The Struggling Actor Syndrome
Many actors listen to their peers as they accept their lot in life. I call it the struggling actor syndrome and the actor buys into a whole bag of excuses. Get away from those who accept mediocrity or non-action. Surround yourself with positive, energized, success driven people. I believe that your patterns of work and your efforts towards your goals are directly affected by the company you keep. Misery loves company; your creature will seek out the creature in others. They all respond to the name Misery.
Recognizing What You Want
Take a look at your life. Are your efforts to pursue a professional acting career based on what you really want? Your body, with Buster at control, cannot distinguish between the real and the imagined. And, remember, the amount of time it takes you to collect your "no’s" is your control factor. So train your Mind to visualize your expectations. Focus on how you’ll feel when you get the acting job. Focus on how you’ll feel by not letting yourself down. Focus on how you’ll feel when you are willing to take risks. Have that feeling now.
All you have to do for success is to know what you want and then create the actions needed to get results. You evaluate the actions. And, change them if the results are not to your liking. That’s right; you change the actions and make different choices to get the results you want. Make choices for your new career efforts by first knowing where you are and how your current talents and abilities fit within your efforts. Evaluate the results of those actions and take all new information gathered to put it into the next set of choices that you make. Evaluate which efforts are working and which efforts are not.
Many people keep doing the same thing over and over. They never accept that their choices and resulting actions need to be changed in order to get different results. Avoid this negative aspect of the human condition.
Recognize that if there is something you want and you’re not going after it the reason is likely that there is more pain linked to the fear of failure than the pleasure connected with the joy of success. If you’re going to change your behavior you’re going to have to change your focus and perception. Follow through with your actions and change the focus from pain to pleasure. You already know what will happen if you don’t follow through. You already know what will be the cost to you if you don’t take action.
Go to as many interviews and auditions as possible to fulfill the quota of "no’s" to get the "yes’s". The sooner you change your perceptions, the sooner the obstacles of life will diminish. It is illogical to expect them to go away. But, the effect of life obstacles can be redirected to your advantage. Focus and perception are the keys that unlock your potential for growth and pleasure. If you focus on your lack of opportunity, then you will manifest that lack as real. It’s the law of the universe. It is the law of attraction. You reap what you sew. You will begin to access your dreams if what you want is made clear and the actions you take toward them are realistic, systematic and consistent.
During your life you have had times when you dreaded having to do something. You kept putting it off until finally, for whatever reason, you forced yourself to do it. Perhaps you found the joy of doing it outweighed the pain of putting it off. If you have experienced this you know the power of changing your focus and your perception. The answer was action. You let yourself go for it! You used pain and pleasure instead of letting pain and pleasure use you. You can change your perception and say, “Wow, now I have time to explore new knowledge and more aggressive plans of attack and draw to myself more opportunity.”
Have a wonderful week, filled with new adventures and new knowledge.
I wish you well,
Russ
Monday, January 31, 2011
Monday, January 24, 2011
The Creature
There is a “creature” that resides inside of you and its sole purpose is to protect your physical body. The “creature” doesn’t want your body to do anything that takes you out of your physical comfort zone. It becomes that little voice that whispers in your ear, “do you really want to do that?” “You might fail.” “It might hurt.” “It’s too hard.” “It’s scary.” “I’m scared.” “Let’s just sit on the couch and watch TV and rethink this.”
This internal dialogue may sound familiar. It is as if your Mind is saying, “I want to try this”, “I want to exercise”, “I want to stop eating so much”, I want, I want, while your “creature” wants nothing to do with change. It wants to be nestled safely inside your inert body. Your creature’s sole responsibility is to protect the vessel it occupies. The “creature” is often described as the little devil that sits on your shoulder and whispers opposing views.
The “creature” represents that instinct-driven, physical reality that comes automatically with the human body. It is the same program designed for survival that comes with all living creatures of the earth. The “creature” responds to and acts upon feelings, not thoughts. His job is to hold your life energy in your muscle tissue to be able to “fight and run” at a moments notice. I want you to give him a persona so he can be real to you. Buster is a thought.
Watch for Buster, listen for Buster, and when Buster speaks to you, tell him to shut up. Like a wild horse that will fight almost to the death from being broken or domesticated your body with Buster in control will fight with every trick at its disposal. Your creature will try to keep you from finding a new talent or strengthening an existing talent.
Buster is a master at taking your focus away from discipline. He does not understand the actual damage it does in its effort to use your life energy to protect your body. It keeps you from uniting your spiritual and physical selves at the expense of your human growth and your well being. Discipline or the controlled use of your time is the key to controlling Buster.
Thought Domination
Discipline has gotten a bum rap, just like the word, work. It brings up negative feelings and thoughts of displeasure. Work should be something that brings you joy and pleasure. Discipline then becomes the active control of your time and thoughts for an end result. It becomes your own personal Jedi ‘light saber’. Discipline must be used to stop the body’s desire to override the action. All thoughts of inadequacies, procrastination and apparent laziness affect your body. These negative thoughts put Buster on alert to reserve energy needed for physical survival against threats. Under the influence of Buster you don’t have the energy and life focus necessary for a successful professional acting career.
