Finding Knowledge for Financial Abundance

It is okay to put financial value on something you give from your soul.  I know you understand this.  However, there may be a connection between some of your most gratifying acting roles and working under a nonpaying circumstance.  Much of the training that you have was the result of doing theatre in situations that do not pay.  There are situations like high school, college, church, Community Theater, charity events, where their existence lies in the willingness of the participants to provide their services at no fee.  There is nothing wrong with this as a means of providing theater. 

These circumstances provide a creative outlet to people who perhaps have dedicated their life to other careers.  Yet, it might create a disservice when these avenues of performance are also career training for someone who plans to make acting a professional career.  The danger of creating an association of remuneration being appreciation, rather than financial expectation creates a false sense of value for your career choice. Not to mention the personal self worth that comes from being able to make a living. 

Built in Financial Expectation

If you have a college degree in theater you know how little attention was paid to expecting to make a decent living.  There are few career field education programs that do not include within their curriculum studies for the expectation and need for financial compensation for services rendered.  Why do acting schools fail to include the need for financial security as a major part of their training?  College is supposed to increase the odds for financial security.  That is one of the primary reasons one goes for a college degree.  A major reason for pursuing a higher education is to give you a stronger competitive edge in the marketplace.  There may be any number of esoteric reasons for pursuing a higher education.  But let’s face it; it’s about preparing yourself to be able to make a comfortable living.  Little or no effort is placed on this area in the academic training of the actor.  It is important, therefore, to figure out a way to get that part of the education yourself.  You want to know how to go about it.  Taking a lesson series, like this one, is certainly a step in the right direction. 

Designing a Knowledge Base

It is not enough to be concerned about the emotional “ups” and “downs” of this highly competitive career.  It is fundamental for your success to know what stands in your way emotionally that affects you financially.  You want to know why you can’t get motivated and/or what fears are keeping you complacent with the lack of financial abundance.  I have explored many of those reasons for financial lack from the psychological position.  Now you need to deal with the more practical reasons for not pursuing your career with the dedication and discipline that other career fields demand.

If you were going to set up a curriculum for teaching someone how to make a comfortable living in this business what would it include?  What would be some of the names of the courses you would offer?  “Making a Living as an Actor on the Stage.”“Making a Living Acting on Television”.  “Making a Living as a Film Actor.” “Acting for Fun and Profit”.  “How to Make Your First Million Acting?” “Acting and Job Security”.  “Acting and its Financial Value.”

Let’s explore some of the course titles I suggest and see what kind of information you might expect to learn. Here is a course title, “Making a Living as an actor on the Stage”. It would include a list of the types of Equity acting jobs and non Equity acting jobs. What is the difference? Equity Actors are members of the union that represents stage actors. They would be considered professional stage actors if they earn or have earned their living on the stage. For those working Equity Actors, the union negotiates contract terms and helps them if disputes arise with the producer. The Equity acting situation is the professional approach. It controls Broadway, Off Broadway, and Regional Theater contracts. It controls the acting opportunities for the union actor. A variety of other contracts ranging from the largest to the smallest of theaters are also available. Every contract code is an avenue of making money as an actor in this business. The few exceptions of this for equity actors would be special charity events. They would include specific acting circumstances the union actor creates for himself to showcase his work in hopes of finding an agent to represent his acting company or a producer who might see the value of having the actor work for him.   

How many courses like this have you taken?  How many courses like this have you seen offered?  I doubt very many.  The reason lies in the subjective approach that this business takes.  There are very few areas of verifiable qualifications that give the participants a strong feeling of ability.  When a career field has little qualifying grounds for the participants there is a risk of an open door policy and a limited access circumstance.  Anyone can say they are an actor.  Not everyone can say they are a doctor.  Not just anyone can say they are a lawyer.  Almost every career field, where good wages are expected, has its needs for the job to be clearly defined. The training and qualifications of the participants are easy to discover. 

