised in Berkeley, which does give a different perspective to gender than many other places in the country, I think, especially in the sort of 90s and 2000s.
[05:30] And I was also very lucky to be raised by parents who were in still are very gender non conforming themselves.
[05:38] So I don’t think I felt particularly restricted by gender.
[05:43] And it took me moving outside of Berkeley to realize that I maybe also didn’t fit into gendered stereotypes around women.
[05:53] Totally. And even though I did go through a period of kind of hyper femininity, which I think Was me being like, what is gender? Wow, gender’s so weird. Like, yeah.
[06:03] Cate Blouke: What did that look like?
[06:05] Ania Upstill: I mean, I used to, like, sew my own dresses in high school. I did, like, rock and roll dancing. Like, I went really, like, 50s, which.
[06:12] Cate Blouke: Okay.
[06:13] Ania Upstill: And now with historic, more historical knowledge, I’m like, terrible time, terrible time woman. Like, actually, wow, we’re really in a much better place now, but the romance of it, I think, and the red lipstick and all of that than actually when I was in physical theater school and embodying a lot more things and recognizing, I think, how strict expectations are on gender and also, like, within the sort of commedia dell’arte, especially, like, the physical theater tradition can be very specific about how you perform gender.
[06:48] Yeah, I just went like, no, like, this is not me.
[06:53] Cate Blouke: I.
[06:53] Ania Upstill: This is classic. I watched a YouTube video about being non binary and I was like, oh, my God, that’s me. And then I just never went back.
[07:00] Cate Blouke: So that’s amazing.
[07:03] Ania Upstill: Yeah.
[07:03] Cate Blouke: And, yeah, just listening to you, I mean, I am so excited to talk about clowning and your background and training in that, because you are the clown in my life. You’re the clown that I know.
[07:14] I don’t think that most people are like, oh, yeah, I know somebody who is a professional clown. But I have done improv comedy a lot. I love it. It brings me so much joy.
[07:23] And it’s really funny because my kind of go to character when I’m doing improv is like, dude, bros. I just love leaning into like, yo, bro, like, what up? Like, huh, huh?
[07:36] And that just like, really performative, hyper masculinity is really fun for me to play with, I think, because it is so different from sort of my normal day to day reality.
[07:49] But also, like, I was a tomboy as a kid, you know, I really didn’t identify with femininity until adulthood. For me, when I was like, oh, no. I actually do like being a girl.
[07:58] This is interesting and nice for me.
[08:02] Ania Upstill: No, I love that because I think one of the things that is very true for some people is that your gender identity changes over time. Yeah, Gender identity, gender expression. And I think that’s maybe under discussed in terms of CIS people.
[08:17] It’s like you can be a cisgender person and have your gender expression change super drastically, and that’s also you finding, like, the joy in your gender.
[08:27] Cate Blouke: Right.
[08:28] Ania Upstill: I think that gender euphoria feels more.
[08:32] Sometimes feels like a bigger win for transgender or gender expansion people. But, like, everyone has it, and I want everyone to have it.
[08:42] Cate Blouke: Oh, my God. I Love that. Like, I invited you on this podcast and it hadn’t occurred to me that this could also apply to me as a cisgender person. Right. But just in this moment, I’m like, yeah, like, you could not.
[08:54] Like, my mom despaired because she could not get me in a dress. She could not get me in pink. I was having none of it in my youth. Like, I just wanted to climb trees and dresses were girly and stupid, and I hated them.
[09:09] And then it’s been really in adulthood for me of, like, finding a deeper connection with my femininity and being like, actually, I fucking love pink. Pink makes me so happy.
[09:19] So I don’t know, I’m just having this really heartwarming moment of like, oh, I get to have that too.
[09:25] Ania Upstill: 100%. And actually, ironically, I think my kind of iconoclastic mother probably hated the fact that actually, as a small child, me and my twin sister decided we loved pink and purple, respectively, and we’re like, all into the dresses.
[09:40] I feel like she was like, really? You never see me wearing makeup and you’re into this. But, you know, she honored me and she fight against me.
[09:49] Cate Blouke: Yeah. And I don’t know, there’s a. Like, to me, I just hear in that. That level of adolescent, like, I’m going to try not being like you and see what happens.
[09:58] Right.
[09:58] Ania Upstill: Oh, yes, the classic. Real classic.
[10:02] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what. What does gender euphoria mean to you that you want for everyone?
[10:09] Ania Upstill: I think it’s both feeling, you know, in alignment between how you feel inside and your expression.
[10:18] So getting to express. And that’s mostly aesthetically, you know, gender especially mostly aesthetic, but, like, getting to express through clothing, makeup, hair, gesture, affectation, whatever the gender that you want to express.
[10:36] And I’m not saying that people’s gender identity and gender expression always have to look the way we want them to look. Right. Like, you can. You can be like, I’m non binary and I dress super femme, and that’s what makes me happy.
[10:47] That’s your gender for you. Like, fuck, yeah. And I think that I want people to feel. Yeah. To have the expression that makes them happy and gives them joy as they move through the world.
[10:58] And I truly do want that for everyone because I also.
[11:01] Diversity is such a beautiful thing.
[11:05] And, like, I want to see everyone feeling themselves all the time.
[11:08] My ideal world.
[11:10] Cate Blouke: Yes. Oh, my God, me too. Of just like, what if we all moved through the world, like, feeling ourselves.
[11:16] Ania Upstill: Yeah.
[11:16] Cate Blouke: In whatever way that looks.
[11:18] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And maybe your gender expression is like, I want to wear Sweatpants all the time. Like, fuck, yeah, whatever makes you feel good. I am here for it. I have no interest in judging anyone else’s choices.
[11:30] Cate Blouke: Yeah. And I got to watch the recording of Transhumance.
[11:36] And what struck me was the way that, like, we sort of, like, put. We try on gender, right? The character in that show or puts on a dress, puts on a kind of tie.