You must be ready for the personal challenge of taking on yourself. If you allow yourself to contemplate the hopelessness of your efforts, these negative thoughts take your life energy, then that is what you will experience. It took years to subconsciously develop these negative thought patterns. With conscious effort and actions they can and will be broken. Remember only you have the power to alter your perceptions and refocus your energies. You are the captain of your ship. Set a course, if the winds change, adjust the course, but keep moving toward your destination.
Have a great week... remember, it's up to you.
I wish you well,
Russ
There is a “creature” that resides inside of you and its sole purpose is to protect your physical body. The “creature” doesn’t want your body to do anything that takes you out of your physical comfort zone. It becomes that little voice that whispers in your ear, “do you really want to do that?” “You might fail.” “It might hurt.” “It’s too hard.” “It’s scary.” “I’m scared.” “Let’s just sit on the couch and watch TV and rethink this.”
This internal dialogue may sound familiar. It is as if your Mind is saying, “I want to try this”, “I want to exercise”, “I want to stop eating so much”, I want, I want, while your “creature” wants nothing to do with change. It wants to be nestled safely inside your inert body. Your creature’s sole responsibility is to protect the vessel it occupies. The “creature” is often described as the little devil that sits on your shoulder and whispers opposing views.
The “creature” represents that instinct-driven, physical reality that comes automatically with the human body. It is the same program designed for survival that comes with all living creatures of the earth. The “creature” responds to and acts upon feelings, not thoughts. His job is to hold your life energy in your muscle tissue to be able to “fight and run” at a moments notice. I want you to give him a persona so he can be real to you. Buster is a thought.
Watch for Buster, listen for Buster, and when Buster speaks to you, tell him to shut up. Like a wild horse that will fight almost to the death from being broken or domesticated your body with Buster in control will fight with every trick at its disposal. Your creature will try to keep you from finding a new talent or strengthening an existing talent.
Buster is a master at taking your focus away from discipline. He does not understand the actual damage it does in its effort to use your life energy to protect your body. It keeps you from uniting your spiritual and physical selves at the expense of your human growth and your well being. Discipline or the controlled use of your time is the key to controlling Buster.
Thought Domination
Discipline has gotten a bum rap, just like the word, work. It brings up negative feelings and thoughts of displeasure. Work should be something that brings you joy and pleasure. Discipline then becomes the active control of your time and thoughts for an end result. It becomes your own personal Jedi ‘light saber’. Discipline must be used to stop the body’s desire to override the action. All thoughts of inadequacies, procrastination and apparent laziness affect your body. These negative thoughts put Buster on alert to reserve energy needed for physical survival against threats. Under the influence of Buster you don’t have the energy and life focus necessary for a successful professional acting career.
You must be ready for the personal challenge of taking on yourself. If you allow yourself to contemplate the hopelessness of your efforts, these negative thoughts take your life energy, then that is what you will experience. It took years to subconsciously develop these negative thought patterns. With conscious effort and actions they can and will be broken. Remember only you have the power to alter your perceptions and refocus your energies. You are the captain of your ship. Set a course, if the winds change, adjust the course, but keep moving toward your destination.
Have a great week... remember, it's up to you.
I wish you well,
Russ
Monday, January 17, 2011
Complacency
You may not be willing to make the change for fear that you could lose what you already have. Complacency is a dangerous place for a person who wants to succeed in this or any business. It takes courage to pursue an acting career. It takes courage and it takes being able to evaluate yourself, your abilities and talents objectively without emotion. If you can’t do this, you’re setting yourself up for many disappointments. Most of these disappointments are created by you. You are totally responsible for your career growth and you are the only one stopping you. Once you accept this as truth you can find out what you are doing and why. It may be easy to blame someone else for your lack of opportunity or advancement.
What is it that stops you from acquiring knowledge and putting it into the physical repetitions required to achieve a talent. Achieving any talent will always take the same path. That path requires actions that will lead to the no’s in order to get to the yes’s. The no’s are equally important. The process of talent almost always stirs up an internal battle that could result in procrastination, apparent laziness or fear of rejection. To combat these ordinary responses you can learn to accept that the anticipated pain that might come from failure is not greater than the pleasure that will come from success. You can change old patterns of non-action and learn to over ride the fear that the pain of failure by focusing on the pleasure of success.
To overcome this complacency, you must be willing to risk. Take any action to experience the real, rather than the imagined, outcome. Accept that there can be no failure if the process of success requires a given number of no’s in order to achieve a yes. You may be content with your misery. You may be content with the knowledge that you’re not making waves or rocking the boat. One thing you can be sure of: no pain, no gain. If there is no risk, you’ll get no change. Your life is what you allow it to be. You may find this difficult to accept. It may not even matter that you are unhappy.
Rules
Procrastination, apparent laziness or fear of success, like all excuses, can be eliminated by an action based regiment. You “gotta be in it to win it”. Play the game. Play it by understanding the rules. The rules are simple. Everything deals with odds. You play 50 to one. The sooner you play the odds the sooner your desired results will appear. Knowledge from a class, a book or wherever must be put into physical action for knowledge to become useful. Without this process the road to talent is closed. It doesn’t matter that you know most people don’t follow through. It doesn’t matter that you know most people won’t fulfill their wishes for their destiny. It doesn’t matter that you know most people use a litany of “poor me” excuses.