At the same time these courses would explain the avenues of financial security that these abilities will provide.  No matter how talented you are, if you don’t know how to make a living with your talents they are pretty much useless. Learn how to condition yourself to expect to make a comfortable living as an actor.This is predicated on your knowledge of the different avenues of payment. Once you know how many areas of this business pay real money and how many of those areas you are qualified for, the sooner you will be able to move toward financial security and abundance. That road to abundance is what you are looking for. 

The audition process itself is designed to eliminate those who appear to be unqualified.  Either someone is believable or they are not.  But, as you know, believability is based on the medium and the style of the production.  A technically trained actor has the ability to adjust to the believability styles necessary in order to get the job and make the money.  You may have one presentational style which will lend itself to a clear placement for you in the industry.  You must have achieved the techniques that you use to show to the buyer that you are skilled in the craft of acting.

You want to take this subjective career field and make an objective training situation.   You do this by having a personal knowledge of the techniques that you possess.  You know how you do what you do in relation to your believability, style, control, presentation, versatility and expectation of acting skills.  Before you learn how to make a comfortable living in the acting business you first want to be sure you know the abilities and technical assets your acting company possesses.  As you know the actor’s responsibility is to know his lines, show up on time, and not cause trouble.   This is based on the assumption that the actor is technically skilled in the acting profession.

Technique to Talent

What are the techniques needed by an actor to achieve success as a professional actor?  It is first important to understand what constitute a technique.  A technique would be a process of doing something.  A technique would be the recipe you have for understanding your abilities needed to be an actor.  Techniques are the individual skills that, as they accumulate, become craft. What are some of those techniques/abilities?  They vary in relation to the different areas of acting.  They also vary based on degree of acting needs for certain venues of acting.  Those venues would be:

Personality Acting
Contemporary Acting
Classical Acting. 

Personality Acting could be defined as being believable based on certain levels of emotional expectation.  A personality actor would have the techniques of voice control, physical awareness and clear type.  His parts (face, body, voice) match.  They say the same thing as a character type (lead, character lead, character.)  This type of acting does not require techniques for emotional journeys that require a balance of emotional pain with physical control.  The personality actor has a clear uniqueness of personality.  He does not stretch to an emotional position that will take him out of his believability comfort zone.  He is recognized by his audience as someone to follow and support.  He is dependent on a strong director and producer.   The personality actor does well on certain types of media.  His endurance for make believe is limited but adequate for the areas of acting he does.  The personality actor is fortunate as long as his basic techniques are in place.  This actor can work consistently even if the characters that he plays are limited in emotional range.  The personality actor is likable.  The personality actor is often forgiven when he stretches beyond his technical abilities.  The personality actor is only limited by the number of technical stills he controls.  All to often a personality actor stays within his limited emotional range because it is his comfort zone.  And, in many cases, the personality actor is not aware that his limitation is based on his lack of knowledge about the techniques he does possess and the techniques needed by contemporary and classical acting.

Contemporary Acting requires stronger techniques in relation to believability and emotional range.  The contemporary actor is clear of his position of play, his physical type, his vocal range, his product, his package, his market, his audience and his emotional range skills.  The contemporary actor is clear about the audience expectations based on media, genre and interpretation.  The contemporary actor has a clear understanding of his vocal techniques, his body techniques, his facial techniques and his mental techniques/knowledge in relation to the venues he works. 

The contemporary actor is trained on various levels.  He may be university trained after having recognized his instinctive techniques earlier in his life.  He may have achieved knowledge of his skills and techniques from working in high school, college, community theatre, regional theatre, etc.  He gets response from his ability to adapt his face, voice and/or body to specific needs or request of the director, casting director or producer.  The contemporary actor can use his voice, body and face to maintain believability regardless of the emotional range needed by the character. 

