Patrice O'Neal Changed My Life
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Photo Credit: http://www.patriceoneal.com/patrice-gallery/
Last night was the annual Patrice O’Neal benefit show in NYC. It’s been just over five years since he passed, and even though I only met him a couple times, he meant a lot to me. I was always enamored with his sharp wit and ruthless logic. Whether or not I agreed with him, he always made me think harder about things.
On his Unmasked with Ron Bennington interview, Patrice talks about guys or girls telling him he changed their life and how that means something even if making a living as a comic can be a struggle. I was one of the lucky guys to have told Patrice exactly that.
Before writing, I listened to hours of Patrice segments on the Opie and Anthony show trying to find the moment that was life changing for me, but have thus-far been unsuccessful. So I’ll describe it here and if I ever find it I’ll post it.
During one of his visits to Opie and Anthony, Patrice explained that his real goal, boiled down, was to have an opinion on everything. This statement was revelatory to me. It may seem mundane, but it hit me in a couple ways:
First, it provided connective tissue between all the figures I’ve looked up to intellectually. I’ve always been drawn to people who have big opinions on a lot of subjects. Not just knee-jerk, biased opinions either, but reasoned, considered points-of-view. I’d just never considered the underlying similarities that drew met to thinkers like Patrice, Carlin, David Graeber, and others.
Second, and perhaps more interesting, it showed me that you can have a goal that is more ethereal, less concrete than money or status. More importantly, you can have a goal that is an exploration of what is inside of you rather than looking for something from the outside.
I got to chat with Patrice a couple times after shows here in town and did tell him how that line changed my life. It made me start thinking differently about the people I admire and my approach to my creativity. So many of the things I try now I do just to see if I can do them as opposed to getting any other kind of reward.
I would never say that I knew Patrice O’Neal personally, but I do miss him.
Here are some other folks with big opinions I think you should check out because they’re awesome and you might find them interesting in the same way.