If you are not doing what is expected of any aspiring actor, regardless of your talent potential, then you have to acknowledge the reasons and re-motivate your desire. Try asking yourself, “Why might I be punishing myself with non-action?” Ask yourself, “What about me gives me the right to tell people I am an actor even though I never do the things necessary to claim that profession as mine?” Ask yourself “What is it that allows me to continually humiliate myself?”
Physical and Spiritual Unity
Your lack of action is part of life’s effort to keep you from physical and spiritual unity. It’s part of the game of life. Understanding how to read your excuses will help you to find what motivates you to non-action. For the next day I want you to carry around a traveling notebook. Every time you hear someone using an excuse for why something wasn’t done or why something can’t be done, write it down. The same is true for you. Be consciously aware of your excuses for non-action and write them down as well. At the end of a week period look at the excuses and seek out a common denominator of all of them. What do all the excuses have in common? It’s like a riddle. When you find the common denominator for your excuses you’ll find a key to unlocking the motivation of your non-action. You may find your motivating force for non action is the same in all the areas of your life.
What you may not know is your physical side has one agenda and your spiritual side another agenda. Both are in need of your life energy to fulfill their agendas. The physical need is to keep your life energy for survival. The spiritual need is to keep your life energy for growth and experience of the journey.
The power of your life energy and the control and use of it through talent could have a powerful impact on someone’s life. On one hand we have the spiritual growth through talent that moves our civilization on the incredible journey of evolution and on the other hand, we have human life dedicated to survival of the fittest through the ‘flight or fight’ responses.
There is no wonder that your efforts are met with hostile forces. It is still you and you alone who have the power to succeed in this journey. You should anticipate the planet working against you when you start working against it. This happens every time you choose to take actions to blend your spiritual power with your physical power. The need to avoid pain or the anticipation of pain is a fundamental effort of the body.
What you may not know is that your body does not differentiate between real pain and imagined pain. To the body, they are one in the same real, imagined, emotional or physical. Your physical self will use your life energy to protect the vessel at all costs. That includes protecting it from you as well. If you have any thoughts of redirecting your life energy for talent, according to your body, you should think again. In either case they render the body inactive. That is the primary effort of the physical self.
Have a great week... and remember, it's all up to you.
I wish you well.
You may not be willing to make the change for fear that you could lose what you already have. Complacency is a dangerous place for a person who wants to succeed in this or any business. It takes courage to pursue an acting career. It takes courage and it takes being able to evaluate yourself, your abilities and talents objectively without emotion. If you can’t do this, you’re setting yourself up for many disappointments. Most of these disappointments are created by you. You are totally responsible for your career growth and you are the only one stopping you. Once you accept this as truth you can find out what you are doing and why. It may be easy to blame someone else for your lack of opportunity or advancement.
What is it that stops you from acquiring knowledge and putting it into the physical repetitions required to achieve a talent. Achieving any talent will always take the same path. That path requires actions that will lead to the no’s in order to get to the yes’s. The no’s are equally important. The process of talent almost always stirs up an internal battle that could result in procrastination, apparent laziness or fear of rejection. To combat these ordinary responses you can learn to accept that the anticipated pain that might come from failure is not greater than the pleasure that will come from success. You can change old patterns of non-action and learn to over ride the fear that the pain of failure by focusing on the pleasure of success.
To overcome this complacency, you must be willing to risk. Take any action to experience the real, rather than the imagined, outcome. Accept that there can be no failure if the process of success requires a given number of no’s in order to achieve a yes. You may be content with your misery. You may be content with the knowledge that you’re not making waves or rocking the boat. One thing you can be sure of: no pain, no gain. If there is no risk, you’ll get no change. Your life is what you allow it to be. You may find this difficult to accept. It may not even matter that you are unhappy.
Rules
Procrastination, apparent laziness or fear of success, like all excuses, can be eliminated by an action based regiment. You “gotta be in it to win it”. Play the game. Play it by understanding the rules. The rules are simple. Everything deals with odds. You play 50 to one. The sooner you play the odds the sooner your desired results will appear. Knowledge from a class, a book or wherever must be put into physical action for knowledge to become useful. Without this process the road to talent is closed. It doesn’t matter that you know most people don’t follow through. It doesn’t matter that you know most people won’t fulfill their wishes for their destiny. It doesn’t matter that you know most people use a litany of “poor me” excuses.
If you are not doing what is expected of any aspiring actor, regardless of your talent potential, then you have to acknowledge the reasons and re-motivate your desire. Try asking yourself, “Why might I be punishing myself with non-action?” Ask yourself, “What about me gives me the right to tell people I am an actor even though I never do the things necessary to claim that profession as mine?” Ask yourself “What is it that allows me to continually humiliate myself?”
Physical and Spiritual Unity
Your lack of action is part of life’s effort to keep you from physical and spiritual unity. It’s part of the game of life. Understanding how to read your excuses will help you to find what motivates you to non-action. For the next day I want you to carry around a traveling notebook. Every time you hear someone using an excuse for why something wasn’t done or why something can’t be done, write it down. The same is true for you. Be consciously aware of your excuses for non-action and write them down as well. At the end of a week period look at the excuses and seek out a common denominator of all of them. What do all the excuses have in common? It’s like a riddle. When you find the common denominator for your excuses you’ll find a key to unlocking the motivation of your non-action. You may find your motivating force for non action is the same in all the areas of your life.