The contemporary actor can use his knowledge of his various abilities/techniques to support his choices for the character during auditions and rehearsals.  The contemporary actor achieves techniques for the business to support his acting pursuits.  He continues to seek out specific techniques that will help him grow as an actor.  The contemporary actor knows his interpretive responsibilities and his creative potential.  This type of actor knows of the techniques found in the works of Lee Strasberg, Anton Checkov, Constantine Stanislavski, Uta Hogan, Stella Adler, Meisner, Sonja Moore and others.  He understands the philosophies and beliefs of these acting teachers and has choses those techniques and philosophies that work for him. 

The contemporary actor is versatile and can support character acting when needed.  He knows how to use his uniqueness of personality and technical skills to go beyond the abilities needed by the personality actor.    He understands the formula for creating a character A + B = C.   These actor have the versatility to work in all forms of acting.  Often they have a certain area that they prefer, such as the stage, however, they are not limited to it.  In many cases the contemporary actor also possesses the skills/abilities/techniques to be a classical actor.

The classical actor often is the reverse of the personality actor.  Even though they have achieved the greatest number of skills/abilities/techniques to support their believability in the classical arena they are often uncomfortable doing contemporary film and television.  These actors have a dedication to the theatre and the history of its styles and purpose.  They have great control of their voice, body and face.  They are the holders of the art of character acting.  They can manipulate their voice, body and face to support characters that play the human emotional range like a master musician.  The classical actor understands his instrument.  He can play his instrument at will and still maintain believability and focus.  Often the classical actor transcends the talent level and rises to the level of brilliance.  This transcendental ability is also the domain of certain contemporary actors but often on a more limited scale.

The Power of Technique

There are times when the aspiring actor in his zeal to be an actor mistakes the journey from personality acting to contemporary acting to classical acting and begins to judge some of them with over expectation or contempt.  A working actor can come from any of these three positions.  He can also have a level of Talent within his area of artistic and technical control that gives him the power of healing and communication with his audience.  It may be true that the classical actor has more technique (skills/abilities/knowledge) and control of his body, voice and face in relation to the arenas needs based on believability.  However, the contemporary actor and the personality actor often have perfected the skills, abilities, and techniques needed by their specific acting arenas to a vibration and frequency level that equals or surpasses those of the classical actor.

Many actors find their first introduction to story telling became the path with which they followed.  If that path results in creating characters that can maintain focus for the audience and achieve a level of Talent that takes and keeps the audience in make believe, then they are masters at what they do. 

They are true storytellers and maintain the tradition of keeping storytelling as the oldest form of healing known to man.   The use of an individual’s life energy to reach out and give the audience peace: be it mental or physical. The actor understands that these areas of technique include the face, the body, the voice and the mind.  Every aspect of the actors being need to be supported with techniques that are at his disposal.  These areas are what the actor manipulates to give the character power in his world of storytelling. 

The techniques available to the actor for each of these areas are what he uses to communicate with the other collaborators.  The actor uses his continuing acquisition of techniques to translate the director’s vision, the author’s story, the producer’s quest and the audiences hope for the future.  Techniques for the voice might include the knowledge based control of the use of instrument and it versatility.  You need the ability to do regionalisms and have a mastery of diction as well as to understand the stage whisper in relation to you projection.

Techniques may also include the knowledge based control of your character’s internal dialogue. Having the ability to find and fill the holes in a script.  You need a technique for understanding silent time, blocking, script analysis, actor’s script analysis, French scenes, positions of play.  You want to have a technique for understanding the giver and receiver of a scene and the responsibilities of each.  You want to have a technique for finding the points of information in a given scene.  You want to have techniques for the cold reading, the stage reading, the commercial audition, as well as techniques for the many styles of acting.

Technique to Talent

Technique to Talent means that the actor has the ability to take the techniques he possesses to that place called Talent.  This is done through the acquiring of knowledge and putting that knowledge into muscle memory through physical repetition.