[11:50] And watching it, I was just thinking about, like, how often we put on these outfits, put on these roles without thinking about it or asking, like, does this really fit me?
[12:01] Is this really what I want? And so for those of y’all who are listening and haven’t seen it yet, I’m gonna put the link in the show notes. You can watch it.
[12:08] It’s delightful.
[12:10] But it is a one hour show without any dialogue.
[12:14] Ania Upstill: That is true. Yes, it is.
[12:17] Cate Blouke: Which is amazing. And when I describe it that way, your mind might be like, what are you talking about? But it’s so good. It’s so expressive. It turns out that with clowning and commedia dell’arte.
[12:31] Is that what we would call what that is?
[12:34] Ania Upstill: Well, I would say the show is clowning. Clowning comes out of commedia dell’arte. Commedia dell’arte is probably a little more like improv in that it relies on character.
[12:43] Cate Blouke: Okay.
[12:43] Ania Upstill: And weirdly, you know, I feel like I made that show and that clown is not really a character. That clown is kind of just a part of me, which is not how everyone makes clowning.
[12:56] Well, what.
[12:56] Cate Blouke: Okay, what. What is clowning? What. How. What do we. How do we even define what we’re talking about when we’re talking about clowning?
[13:03] Ania Upstill: Right. People define it in a lot of ways. So I want to say there’s a lot of different kind of aesthetics or. Or sort of approaches to clowning. The clowning I see coming out of LA feels very stand up comedy influence.
[13:15] It’s a lot of talking. The clowning I was trained in comes from the Lecoq school in France. So I think of it as, like, European style clowning, which tends to be about physical theater.
[13:26] It comes out of this commedia dell’arte transition or tradition, which kind of was transitioned over time. And so it has a long history. And then of course, there’s circus clowning.
[13:36] And circus clowning tends to be more trick based or routine based. And prat falls juggling, there’s more skills. So when I. I sometimes talk about, like, the hard skills of clowning, which are kind of what I think about with, like, Ringling and like, literally what they would Teach people at Ringling School.
[13:55] Yeah. And then the sort of soft skills, which I think are more about clown perspective, the way the clown interacts with the world.
[14:03] And I think why that is so valuable is there’s a certain innocence or naivete to the clown.
[14:13] I think that allows us as audiences to discover our world a little bit anew or have a new perspective on the world. And I think that’s what’s so valuable about looking at gender through the lens of clowning is because, as you say, it’s really easy to exist.
[14:28] Exist in the world and just not necessarily see the way that gender is being taken on or performed. But as a clown, you’re like, I don’t know what’s going on.
[14:40] So I’m going to try to figure out this structure that everyone seems to somehow be participating in, and I’m going to try to figure out if it’s right for me.
[14:51] Right. That’s kind of the premise of the show.
[14:53] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. And it’s, like, so beautiful. I mean, that’s exactly what I experienced in watching it of, like, oh, like, what would happen if someone who didn’t know anything about gender just sort of like, showed up in this.
[15:04] In this world and was like, oh, what am I supposed to do? Right.
[15:07] Ania Upstill: And it.
[15:08] Cate Blouke: And it was just so beautiful. Is so beautiful. It exists. It’s a. There’s an archive now.
[15:15] Ania Upstill: Yes. But I will say it’s not just resonant with trans people.
[15:19] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[15:20] Ania Upstill: We had cisgender people like Ball during the show and then kind of come up and be like, oh, my gosh, that was so real. Because I do think, especially if you are a person who has experienced, like, oppression or marginalization for your gender.
[15:35] So, like, basically, I mean, women and anyone who’s not a CIS man, but any kind of marginalized gender. Yeah, I think you can. You can feel that. And if you’re a CIS man, like, gender is also really oppressive there too.
[15:49] I think these structures are not set up to respect the reality of people’s lives.
[15:54] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. And I feel like I saw that right in the. When the characters trying on sort of like, what masculinity is supposed to look like and whatnot. It really touched me of, like, yeah, we’re all just having these boxes forced upon us in contemporary capitalist, patriarchal society.
[16:13] And, like, it’s not great for anybody.
[16:18] Like.
[16:19] Ania Upstill: Yeah, it’s not. It’s really not.
[16:22] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. What was the kind of trans or non binary queer folk reaction? How was it received?
[16:32] Ania Upstill: I think. Yeah, I think people feel very Deeply seen. I. The anecdote that sticks with me is there was a young person who came and saw it when I did the show in Adelaide in 2020, right before the world shut down, anyway, and sent me a message later on Facebook and was like, thank you for the show.
[16:52] I’m now in the middle of my transition and like, your show meant so much to me and I just wanted to let you know that, that it had this impact.
[17:00] And, you know, if you’re ever in Adelaide, like, I would love to see anything you make. So it’s. It was that sort of thing. And then I think I was also very struck by parents coming to the show.
[17:11] Um, when it was in Edinburgh, there was a couple who came up afterwards and were like, hey, we’re actually pregnant and we want to raise our child in a different way.
[17:21] So, like, thank you for this show. And, you know, it’s that kind of thing where I’m like, that is the impact I want to have. Because again, it’s super easy to grow up and just follow these very strict binary rules.
[17:34] And I just don’t think it really serves people.
[17:38] Cate Blouke: No, no. And what I hear in that is just like, without the supportive container, it’s really hard to break out of. Right. Or to find our way or to find what’s true for us.
[17:52] Ania Upstill: Yeah, I mean, if I. And you know, that’s the core of, I think, why queer joy specifically and representation as a related factor are really important. You know, representation is like.
[18:05] It’s like, if I hadn’t seen that YouTube video about being non binary, like, maybe it would have taken me another couple of years. You know, there’s a lot more exposure now for trans and non binary people, which is really great.
[18:16] And I think about how important also seeing queer people being happy is because there’s so many stories about trauma, like, look, it’s really not that bad. It’s actually kind of great.