What you may not know is your physical side has one agenda and your spiritual side another agenda. Both are in need of your life energy to fulfill their agendas. The physical need is to keep your life energy for survival. The spiritual need is to keep your life energy for growth and experience of the journey.
The power of your life energy and the control and use of it through talent could have a powerful impact on someone’s life. On one hand we have the spiritual growth through talent that moves our civilization on the incredible journey of evolution and on the other hand, we have human life dedicated to survival of the fittest through the ‘flight or fight’ responses.
There is no wonder that your efforts are met with hostile forces. It is still you and you alone who have the power to succeed in this journey. You should anticipate the planet working against you when you start working against it. This happens every time you choose to take actions to blend your spiritual power with your physical power. The need to avoid pain or the anticipation of pain is a fundamental effort of the body.
What you may not know is that your body does not differentiate between real pain and imagined pain. To the body, they are one in the same real, imagined, emotional or physical. Your physical self will use your life energy to protect the vessel at all costs. That includes protecting it from you as well. If you have any thoughts of redirecting your life energy for talent, according to your body, you should think again. In either case they render the body inactive. That is the primary effort of the physical self.
Have a great week... and remember, it's all up to you.
I wish you well.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Perceived Rejections
A major excuse for many actors is fear of rejection. Yet, you know that you must have a certain number of rejections before you receive an acceptance. Therefore, you should eagerly pursue the possible perceived rejections to get yet another one out of the way. These perceived failures, or lack of desired results, can be put to your advantage if you are clear of the odds in the process of success. If there are 20 no’s necessary to get a yes, then the no’s must be gathered as quickly and as successfully as possible. They are a major part of the process of success.
Look at your results with the knowledge that part of the game requires a certain number of negative results before positive results can be achieved. That is why it becomes imperative that you create as many actions as possible to get your quota of negative results out of the way. That should be simple enough. There may be many negative results. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you persevere on the path of knowledge and repetition. The positive results will be achieved. It is important that you realize that your odds are based on the process of knowledge becoming talent. Each effort is part of the physical repetition power of talent. The knowledge could come from books, classes, this series, other actors or wherever. You do the work. You use time effectively by understanding discipline.
The talent comes from action. You do this in the same way you get a talent for anything else. You understand the process. You acquire the knowledge, in this case, creating action, and you put that knowledge to work through physical application. You dedicate yourself to a daily routine. You stay determined to fulfill your daily tasks. You look for the long and short term desired results. You do this until you don’t have to refer to your notes or to your schedule of routine. You do it until you don’t have to think about it. You do this until it becomes second nature.
Choices
It is said that success is the result of good choices and that good choices are the result of experience. It is also said that experience is the result of bad choices. If you make choices, good or bad, you are going to have the experiences that ultimately will lead you to success. If luck is preparation meeting opportunity you can have luck on your side by being prepared when opportunity knocks on your door. That opportunity can be guided by your knowledge of how you can use the universe as your constant energy source. So don’t refer to your lack of desired results as bad choices. You’re after the knowledge that comes from what may appear to be bad choices. These apparent non responsive actions are all part of the process of success.
How many classes have you taken over the years where you felt you didn’t receive the information to move your efforts forward or you didn’t assimilate the information to talent?
You may be aware of certain patterns that you have developed concerning classes. Of course, you may be one of those people who have never taken classes. You may believe that classes have little or no value. You may believe your money should be spent on other more productive efforts. You may be using an excuse that is being empowered by your inner consciousness.
You will find what is getting in the way of your inability to make the changes necessary to get more positive results. Have you ever asked yourself, “how is it possible after all the studying, all the courses, all the books, I still can’t find the motivation needed to create action?” Not only is it possible, it’s a reality for many.
Lack of Action
There is a 98% failure rate for professional union actors. That means that only 2% of union actors are actually working at any one time. In order for you to be in the 2% you need to take action. Action is movement. Action is putting into practice the physical efforts needed to produce desired results. You may be aware of the reasons you don’t take actions to move you towards a successful career. That could include the fear of success. It could include the fear of discovering that you might not have what it takes to achieve success.
You may attribute your lack of action to being lazy. But, why would you allow being lazy to be more acceptable to you than taking actions to get the talents and abilities that would lead to success? Maybe lazy is an excuse without the effort of cover up. However if you were working on a project, let’s say an independent film, a play, a showcase or whatever, wouldn’t you work tirelessly in order to see the project through? You would have little or no time for your apparent laziness. There would be no mindless TV, no endless emails, no aimless phone conversations or bad movies. So, your action or non action has nothing to do with lazy. It’s about the control of your focus. You accept being lazy when there is no one accountable to you but you. Yet, you’ll do anything for a friend or acquaintance. Maybe you don’t want them to feel badly about you for not completing a promise or judging your value. When you are alone, however, you can avoid having your abilities judged through action so you may constantly disappoint yourself.