Technique vs. Philosophy

It might be worth noting the difference between technique and philosophy.  Technique is a process, a skill. A technique is an ability that the actor has for each of his knowledge based voice, body, face and mind workable assets.  They could be explained like a recipe for anything.  Each technique supports the ability to act with believability and Talent.  Each technique is profoundly actable.

A philosophy, on the other hand, is a way of thinking.  A philosophy is a belief system taken to application.  My philosophy for acting/storytelling is that it is the oldest form of healing known to man.  A philosophy is not actable.  A philosophy gives us purpose and peace.  But, we must be careful not to believe that a philosophy can override technique.  It can not.

Filling Holes with Technique

Holes are silent moments that are either created by the director, specified by the writer or appear as a result of missing knowledge needed by the character and/or audience to get the full appreciation for the character’s circumstance.  That silent moment becomes the responsibility of the actor to fill internally.  A hole is filled by letting the character’s internal dialogue recognize the need of the information not said. 

Holes are often created by directors to support the power and creative strength of certain actors.  These silent moments are given to the actors with the ability to bring internal dialogue to the character’s world that can be read without indication.  The more holes, silent moments, the actor is given to fill the more powerful the actor’s talents are.  Once an actor realizes that he is given holes, silent moments to fill, he should also recognize that his acting skills are being recognized and supported.

The actor should know that the more holes, silent moments, he is given to fill the more important his acting is becoming to the acting community.  This community would include: the writer, director, casting agent, producer and audience.  It is often possible for a young actor to learn how to create holes in his character’s world that he then fills creating interest and a uniqueness of the actor himself.  The actor should be able to take courses of study that provide the knowledge needed to achieve the responsibilities of the actor’s creed. 

Know the Contracts

By knowing contract codes of your unions you know the available paying job opportunities for the union actor.  The Broadway Contract, the Off-Broadway Contract, the LORT Contract which is the “League Of Regional Theaters, the Disney Contract, specific to the Walt Disney Co., the Guest Artist Contract, SPT (small professional theatre) the special performance theater code contract.  These are all areas of employment that pay.  Equity Dinner Theater Contracts, National Tour Contracts, Bus and Truck Contracts, Stage Manager Contracts, Assistant Stage Manager Contracts, Chorus Contracts, and Production Assistants (PA) Contracts are all paying positions.   You want to know how many Broadway Show Contract possibilities exist.  You want to know how many franchised producers produce Broadway shows and are hiring actors.   Know who they are.  If you do not know this then you are telling yourself something you don’t want to hear.   You may consciously be ignoring the information but your subconscious knows what that really means.

You are telling yourself that this information is not applicable to you.  It is not important enough to sit down and put to memory to knowledge.  You don’t want to send this message.  Know about Off-Broadway Theatre.  Know how many Off Broadway theaters exist in New York.  Know what would be considered Off Broadway in the other major theatre producing cities.  Know the names of those franchised producers.  You cannot put yourself into the path of the divine flow of universal energy if you have not made yourself part of the knowledge base you desire. 

Creating  Classes for Knowledge

All this information would be part of a class you would set up for yourself.  The class would be designed to teach you what the areas of employment are and who are the current players. The class would also provide the knowledge to evaluate your acting abilities.  It would clarify your product options so you would know how to take advantage of your company’s style and the style of the different buyers. 

This course would include the LORT theaters, the Equity Dinner Theaters, the Guest Artist theaters and who the participants are.  It could be a valuable course.  It could be a practical course designed to give you the competitive edge.  It could pull your company into the energy flow of those paying circumstances and increase the coincidences necessary to make job opportunities happen. 

What about setting up another course titled, “Making a Living as a Non-Equity Actor”.  What would be the curriculum of this course?  It would list all the Non Equity theater circumstances that pay.  You want to know what they are.  There would be certain regional theaters that have a split-deal with equity.  It would list their status, explain their association to the unions and teach the non-union actor who the players are and what types of theater they produce.  It would include their style, their pay scale, their accommodations and their participants.  This course would also cover Non-Equity Dinner Theater.  It would cover what the actor can expect.  It would cover what the actor can expect in pay.  It would cover where the auditions are held.  It would cover all the participant’s names.  It would cover how many areas there are in the Non-Equity arena where an actor can work for at least some pay.  This course would include the addresses.   It would teach you how to communicate with and woo them. 