[18:28] Cate Blouke: Yeah. What do you love about sort of your life now and who you have found yourself to be?
[18:35] Ania Upstill: You know, I do get to be exactly who I want to be.
[18:39] I feel like I’m in a position where I do get to live my own gender euphoria consistently.
[18:48] And I have a community that is supportive of that. And maybe almost more importantly, because I’m an educator, I get to be that person around other people very overtly.
[19:03] And because I work as a teaching artist, I often go into situations where I am not necessarily teaching about gender, but I think just by being myself and using they.
[19:14] Them pronouns, which not all young people in the New York City school system understand it’s just like opening a door or an opportunity for students to see that maybe a different type of gender expression or gender identity is open for them.
[19:32] Cate Blouke: So, I mean, what, like, how do you explain your gender expression to them? Do you get questions about it? Do you explain it?
[19:38] Ania Upstill: I don’t get a lot of questions, but I do try to be very overt about being open to questions and then also modeling using more like, gender expansive language rather than just men and women.
[19:54] Cate Blouke: Yeah. So people.
[19:56] Ania Upstill: Or people, you know, if we’re talking about abortion, talking about how it affects people who have uteruses, because it doesn’t just women, those sorts of things where, like, there’s. They’re kind of subtle linguistic shifts, but I think they’re important.
[20:09] And, you know, as they get more. As my students get more comfortable with me, they’re more likely to be like, what does that mean? Or like, why are you using that?
[20:16] And I think that’s so really good learning. Learning points.
[20:20] Cate Blouke: So what are some of the kind of big misconceptions you encounter or the things that they’re. You’re like, oh, I sort of assumed you might be literate about that, but apparently not.
[20:30] For like, anybody who’s listening who doesn’t feel super literate about this, here are the things we should be paying attention to.
[20:36] Ania Upstill: Well, you know, I’m going to reframe this within the gender diversity training that I co run with a friend of mine, because we were in the same master’s program together, and at some point, we both just realized, as the two students who used they.
[20:50] Them pronouns, that we were getting a lot of questions, but they weren’t happening in a sort of formal way. It was like other students at various times asking questions, and we were like, look, y’all, we’re just going to do this in a training.
[21:03] We’re going to answer all your questions in one go, and then you’ll, like, at least have some information.
[21:09] So I think people don’t really understand the separation of sex and gender as a baseline.
[21:19] And I think people get. And this is a very human trait. People get really worried about doing the wrong thing.
[21:26] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[21:26] Ania Upstill: So they don’t ask the question. And so. Well, I think people don’t understand that transgender can be a more broad category than people who are medically transitioning from.
[21:35] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[21:36] Ania Upstill: Woman to man or man to woman like that. The goal is not necessarily to pass. You know, there’s a lot of kind of stuff in there. I also think people get a little confused with like, oh, you can be cisgender, but gender non conforming or you can be cisgender and also androgynous.
[21:52] That there’s, you know, there’s a, there’s a lot of nuance in how people find their identity and their expression intermeshing or not.
[22:03] And really the thing we say, Rachel and I, when we’re teaching is like, you actually don’t have to understand it to respect it. So baseline.
[22:13] If someone’s wearing something and you’re like, but why are they wearing that? If their pronouns are this other thing. No, no, just, just use their pronouns.
[22:22] Cate Blouke: It doesn’t.
[22:23] Ania Upstill: You actually don’t need to like ask the question cognitively. Like, figure it out for yourself. Like, all you need to do is just like, use their name and pronouns and just like go about your day.
[22:34] Cate Blouke: Oh, I feel some freedom in that. Like, that’s nice. Right. Of just. What if we just like accepted what people tell us about themselves?
[22:46] Ania Upstill: Yeah, it would be great. Yeah.
[22:50] Cate Blouke: Yeah. And I, and I feel that element of gender euphoria.
[22:55] Oh, yeah. I guess there’s a question of like, do you feel like gender is really like. The relationship between gender and pronouns is pretty intertwined.
[23:06] Ania Upstill: I think it’s one of the ways that people express their gender.
[23:14] Yeah, I don’t think it’s a one to one, you know, especially because there’s people who use like multiple pronouns or one pronoun for different reasons.
[23:28] You know, for some people it might be like, well, I actually just kind of feel fluid, so I use all of them. Or, or if there might be someone who’s like, I’ll accept all of them, but I have a preference for this one because it’s how I want people to refer to me.
[23:42] But I don’t want to feel misgendered. So I’m going to use multiple pronouns.
[23:47] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[23:48] Ania Upstill: So it’s, it’s definitely not a one to one. I think it’s just one of the most obvious ways that people flag their gender sometimes.
[23:56] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Yeah. What was your process of choosing they them?
[24:00] Ania Upstill: Well, so when I finished physical theater school, I’d already been like, I’m non binary. And then I was like, well, I’m moving to New York and I’m meeting all these new people.
[24:07] So I’m going to change my pronouns because I feel like they them is right for me, which is a lot. Was a lot easier than doing it in a place where I’d already lived.
[24:17] I mean, I’ve had to do that when I’ve gone back to places that I’ve lived or before I moved. But it was really nice to get to just like start using they.
[24:27] Them pronouns and have everyone just use them. I mean, not everyone, like.
[24:30] Cate Blouke: Right.
[24:31] Ania Upstill: But people that I met who were like, good at using pronouns.
[24:35] Cate Blouke: Right, Right. Yeah. I mean, I think like Portland is also kind of a bubble in terms of people are real good about pronouns around here for the most part. And then I go other places and I’m like, oh, yeah, there’s a lot of the world that this is not a thing yet.
[24:51] And it’s confusing and it’s hard and I just want to offer some empathy to, to cisgender folks who are trying, you know, and it is confusing.
[25:02] And Yeah.
[25:04] Ania Upstill: I mean, I misgender people. I want to be really clear that like everyone does it because humans aren’t perfect and we’re actually not that good at learning new information.
[25:11] Cate Blouke: Right.