Acknowledge that lack of action puts you in the majority not the minority. There is nothing really wrong with you because you can’t seem to get your act together. You are in the mainstream. Most people never fulfill their dreams. It takes too much dedication and too much discipline to achieve success. You may adamantly protest that you however would never allow yourself to be financially limited or emotionally dysfunctional. You would never allow yourself to be physically unfit, spiritually void, professionally disconnected, personally alone or creatively empty. It’s not that you don’t want to change. The effort itself could be the possible pain. Procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection may be caused by not knowing how to evaluate your talents and abilities. Procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection could come from not knowing what to do to be prepared. This could be the root of your action problem.
What gets in your way of your responsibilities to you are the two elements of life you must contend with on the physical level. Actions that give you pain and actions that give you pleasure. Most people will opt for emotional pain and physical pleasure. Another reason for non action is procrastination. It falls in the same category as the lazy and fear excuses. You procrastinate because you believe that taking no action will give you less pain than the possibility of being rejected or having to evaluate the competitive potential of your abilities. Actions can be looked at as the ability to do something because you can.
You may have many surviving relics from previous efforts to restart your career. You may have things like a notebook with fashion ideas or marketing labels to agents. What you think they say about you? These things may be reminders of your past perceptions of personal failures. Gather these relics together so you can empower them. Let them be examples of efforts toward the number of negative results needed to fulfill the journey of life.
It’s not just your professional life that you are responsible to. It’s also the other six areas of your life that must be included in your excuse seeking. Otherwise, you can be sure that the neglect of them or the lack of support from them will come back to haunt you. Are all the areas of your life running like a top? Or, are there any areas of your life that are neglected or are neglecting you? You may find that some areas of your life are working well and are supporting your efforts. You may also find that there are definite areas needing improvement.
In some areas of your life, you may have no clue as to what your desires and expectations are. It’s time you had a conference with all the areas of your life. These parts of you should have a support person or persons who are aware of your dreams and ambitions. If there are areas of your life that don’t have a support person, then these areas need to be re-evaluated and restructured. Without a clear and solid awareness of your expectations and desires your chances for success are limited. You want more than the expected feeling you might get from success. You want to be grounded in your desire to feel secure and content with the journey itself. You are looking to break old patterns that are, in reality, considered normal.
A major excuse for many actors is fear of rejection. Yet, you know that you must have a certain number of rejections before you receive an acceptance. Therefore, you should eagerly pursue the possible perceived rejections to get yet another one out of the way. These perceived failures, or lack of desired results, can be put to your advantage if you are clear of the odds in the process of success. If there are 20 no’s necessary to get a yes, then the no’s must be gathered as quickly and as successfully as possible. They are a major part of the process of success.
Look at your results with the knowledge that part of the game requires a certain number of negative results before positive results can be achieved. That is why it becomes imperative that you create as many actions as possible to get your quota of negative results out of the way. That should be simple enough. There may be many negative results. It doesn’t matter. What matters is that you persevere on the path of knowledge and repetition. The positive results will be achieved. It is important that you realize that your odds are based on the process of knowledge becoming talent. Each effort is part of the physical repetition power of talent. The knowledge could come from books, classes, this series, other actors or wherever. You do the work. You use time effectively by understanding discipline.
The talent comes from action. You do this in the same way you get a talent for anything else. You understand the process. You acquire the knowledge, in this case, creating action, and you put that knowledge to work through physical application. You dedicate yourself to a daily routine. You stay determined to fulfill your daily tasks. You look for the long and short term desired results. You do this until you don’t have to refer to your notes or to your schedule of routine. You do it until you don’t have to think about it. You do this until it becomes second nature.
Choices
It is said that success is the result of good choices and that good choices are the result of experience. It is also said that experience is the result of bad choices. If you make choices, good or bad, you are going to have the experiences that ultimately will lead you to success. If luck is preparation meeting opportunity you can have luck on your side by being prepared when opportunity knocks on your door. That opportunity can be guided by your knowledge of how you can use the universe as your constant energy source. So don’t refer to your lack of desired results as bad choices. You’re after the knowledge that comes from what may appear to be bad choices. These apparent non responsive actions are all part of the process of success.
How many classes have you taken over the years where you felt you didn’t receive the information to move your efforts forward or you didn’t assimilate the information to talent?
You may be aware of certain patterns that you have developed concerning classes. Of course, you may be one of those people who have never taken classes. You may believe that classes have little or no value. You may believe your money should be spent on other more productive efforts. You may be using an excuse that is being empowered by your inner consciousness.
You will find what is getting in the way of your inability to make the changes necessary to get more positive results. Have you ever asked yourself, “how is it possible after all the studying, all the courses, all the books, I still can’t find the motivation needed to create action?” Not only is it possible, it’s a reality for many.
Lack of Action
There is a 98% failure rate for professional union actors. That means that only 2% of union actors are actually working at any one time. In order for you to be in the 2% you need to take action. Action is movement. Action is putting into practice the physical efforts needed to produce desired results. You may be aware of the reasons you don’t take actions to move you towards a successful career. That could include the fear of success. It could include the fear of discovering that you might not have what it takes to achieve success.
