Davin Youngs Wants to Immerse You in 'The Reset'

EDGE: Why are you bringing this experience to a theatrical venue like the Huntington Theater Company?

Davin Youngs: Because theaters are made for the power of art and creativity and music and sound. That's what they were designed for; they're sacred spaces. This is my maybe not-so-subtle attempt to reintroduce the language of healing into theatrical, symphonic, artistic spaces. One of the aspects of that is acknowledging the commonalities of what the art and creativity brings us, and, on a baseline level, we all know that we walk away from those experiences feeling changed. I think that's a component of healing that people are having the courage now to name explicitly, and I'm excited to be part of that.

EDGE: The title of this is "The RESET." Can you tell me a little bit about what that means?

Davin Youngs: I'll give you this analogy: If you have a computer that's been on a long time and you haven't rebooted it, there's a good chance there are a lot of programs open and a lot of tabs on your browser, and something will glitch, or it'll get slow. We lose track that everything's crowded and constricted because we have all these ideas and stories and narratives open, and so it's my belief that certain experiences are like hitting the reset button on the computer. Some folks have daily practices around that: Meditation, yoga, massage, practices that are intended to help them come back to ground zero so that they can get clarity around how they want to move through life.

This experience is being created with the intention of shutting down a lot of the programs that have been cramping your hard drive, and that's why I call it "The RESET."

EDGE: How do you go about recharging your own batteries?

Davin Youngs: I have a history of having burned out, and the gift of that burnout was that I set new boundaries around myself professionally and creatively. One of those boundaries was that I would always put first and foremost my own creativity. Making and creating is at the heart of my health and well-being. The way that I participate in what I create is that it gives me energy. I may feel fatigued physically, but energetically I don't walk away feeling depleted, and that is because I have very hard boundaries around it being a creative experience for me, too.

I also need to move my body. I meditate every day. Travel is a really big thing for me. Relationships are so important. So, there are many, many ways in which I keep myself nurtured. It's my intention that this is reciprocal when we're together.