[25:12] Ania Upstill: So 100%. I would love to. I’d love to extend grace to people. I really hope that on both sides of the equation we can understand that. It’s like the trying that really matters.
[25:24] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[25:24] Ania Upstill: And the apology if you don’t do it. Right. But then just moving on because truly, really funny is when. Not funny. What’s really like, unnecessary is when someone messes up and then it’s like, oh my God, I’m so sorry.
[25:37] I can’t believe. And then it’s like, just say I’m sorry, correct it and move on. This is.
[25:42] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah, right. That like, this is all learning and unlearning. Right. I mean, I think learning to use they. Them pronouns is also an unlearning of the sort of binary gender structures that we, the majority of us grew up, all of us, like millennials and older grew up with.
[26:02] Yeah.
[26:03] Ania Upstill: And I think even Gen Z. Yeah. Most of them would have had family systems that, you know, carbon and nuclear families that use binary. So I’m like, we’re.
[26:12] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Oh, yeah.
[26:13] Ania Upstill: But I’m.
[26:13] Cate Blouke: I don’t know. Those are the youths. I’m not going to speak for them. I have no idea. They all seem much more woke than, than our generation. I don’t know.
[26:20] Ania Upstill: You know what’s so interesting is I think they are. But I, and I do think it’s like even within the New York City school system, I can see that it’s school by school.
[26:28] Yeah. I’m like, this is wild. Culture matters so much.
[26:32] Cate Blouke: And who you’re around does it. Does it matters so much? You know, like I just said. Right. Like Portland is a really gender aware, trans inclusive city on the Whole.
[26:47] And that also probably depends on like, what part of town you’re in. But I think one of the things I have learned, having moved around a fair bit and trying to find my place, is how important the places that we live and the spaces that we kind of inhabit can be in allowing us to be who we are.
[27:08] Ania Upstill: Yeah, it’s massive.
[27:09] And again, like, I don’t know. If I hadn’t grown up in Berkeley, honestly, my trauma as a queer and trans person would probably be a lot higher.
[27:17] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. Growing up in Las Vegas did imply. Did a, did a number on me as a, like, as, as at the time, like a gender non conforming female. Right. I wasn’t doing the kind of like makeup and the dressing and the whatever and I.
[27:33] It was bad.
[27:35] And it wasn’t really until I left and like moved to Austin, Texas, that I actually felt permission to explore my femininity in a space that felt like there was a much more expansive vision of that because, like, in Vegas it’s fucking, you know, fake tits and like, spray tan and just that in a lot of ways, version of femininity.
[27:57] If I have any Vegas listeners, I love you. You understand what I’m talking about? It is a hard place to grow up as a girl.
[28:06] And so for me there was a lot of like, moving away from that and into cowboy boots and sundresses and being like, oh, this is fun. I like this.
[28:17] Ania Upstill: You know, cowboy boots are like. I mean, they’re just great.
[28:21] Cate Blouke: They’re so good. There’s. I don’t get to wear them very often in Portland because it rains too much. But I do still have my collection.
[28:27] Okay. I have taken a somewhat far afield back to clowning and that as an, like, as an art form that you were drawn to, that you champion, that you use, what lights you up about clowning?
[28:47] Ania Upstill: Oh, it’s definitely the sense of curiosity and expansiveness and how that creates joy.
[28:59] No, I, it’s. It’s really funny. When I was, apparently when I was a baby, so going way back, my dad used to call me the joy baby because I was so like, I guess just I would smile.
[29:12] I was like really happy. I was a really happy child then. I feel like, you know, whatever the world happened and we all know, lose some of that childhood joy, I think over time.
[29:23] You know, also we get used to things, we get numb to things. But clowning really allows you to access that, that wonder and that curiosity in a very special way that I think kind of has a special potency in our world.
[29:44] That is so, I don’t know, full of information and in which, in some ways, I think there’s a real pressure to know the right thing or say the right thing or, you know, do the right thing.
[29:58] There’s. There’s a real.
[30:01] Yeah. Like a permission to play and to learn. And I think those are just things that are really good for our brains. Like, I’ve taught clowning for mental health before because I think that the practice of, like, being in a state of exploration is just cognitively good for people.
[30:19] Yeah, about that as well. It’s not just me.
[30:22] Cate Blouke: Right? Right.
[30:23] Ania Upstill: Yeah.
[30:24] Cate Blouke: So I guess I’m curious, like, what’s the distinction for you between, like, improv and clowning?
[30:30] Ania Upstill: Improv, which I have an okay relationship with, but I’ve never personally been.
[30:35] Cate Blouke: Oh, okay, okay. I love it. And that’s what I have experience with. And it brings, like. It’s just. It brings me so much joy because it’s just like this process of, like, I don’t know what’s going to happen next.
[30:45] Like, let’s just discover it together and play and, like, be comfortable fucking up because there’s no right way to do it. And that was, like, so freeing for me as someone who used to be, like, really uptight and want to do it right and really had the anxiety.
[31:03] But, like, no, I gotta get it right. It was terrifying and freeing for me to be in that space of play and curiosity and exploration. So listening to you talk about clowning, I’m like, these sounds similar.
[31:15] So I’d love to, like, understand, like, what makes clowning. Clowning?
[31:19] Ania Upstill: Yeah, no, I think so.
[31:20] Cate Blouke: It’s.
[31:20] Ania Upstill: That’s funny. Is like, what you’re saying about improv is very resonant of how I feel about clowning. And similarly, when I started clowning, I actually thought I was going to hate clowning.
[31:28] I went to a physical theater school that is not. It’s not just about clowning. And clowning was the thing I was like, I’m going to hate this. So.
[31:33] Cate Blouke: Okay, okay to pause. So what’s the distinction between physical theater and clowning?
[31:41] Ania Upstill: I would say clowning is a form of physical theater. So, yeah, physical theater is more like the basket, and clowning is like a juggling ball in the basket just to keep it.