You may attribute your lack of action to being lazy. But, why would you allow being lazy to be more acceptable to you than taking actions to get the talents and abilities that would lead to success? Maybe lazy is an excuse without the effort of cover up. However if you were working on a project, let’s say an independent film, a play, a showcase or whatever, wouldn’t you work tirelessly in order to see the project through? You would have little or no time for your apparent laziness. There would be no mindless TV, no endless emails, no aimless phone conversations or bad movies. So, your action or non action has nothing to do with lazy. It’s about the control of your focus. You accept being lazy when there is no one accountable to you but you. Yet, you’ll do anything for a friend or acquaintance. Maybe you don’t want them to feel badly about you for not completing a promise or judging your value. When you are alone, however, you can avoid having your abilities judged through action so you may constantly disappoint yourself.
Acknowledge that lack of action puts you in the majority not the minority. There is nothing really wrong with you because you can’t seem to get your act together. You are in the mainstream. Most people never fulfill their dreams. It takes too much dedication and too much discipline to achieve success. You may adamantly protest that you however would never allow yourself to be financially limited or emotionally dysfunctional. You would never allow yourself to be physically unfit, spiritually void, professionally disconnected, personally alone or creatively empty. It’s not that you don’t want to change. The effort itself could be the possible pain. Procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection may be caused by not knowing how to evaluate your talents and abilities. Procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection could come from not knowing what to do to be prepared. This could be the root of your action problem.
What gets in your way of your responsibilities to you are the two elements of life you must contend with on the physical level. Actions that give you pain and actions that give you pleasure. Most people will opt for emotional pain and physical pleasure. Another reason for non action is procrastination. It falls in the same category as the lazy and fear excuses. You procrastinate because you believe that taking no action will give you less pain than the possibility of being rejected or having to evaluate the competitive potential of your abilities. Actions can be looked at as the ability to do something because you can.
You may have many surviving relics from previous efforts to restart your career. You may have things like a notebook with fashion ideas or marketing labels to agents. What you think they say about you? These things may be reminders of your past perceptions of personal failures. Gather these relics together so you can empower them. Let them be examples of efforts toward the number of negative results needed to fulfill the journey of life.
It’s not just your professional life that you are responsible to. It’s also the other six areas of your life that must be included in your excuse seeking. Otherwise, you can be sure that the neglect of them or the lack of support from them will come back to haunt you. Are all the areas of your life running like a top? Or, are there any areas of your life that are neglected or are neglecting you? You may find that some areas of your life are working well and are supporting your efforts. You may also find that there are definite areas needing improvement.
In some areas of your life, you may have no clue as to what your desires and expectations are. It’s time you had a conference with all the areas of your life. These parts of you should have a support person or persons who are aware of your dreams and ambitions. If there are areas of your life that don’t have a support person, then these areas need to be re-evaluated and restructured. Without a clear and solid awareness of your expectations and desires your chances for success are limited. You want more than the expected feeling you might get from success. You want to be grounded in your desire to feel secure and content with the journey itself. You are looking to break old patterns that are, in reality, considered normal.
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Process of Success
The process of success requires that you create actions that guide you toward success. I recommend that you do something every day in order to create a long-term and a short-term goal. To do that you need to acknowledge what gets in your way of doing that. I’m addressing those issues that keep you from a daily routine that will propel your progress. There are things that keep you from action. There are things that drive you to inaction. There are things that get in the way of your doing the actions necessary to be competitive, and it is important to realize that non action, for any reason, is just another form of action. You want to acknowledge what stops you from doing the daily tasks necessary to enhance your growth potential in this business. Of course, there’s always the outside chance that you think you’re just lazy. Lazy and fear of pain have two things in common. The first thing they have in common is you. The second thing they have in common is that they are excuses. Remember, excuses are always going to be excuses.
What do you think motivates your excuses? If your motivations are not clear to you then changing them is beyond your control. You already know that it is your motivations that will lead you toward or away from your primary professional goal: being successful in this business.
I want you to discover why an excuse appears less negative to your life than the possibility of taking an action. I want you to know what motivates your excuses. If you have not been motivated to action you now know the motivating factors you choose are not working for you. We are all motivated by two basic emotional positions with which to live life. The first are those things that make you happy and the second are those things that make you sad.
Some actions you choose will give you pleasure and some actions you choose will give you pain. You strive to be happy but many of the things you believe make you happy are based on choices that result in failure or pain. Choosing to use alcohol, sex, drugs excessively or choosing to neglect taking care of your body, the instrument you use to create your characters are often the result of “enjoying” the moment. The results of these actions most often lead to pain.
For example, if you don’t have an agent you may link more pain to trying to get an agent than to the pleasure you would get from having one. If you don’t have an acting job, you may link more pain to trying to get one than to the pleasure of having one. This is a possible truth. You may already have what you really expect. It may not appear that way but your existence could be based on settling for rather than working towards. If you have not achieved the success you want and the financial gratification that comes with that success there could be two reasons. You may believe the work necessary to receive financial gratification is too great. You may believe you may discover your abilities and talents are not up to the competition.
If you think this way or look at the world this way, you will only attain and perpetuate lack. Lack is as real as plenty. They are both mindsets. They are both brought about by perception and focus. Most of us are motivated to avoid the possibility of pain. One way to do this is by holding on to the degree of pain and unhappiness that you now experience. Sometimes this leads us to take the path of least resistance.