[31:53] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, we actually met through a Shakespearean performance program, and then you went off and had a beautiful big life, and it’s exciting to catch up with you again.
[32:04] What. What drew you to a physical performance school?
[32:08] Ania Upstill: Well, so I did. So having done a Lot of Shakespeare, which is obviously very text based.
[32:14] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[32:15] Ania Upstill: And I did do Shakespeare for a while, and then I kind of went, well, the things I really love about the, you know, original practice approach to Shakespeare, which is what, you know, as, you know, is what we did at Wyndale, talking to the audience and performing with the lights on and those sort of fun things, was that it was more heightened and more physical and had a sort of direct relationship to the audience in terms of storytelling.
[32:41] And I realized that it took me a long time, I think, to realize that I’m actually a very physical person. Like, I maybe had. I probably had a type A perfectionist.
[32:52] No, I definitely had a type A, like, perfectionist blocked being like, well, if I can’t be the best, I’m not going to do it. So I gave sports pretty early because I was.
[32:59] Wasn’t that good.
[33:00] Cate Blouke: Oh, yes.
[33:02] Ania Upstill: Well.
[33:02] Cate Blouke: And for me, it was team pressure. Like, it was that. And it was also team pressure of like, I don’t want my not being good enough to bring everybody down. So, like, I can’t handle this.
[33:10] I’m not gonna play.
[33:12] Ania Upstill: Yeah. Yeah. Well, I couldn’t be the best at it, so I stopped very. Which is like. Honestly, I’m like, really? Now I’m like, wow, you really should have just stuck with sports.
[33:22] Sports are great. Anyway. Yeah, we have the journeys. We have. So anyway, I think I wanted to explore this more physical side of performance. I’d taken a couple workshops in New Zealand, and so I went.
[33:36] The school is outside of Arcata in Northern California, so it’s actually pretty close to where you are.
[33:40] Cate Blouke: Okay.
[33:41] Ania Upstill: And they sort of this. The structure of the program is in the fall, you do 10 weeks of physical theater training, and then in the spring, you do three forms of physical theater.
[33:50] So we did Commedia dell’arte and melodrama and clown. And I was like, I’m gonna hate clown, but I’m just gonna have to get through it. Whatever. I’m not funny.
[33:58] And I did hate it at first.
[34:04] And I think being in the physical theater program really broke me of some of these ideas about having to be perfect or the best or that sort of genre of ways to be hard on yourself.
[34:22] And so by the time I got to clowning, I think it was in a better place to accept it.
[34:30] And I also.
[34:32] I discovered that I could still be a character that connected with the audience without having to be, like, kind of traditionally funny all the time. Because I don’t think my clown is very.
[34:46] In general, my clowning is not necessarily like laugh out loud funny. It’s not Ringling clown. It’s not, you know, these like big setups. It’s actually like my clown is a very connected to the audience, storytelling, narrative based clowning.
[35:00] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[35:01] Ania Upstill: And I don’t know, I really loved it. I also, a hundred percent, like, I personally believe that everyone has multiple clowns inside of them which probably come from different aspects of their personalities.
[35:11] And the clown that I found at Dell Arte was like, she was such a bitch. Like, it was really fun. She was like the most high status clown in the class and she just like didn’t like anything.
[35:21] And I think I was just really like exercising that like perfectionist side of myself. Being like, no, like, I’m not going to enjoy anything. I’m just going to stand over here and tell people what to do.
[35:31] So it was kind of a gift in those ways. And then, and then I kind of just kept doing it because I found it easy to make short form work.
[35:39] And I moved to New York and I was doing nightlife performance. So it was never, it wasn’t actually super intentional, but it just ended up being this form that I really resonated with.
[35:50] And the more I do it and the more I teach it, the more I’m like, wow, this is like a practice for life. Like, this is like a, a mental health practice.
[35:57] It’s a, like a cognitive practice and it’s a skill.
[36:02] Cate Blouke: So what are some of the ways in which that shows up as a like mental health practice? Like what are some of the elements that you bring forth?
[36:12] Ania Upstill: You know, it’s mostly presence.
[36:15] I feel like it’s a little bit like a moving meditation in that clowning really asks you to be like hyper present with like the minutia of the things around you in a very childlike way.
[36:32] You know, it’s like discovery play. Like anything can become an object of play.
[36:38] So it feels like. Yeah, it kind of feels like a moving meditation.
[36:43] And I do think in a world where we’re like not just probably overstimulated, definitely overstimulated. Overstimulated. Like too many things coming in and then like also, you know, so many people work remotely.
[36:57] So many people are sort of switched context switching all the time. It’s like we’re kind of having almost, I think an out of body experience.
[37:06] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[37:06] Ania Upstill: It’s also a very like embodied form and a form where you are like asked to like physically touch things and be very present in your actual physical space.
[37:15] Cate Blouke: Yeah. So, okay, so if I were to do a like clowning Practice. What would you tell me to do right now, to do what you just talked about?
[37:24] Ania Upstill: I would tell you to get a pencil or something really easy to. Easy to manipulate and look at it for. Just look at it. Okay. And in your mind, just go like, wow.
[37:42] Like, give it a little, like, wow.
[37:44] Wow.
[37:45] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. Like, I’m looking. I do. I literally have a pencil in my hand right now, and I’m looking at the little, like, metal bit that, like, attaches it to the wooden part and to the eraser.
[37:56] And, like, I’ve never looked at that, not really.
[38:00] I’m like, wow.
[38:02] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And then, you know, you could take it farther. You could go, well, what. You know, you’re a clown. You don’t know what a pencil is. What can this pencil do?
[38:11] You know, like, what could it be? You know, how can it move in space? You know, it’s like, it’s. Yeah, yeah, that’s. That, I think is, to me, is the basis of, like, clown perspective.
[38:20] It’s just being like. It’s like, truly, like, encapsulated by the word wow.
[38:25] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Like, wow. And. And I don’t know. And like, what is. Like when you just asked, like, what. What is this thing in front of me? What could I do with it?
[38:31] And of course, because, like, there’s an inner 5 year old in me, like, I want to stick it up my nose. Right. Like, that was like, soon as you asked that question, I was like, oh, well, like, an eraser would go up my nose.
[38:43] Like, that’s what pencils are for. Right?
[38:46] Ania Upstill: Like that’s what pencils are for. Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
[38:51] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Ugh, I love that. I love that. So, okay, that was delightful. Now I’m gonna do that after our call. What does that do for mental health?
[39:04] Ania Upstill: Yeah. So I think a lot of it is getting a break. I think it’s the same. I think a lot of it’s the same as meditation. It’s like.
[39:10] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[39:10] Ania Upstill: Getting to be present, breaking whatever mental habits you’re in. You know, as someone who has anxiety, I find it really grounding, you know, because you’re, like, kind of giving yourself a little, like, interruption of whatever worries are going on in your brain and also just makes you smile.
[39:32] It’s kind of like laughter yoga. I feel like often clowning, you’re just. You’re just like, having a nice dime. And I think that’s also really important. Yeah. And, you know, I.
[39:43] I do think that’s why there’s. There’s been a big surge in clowning. At least In New York and I think in LA as well, a lot of interest in teaching.
[39:49] There’s like a New York City Clown WhatsApp group that I think has like 400 members. Like it’s.
[39:54] Cate Blouke: Which, yeah.
[39:56] Ania Upstill: For what is considered a niche discipline is a lot of humans.
[39:59] Cate Blouke: Right.
[40:00] Ania Upstill: I think also people just want to laugh right now because there’s so much happening in the world that is like maybe not great.
[40:09] Cate Blouke: Yeah, I think I’m going to just take the maybe out of that. There is so much happening in the world that is not great. There’s a lot out there that’s not ideal and actually.
[40:22] Well, and that touches on part of what I have found really interesting and attractive about the work you’ve done, the performances you’ve done. It seems like you take on kind of big topics, but in a playful, curious, potentially laugh inducing way.
[40:42] Ania Upstill: Yeah, I think especially with transhumance, but also with A Bit too Much Hair, which is the musical cabaret show I co wrote slash write about gender euphoria. It’s like, I think people shut down when they feel like they’re being lectured.
[40:57] I think it’s really hard to get people to even go to or participate in something if they feel like they’re. Yeah. They’re being lectured to or they’re. It’s going to be something that they disagree with.
[41:09] And I think that taking a more joyful, light hearted approach, even though it can feel, I don’t know, like, compared to like a protest, it’s kind of like, well, is that gonna help like making people feel good?
[41:23] And I’m like actually I, you know, I like 100%.
[41:28] Cate Blouke: Right. I mean, and this is, this is kind of one of the things I wrestle with with this podcast in my own writing is that like, what if we could talk about things that are hard and that are often heavy in a way that’s like a little bit more light hearted and a little bit more inviting.
[41:44] Ania Upstill: Like we, and we live in such a. The political situation in this country tends to be very binary, like gender and very polarizing. And I just, I struggle to see how we can move towards a more understanding world if we can’t have conversation.
[42:05] And I think that a gentler approach is more proactive than a harder edged approach.
[42:11] And you know, especially with something like transhumans where it’s like there’s not really words, you kind of just, you experience the show as the clown experiences it.
[42:20] I think there’s potential there for people to create to. Well, in applied theater we talk about meaning making.
[42:29] Cate Blouke: Right.
[42:29] Ania Upstill: You can make the meaning you need to make from that show, not that it doesn’t have a message, but that, like, you can access it from your own experience. It’s not limited to people who are transgender or people who are gender expansive.
[42:43] Like, we all experience gender.
[42:46] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. Right. Wherever we fall on the spectrum, you know, it’s a reality that we operate within.
[42:54] Ania Upstill: And I think people are more likely to accept something if they also experience how great it can be. I think it’s harder to watch something about queer joy and be like, God, I really hope my child isn’t queer, because their life’s gonna be really hard.
[43:07] Which is what my mother told me when I came out to her. She was like, but could you just date men? It’ll be easier. And I was like, I could, but I don’t want to.
[43:16] Like, I feel like maybe I want to be true to how I feel, which is that I’m not just going to date men.
[43:24] So, you know, I do think it’s important as also a way of being, like, how can we address the fear that people have around identities? And I think that there’s more to be shown than.
[43:34] Than just trauma, for sure. Yeah.
[43:37] Cate Blouke: Yeah. And, like, what I hear in that, I feel like, applies to all of us, that really being ourselves and honoring what is true for us and what we want and how we want to be in the world often isn’t easy.
[43:57] Right. Like, it’s easy to stay in a structure and in a box. That is the expectation of us.
[44:04] And.
[44:05] And it’s hard to, like, acknowledge that that doesn’t really fit and to make choices to step outside of it, you know?
[44:12] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And I think the joy part of it is, like. And also it’s great.
[44:18] Cate Blouke: Oh, yeah, totally.
[44:19] Ania Upstill: You know, it’s like. And that’s what it is. Cause it’s. Cause it’s legitimately hard. So if we don’t celebrate the parts of it that are good, it’s just gonna feel hard.
[44:27] Right?
[44:28] Cate Blouke: Absolutely right. Like, I have made a number of unconventional choices in my life that have been, like, hard. Like, I left a tenure track job in academia where I would have gotten tenure.
[44:39] And, like, that was a big deal to be. Like, this doesn’t work. But it. Like, it. It didn’t work for me.
[44:46] Like, it just didn’t.
[44:48] And, like, oh, my God, I’m so much happier being able to have a podcast that I swear on and not. And not having to, like, try to persuade college freshman football players that they need to give a fuck about Shakespeare.
[45:00] Like, it’s just not like, that wasn’t. That wasn’t my journey.
[45:05] But, like, that also wasn’t an easy decision to make. Right, right.