Any actions can be perceived as potential pain. For example, the potential pain could be caused by the time and effort needed to get new headshots. It could be caused by the time and efforts needed to do a mailing to agents, casting directors, producers, ad agencies, etc. It could be the time and effort needed to take lessons, voice, dance, acting, diction, fencing, or yoga, etc. It could be caused by the efforts and preparations needed to go to auditions and interviews. Or, the pain could be caused by efforts it takes to get your union cards so that you can compete as a professional actor.
This potential pain leads to procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection. The possibility of pain also can lead you to avoid being responsible for evaluating the talents and skills necessary for you to get and to do the job. Think about the joy of being able to do things that will replace the complacency of sitting in front of a TV set or mindlessly surfing the net.
You can change these excuses and patterns that you have developed that keep you from the daily actions needed for your career goals. Lazy is a derogatory term. When you use it on yourself you don’t feel good about yourself. It’s the same with any personal addiction. Addictions spill over into areas of life (Professional, Physical, Personal, Financial, Intellectual, Emotional and Spiritual). The constant thought of being lazy is made real in your body.
But, you can change this. Your old patterns and excuses can be broken by evaluating everything you do in terms of pain and pleasure; you can reverse your excuses. The two emotional elements of your being are happiness and sadness. They are the elements of pleasure and pain. If you don’t go to an audition it must be that the pleasure you might receive from getting the role is not as significant as the pain you might receive by being rejected. You are weighing the degree of pleasure in relation to the possible risk of pain. This is illogical. It is also understandable.
You want to make choices that will give you the power and fortitude to take risk in relation to your career. You want to avoid the choices that are excuses for not taking risks. Without risk there can be no success. You may have learned from an early age not to take risks; “Be careful, you’ll hurt yourself” or “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” And yet, you admire the people who do take risks. Even when they fall short you admire their courage.
Therefore, it’s necessary that you evaluate the excuses you use that keep you from action. It is important that you discover your excuses for non-action as non-action is the road to true failure. Every action not taken results in the possibility of a failure. That risk or action could be used as an experience needed for the process of success. You must take risk. Therefore, you must know what your excuses are for non-action. True failure can only happen when you give up. Only non-action can lead you to that result.
Maybe your excuses for non action are driven by your need to avoid the expectation of pain. Many of the excuses you use for not creating action are based on the perceptions you have applied to the possible results. Once an applied perception is in place the effort to create an action often becomes impossible. But, your perception of your expectations can be altered. This can be done by changing your perception of the result.
For example, you know that you have to experience a certain number of auditions before you get a call back. So go after the odds with a vengeance! Get them out of the way. Each supposed rejection then becomes part of your success plan because it moves you toward the ultimate result you want. Understanding perceived failure can guarantee you success because you understand that success is a process that necessarily contains some failures..
You have decided many times to get yourself organized and approach the business with dedication and discipline. You may have gotten all your tools together, your picture, your postcards, your resume, the Ross Report, Theatrical Index, etc. and prepared a massive mailing only to become disheartened and slowly make excuses for not following through. It is also possible that some of your fellow actors have allowed you to use the excuses you do. They let you use them so they don’t have to acknowledge their own failure. If the people around you support your excuses or give support to your inaction, then you may have a serious problem on your hands. You may have surrounded yourself with the kind of energy and mentality that can only breed fear and failure.
How many excuses have you used this week? How many excuses have you allowed to be used by others? It is important to know the excuses you use in your life, personally, professionally, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, physically and financially. Do they follow the same pattern through procrastination and/or avoidance? By exploring each of these areas you can find the excuses and patterns used to undermine your success. Then you can recognize what patterns and excuses you use and how they work to keep you complacent. You can make the choices to create the actions to change them. You can reverse old patterns and refuse to let excuses be part of your new pattern of living.
Therefore, the process of success is action. You continue the actions that are working and you change the actions that are not. The process of success also demands that you recognize the excuses you use to justify your inaction.
I wish you a great week and, now with the new year, a new zeal toward your quest to be a working storyteller, in my book the most honorable profession anyone can undertake.
The process of success requires that you create actions that guide you toward success. I recommend that you do something every day in order to create a long-term and a short-term goal. To do that you need to acknowledge what gets in your way of doing that. I’m addressing those issues that keep you from a daily routine that will propel your progress. There are things that keep you from action. There are things that drive you to inaction. There are things that get in the way of your doing the actions necessary to be competitive, and it is important to realize that non action, for any reason, is just another form of action. You want to acknowledge what stops you from doing the daily tasks necessary to enhance your growth potential in this business. Of course, there’s always the outside chance that you think you’re just lazy. Lazy and fear of pain have two things in common. The first thing they have in common is you. The second thing they have in common is that they are excuses. Remember, excuses are always going to be excuses.
What do you think motivates your excuses? If your motivations are not clear to you then changing them is beyond your control. You already know that it is your motivations that will lead you toward or away from your primary professional goal: being successful in this business.
I want you to discover why an excuse appears less negative to your life than the possibility of taking an action. I want you to know what motivates your excuses. If you have not been motivated to action you now know the motivating factors you choose are not working for you. We are all motivated by two basic emotional positions with which to live life. The first are those things that make you happy and the second are those things that make you sad.