[45:08] Ania Upstill: Your mom might have been like, but are you sure?
[45:12] Cate Blouke: Oh, my mom didn’t want me to be an English major. She wanted me to, like, fudgeing, go into computer science or hotel management, because those were more like, practical, lucrative, like, careers when I was at University of Nevada, Las Vegas.
[45:23] Like.
[45:25] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And you know, how great that you’ve made those choices and you get to have your joy in making those choices.
[45:32] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah.
[45:33] Ania Upstill: Or being true to yourself. And then, like, I don’t know, it’s interesting, the idea of choice. Right? Like, that’s a whole conversation.
[45:39] Cate Blouke: Well, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I. And like, to be clear, it is sexual orientation, not sexual preference. Everybody, like, right. So that’s a slightly. I pivoted it a little bit.
[45:52] But like, careers are choices. Like, those are choices.
[45:57] Ania Upstill: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[45:59] Cate Blouke: College majors, those are choices.
[46:02] Ania Upstill: But I. And I do think the sort of resonant point for me is the like, yes, it is. Can be challenging to live in a way that is not accepted by your family, maybe your culture, you know, in various ways.
[46:22] And it can be really beautiful to be able to live in a way that is true to yourself, whether that’s your identity or your, you know, best occupation or whatever it is.
[46:34] And I do think, I mean, I think that’s like what you celebrated your podcast, and I think it’s what’s really important to celebrate.
[46:40] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah. Like, and the other things that are coming up for me of, like, having kids, not having kids. Right. There’s joy in both of those things.
[46:48] And I super respect everybody’s choice in that matter of, like, bless all of you parents, you are superheroes.
[46:57] That’s not the choice I have made for myself.
[46:59] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And I think where we get hung up as humans actually is assuming that the choice that we make for ourselves is the right choice for everyone.
[47:10] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[47:11] Ania Upstill: And that’s sort of where the. You don’t have to understand it to respect it comes in is. It’s like, this does not have to be true for you, for you to go love that you’re living that life, you know?
[47:23] Cate Blouke: Ah, yeah, Like, I love that for you, but in a, like, sincere way.
[47:28] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And I think it’s. I think it’s partly that we get, you know, I mean, we’re tribal. We’re tribal creatures and we, like, love an in group. We fucking love being with people that we’re like.
[47:38] And also, I think people get a little scared of like, well, is, you know, is this right for me? Like, if. If something challenges the status quo, then what does it bring up for themselves?
[47:47] I’m like, doesn’t. I mean, if it brings something up, it brings something up. But, you know, everyone still gets to live their best life.
[47:54] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Yeah. And I think for me, that’s where the, like, sort of self awareness piece comes in. Of, like, when I’m uncomfortable about something.
[48:01] Like, it’s often because I feel threatened in some capacity, whether it’s my little. My sweet little ego, you know, comparing myself to other people, whatever, like internal systems of judgment.
[48:17] Right. And just recognizing that, like, most of that shit is just in my head, that when I’m feeling like, oh, that person’s doing a thing, and does that mean I should be doing that?
[48:28] You know, that person isn’t thinking about me.
[48:31] Ania Upstill: Right. I don’t care. Yeah. I like to remind myself that we think about ourselves way more than anyone else thinks about us by, like, a huge margin.
[48:43] Cate Blouke: Right.
[48:44] Ania Upstill: Really big margin.
[48:46] Cate Blouke: Yeah, totally.
[48:49] And, yeah, I just. And I. And I think about that especially with transphobia, with homophobia. Right. It’s the sort of, like, way in which, like, how other people are living becomes a threat to a different person’s existence.
[49:08] I’m not going to put myself in that one.
[49:10] Right. And that, I don’t know, just the world I’m working towards is like, what if we just let everybody be who they are?
[49:18] Ania Upstill: Yeah. I say this to my students. I’m like, I truly don’t understand why people care. Like, I truly don’t. I’m like, it doesn’t impact your life, who someone else marries or who they’re sleeping with.
[49:29] Like, I don’t understand.
[49:33] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[49:34] Yeah. I mean, and I know when I quit drinking to sort of pivot that train of thought just a little bit, is that oftentimes what can happen, and I know this happens for other folks in recovery, is that, like, when we quit drinking, the people that we’re around can find that threatening because they feel like they need to look at their drinking or behavior or whatever.
[49:55] And. And yeah.
[49:58] I’m just struck by the ways in which we so often just internalize how, like, what other people are doing is somehow a metric of what we should be doing. And that’s.
[50:09] And. But that’s, like, pervasive. Right? I mean, that is what culture is like, existing in a culture is having these sort of, like, societal expectations.
[50:19] But I think I’m feeling hopeful for the future and just like, hopeful for the world that we are co Creating by having this kind of conversation, by really choosing to celebrate joy and to focus on the, like, joyful aspects of making counterculture choices.
[50:41] Ania Upstill: Totally. And, you know, it’s so much bigger than gender or sexuality, too. I think it. I really hope. Yeah. We can move towards a place where we can, you know, respect all of who people are without feeling attacked.
[50:57] Because I really think that that is what it is a lot of the time. It’s. It’s. It’s the. The fear of if someone else is doing it, should I be doing it?
[51:04] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[51:05] Ania Upstill: And. Or if someone else is doing it, but it’s not what I’m doing, then one of us must be wrong, so it must be them.
[51:12] Cate Blouke: Oh, yeah, totally. Totally. Right. And I think that’s, like, what comes up for me around that is just, like, thinking about, like, the really broad spectrum of, like, femininity. And even for me, I can struggle to respect sort of choices around feminine presentation.
[51:30] Right. Even. Even when I was talking about, like, in a disparaging way, like fake boobs just a few minutes ago. Right. Like, there’s a way in which I’m like, oh, that’s wrong.
[51:38] And. And I don’t even always notice that I’m doing it.
[51:42] Ania Upstill: Yeah. And I. I mean, I. I think where that gets complicated for me is on the one hand, going, whatever you want to do with your body, fine. I. I do feel very strongly that people who feel fine about plastic surgery should feel fine about physical transition for trans people, because they’re the thing.
[52:04] And that’s not a conversation that happens enough. And I think it is interesting to engage with why we, as a. Well, well, what we’re saying culturally about what a woman should look like.
[52:20] Cate Blouke: Right.
[52:20] Ania Upstill: And how that is. How that pressures people into doing things that otherwise they might not choose to do. And I think, like, Botox is a really good example because, like, there’s such a prevalence of it.
[52:33] And, you know, I was talking to a friend in tech, and she was like, well, you know, people do it because you get paid more in tech if you look younger as a woman.
[52:46] And I was like, so there’s a couple things happening. Like, there’s the pressure to get Botox, because the tech industry is, like, rewarding women for getting Botox, which means they’re going to feel like they have to get Botox, which then is it a choice?
[53:01] So there’s, like, a couple things I think we need to, like, look at critically.
[53:05] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[53:06] Ania Upstill: While also being like, look, you can get Botox. I’m not gonna die. Bacteria in my Face is terrifying to me.
[53:12] Cate Blouke: Right.
[53:14] Yeah. So it’s. It’s the sort of, like, question of the systems and the. All of it. But I.
[53:21] I don’t know, I just feel good about catching myself in that moment of, like, just recognizing that, like. Oh, yeah. Like, I do have judgment about people’s trait, and that’s human.
[53:29] Right. Like, we do that. It’s super normal, and it can be really sneaky.
[53:35] Ania Upstill: Yeah, yeah. You know, in the correlation in the, like, transgender community, is that, like, the. You know, there’s this sort of.
[53:43] I think there can be a pressure to medically transition.
[53:46] Cate Blouke: Yeah.
[53:47] Ania Upstill: And I’m a little too old to be in that world. Like, I can’t. I kind of came out a little too early, and I’m like, oh, interesting that people are, you know, doing this.
[53:56] And it’s. I think it’s gender affirming care saves lives. And I would love to live in a world where we’ve managed to separate gender and sex a little bit more, because physical changes lives in that world of, like, kind of like sex and physiology and, like, what we expect people to physically look like and gender is something that I think we can be like.
[54:20] You can. You will respect whatever gender you are without expecting your sex to be the same. And so it’s like.
[54:27] Yeah, it’s. It’s. Again, there’s. These conversations are really interesting because we live in all these cultural norms.
[54:32] Cate Blouke: Right, right.
[54:35] Ania Upstill: And also, I do want people to just have whatever gender affirming surgery enjoy in whatever way.
[54:40] Cate Blouke: Right. A hundred percent. A hundred percent. I love that connection of, like, people who are okay with plastic surgery, like, should be okay with gender affirming Care.
[54:49] Ania Upstill: Is literally the same. I mean, the same. It’s the same surgeons doing it don’t really.
[54:54] Cate Blouke: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s getting a surgically surgical alteration to your body so that you can feel better in your body.
[55:01] Ania Upstill: Yes.
[55:02] Cate Blouke: Right.
[55:03] Ania Upstill: Bless people who feel like they want to do that, you know?
[55:06] Cate Blouke: Yeah. Yeah, totally.
[55:09] Ania, this has been such a delight.
[55:12] Just, like, sprawling, rambling, wonderful conversation.
[55:17] I really love to ask people as we wind down, what brings you joy?
[55:22] Ania Upstill: You know, sharing food with people that I love brings me a lot of joy.
[55:27] And conversations about art being. Making art with people is probably my favorite thing. Specifically, making theater with people is probably my favorite thing. And, you know, actually teaching, I had a moment last spring where I went, the most radical thing I can do for my students is just to be, like, hyper present with them to get back to clowning, just to really actually Listen, because attention is such a.
[55:57] It’s being. It’s being taken away from us, I think, in a lot of ways in life. And I think attention is really radical. So it brings me a lot of joy to give people deep attention.
[56:07] Cate Blouke: Mm.
[56:09] I love that. I’m gonna adopt that as well. I mean, I think that’s one of the things that. Again, to bring it a little. It’s similar to improv. Like, improv is about just, like, really being present and really listening because you don’t know what the fuck is gonna happen next and you can’t plan ahead.
[56:23] Right. And that has definitely heightened my skillset in being present and available and connected, setting fucking devices aside. And, you know, look, you’re selling me.
[56:37] Ania Upstill: On improv, and I have not ever been sold on improv, so great work.
[56:41] Cate Blouke: Well, you’re selling me on clowning, so I’m like, okay, is there anywhere in Portland that like. Or we can do some.
[56:46] Ania Upstill: Oh, there is. Clowns Without Borders is based in Portland. There’s clowns around.
[56:49] Cate Blouke: Oh, amazing. Well, look at that. I just found a new little adventure for me to explore. Oh, beautiful. Ania. Where can people find you?
[56:57] Ania Upstill: Probably most easily on my website. And also, I don’t really do social media very much because I hate it, but I do fair. I have Instagram as Butch Mermaid, which is also my.
[57:13] My company name. So, I mean, good luck.
[57:17] Cate Blouke: But like, every once in a while when you’re doing a thing like, right, we can follow your account and then, you know, when you have a thing coming up, we’ll know about it.
[57:26] That’s how I learned about Transhumance, and it was great. So thank you so much. This has been a joy.
[57:32] Ania Upstill: Thank you.
[57:37] Cate Blouke: Thank you so much for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, please help me grow the podcast by subscribing, leaving a review, and sharing it with anyone you think would benefit from hearing it too.
[57:47] Your support means the world to me. If you’d like to get updates about new episodes, posts and offerings, please. Please visit settlingisbullshit.com to subscribe to my newsletter. You can also find information there about working with me one on one to build your most amazing life.
[58:02] Until next time, remember that I believe in you and that you are fucking awesome.
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