Some actions you choose will give you pleasure and some actions you choose will give you pain. You strive to be happy but many of the things you believe make you happy are based on choices that result in failure or pain. Choosing to use alcohol, sex, drugs excessively or choosing to neglect taking care of your body, the instrument you use to create your characters are often the result of “enjoying” the moment. The results of these actions most often lead to pain.
For example, if you don’t have an agent you may link more pain to trying to get an agent than to the pleasure you would get from having one. If you don’t have an acting job, you may link more pain to trying to get one than to the pleasure of having one. This is a possible truth. You may already have what you really expect. It may not appear that way but your existence could be based on settling for rather than working towards. If you have not achieved the success you want and the financial gratification that comes with that success there could be two reasons. You may believe the work necessary to receive financial gratification is too great. You may believe you may discover your abilities and talents are not up to the competition.
If you think this way or look at the world this way, you will only attain and perpetuate lack. Lack is as real as plenty. They are both mindsets. They are both brought about by perception and focus. Most of us are motivated to avoid the possibility of pain. One way to do this is by holding on to the degree of pain and unhappiness that you now experience. Sometimes this leads us to take the path of least resistance.
Any actions can be perceived as potential pain. For example, the potential pain could be caused by the time and effort needed to get new headshots. It could be caused by the time and efforts needed to do a mailing to agents, casting directors, producers, ad agencies, etc. It could be the time and effort needed to take lessons, voice, dance, acting, diction, fencing, or yoga, etc. It could be caused by the efforts and preparations needed to go to auditions and interviews. Or, the pain could be caused by efforts it takes to get your union cards so that you can compete as a professional actor.
This potential pain leads to procrastination, laziness or fear of rejection. The possibility of pain also can lead you to avoid being responsible for evaluating the talents and skills necessary for you to get and to do the job. Think about the joy of being able to do things that will replace the complacency of sitting in front of a TV set or mindlessly surfing the net.
You can change these excuses and patterns that you have developed that keep you from the daily actions needed for your career goals. Lazy is a derogatory term. When you use it on yourself you don’t feel good about yourself. It’s the same with any personal addiction. Addictions spill over into areas of life (Professional, Physical, Personal, Financial, Intellectual, Emotional and Spiritual). The constant thought of being lazy is made real in your body.
But, you can change this. Your old patterns and excuses can be broken by evaluating everything you do in terms of pain and pleasure; you can reverse your excuses. The two emotional elements of your being are happiness and sadness. They are the elements of pleasure and pain. If you don’t go to an audition it must be that the pleasure you might receive from getting the role is not as significant as the pain you might receive by being rejected. You are weighing the degree of pleasure in relation to the possible risk of pain. This is illogical. It is also understandable.
You want to make choices that will give you the power and fortitude to take risk in relation to your career. You want to avoid the choices that are excuses for not taking risks. Without risk there can be no success. You may have learned from an early age not to take risks; “Be careful, you’ll hurt yourself” or “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.” And yet, you admire the people who do take risks. Even when they fall short you admire their courage.
Therefore, it’s necessary that you evaluate the excuses you use that keep you from action. It is important that you discover your excuses for non-action as non-action is the road to true failure. Every action not taken results in the possibility of a failure. That risk or action could be used as an experience needed for the process of success. You must take risk. Therefore, you must know what your excuses are for non-action. True failure can only happen when you give up. Only non-action can lead you to that result.
Maybe your excuses for non action are driven by your need to avoid the expectation of pain. Many of the excuses you use for not creating action are based on the perceptions you have applied to the possible results. Once an applied perception is in place the effort to create an action often becomes impossible. But, your perception of your expectations can be altered. This can be done by changing your perception of the result.
For example, you know that you have to experience a certain number of auditions before you get a call back. So go after the odds with a vengeance! Get them out of the way. Each supposed rejection then becomes part of your success plan because it moves you toward the ultimate result you want. Understanding perceived failure can guarantee you success because you understand that success is a process that necessarily contains some failures..
You have decided many times to get yourself organized and approach the business with dedication and discipline. You may have gotten all your tools together, your picture, your postcards, your resume, the Ross Report, Theatrical Index, etc. and prepared a massive mailing only to become disheartened and slowly make excuses for not following through. It is also possible that some of your fellow actors have allowed you to use the excuses you do. They let you use them so they don’t have to acknowledge their own failure. If the people around you support your excuses or give support to your inaction, then you may have a serious problem on your hands. You may have surrounded yourself with the kind of energy and mentality that can only breed fear and failure.
How many excuses have you used this week? How many excuses have you allowed to be used by others? It is important to know the excuses you use in your life, personally, professionally, emotionally, intellectually, spiritually, physically and financially. Do they follow the same pattern through procrastination and/or avoidance? By exploring each of these areas you can find the excuses and patterns used to undermine your success. Then you can recognize what patterns and excuses you use and how they work to keep you complacent. You can make the choices to create the actions to change them. You can reverse old patterns and refuse to let excuses be part of your new pattern of living.
Therefore, the process of success is action. You continue the actions that are working and you change the actions that are not. The process of success also demands that you recognize the excuses you use to justify your inaction.
I wish you a great week and, now with the new year, a new zeal toward your quest to be a working storyteller, in my book the most honorable profession anyone can undertake.
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