What about setting up a course entitled “How to Negotiate for More Money from a Non-Equity Job Situation?”  How about setting up a course entitled “Salary and Benefit Negotiations for the Non-Union Actor” or “Salary and Benefit Negotiations for the Equity Actor”.  You want to know what these courses would teach you.  Your competition might know 10% of this information.  You can know 100%.  Your success is based on your knowledge. 

It is the knowledge that will allow for the divine flow of energy to support your desired destiny.  There is no way to be a part of something without knowing what that something is.  What about setting up a course called “Making Paying Acting Jobs Work for the Uniqueness of You.”  What do you think this course would include?  What would you expect to get from it?  How much would you be willing to pay for it?  Often I’ll hear actors say I’d love to take that course but “I can’t afford it.”  If you have ever heard yourself say that then you should know you can’t afford not to take it.   The “but” you are using really means “behold underlying truth.”  The “but” response is the truth of your beliefs.

Talent to Opportunity

The truth is in the statement itself.  If you can’t afford these courses you are not making the money needed in your career. Something must change.  Change can only come by creating new talents that will enable you to be more competitive.  Anything that makes you anxious, annoyed, upset or you avoid are obvious areas of talent deprivation and must be changed. This change will come by taking the feeling of discomfort as indication that these areas must be addressed and conquered.  You conquer them with knowledge and repetition of that knowledge to muscle memory and, therefore, talent. 

Don’t get confused by thinking talent itself is adequate to explain your abilities.  You need to know how many talents you have.  You want to know what each talent affords you the opportunity to do.  It is from these accessible talents that you can assure your ability to make money as an actor. Your acting talents must be competitive to be profitable.  Even if you are still auditioning for showcases and other non-paying acting jobs, you still want to be able to negotiate for something.

How about setting up a course entitled “How to Negotiate a Non-Paying Acting Job.”  This course would teach you how to expect and negotiate non-financial perks that indicate to the audience that your participation in this non-paying circumstance is greatly appreciated.  It shows your value to the producer is clearly appreciated.  You’ll find that many showcase situations would balk at your request.  This course would teach you to see the refusal as an indicator of your company’s perceived value and the producer’s true objective.  Get a clear understanding of why actors are paid.  Know why many actors allow others to use their talents, at no fee, causing more damage to their subconscious than they could realize. 

Secret of Getting Paid

If you realize the amount of damage this type of situation causes then you would never put yourself into the situations.  There is a direct relationship to your being paid as an actor and your ability to get paying jobs.  You are looking to create that ability with greater speed and clarity.  If you know the secret to being able to be hired for paying jobs then it stands to reason you would use that secret.  What is that secret?  I suggest there is more than one secret but they are all predicated on the same concept. 

Let’s look at a few quotations about money and opportunity.  “It is easier to make money when you have money.”  “It is easier to get a job when you have a job.”  “No one wants to hire someone who is hungry.” “It’s easier to get something if you don’t feel you need it.”   These quotes may have been part of your entire life.  They are expressions of truth that, with all of their obviousness, are still the secrets of life success.  They are so simple to understand that they become difficult to execute. 

Process to Success

You want to know what makes it difficult to execute the needs of the riddle to achieve success.  Could it be the fear that if you follow all the rules, apply the secrets of the obvious, you might still fail.  You might if that is how you want to perceive the results of your early efforts.  If the results of your early efforts are not supportive of your long term intended outcome, you run the risk of stopping short of the completion of the success process.  It is said that success comes from good judgment, good judgment comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgment.  Remember, you must have the “no” to get the “yes”. 

Allow yourself the experience of the mistake. Follow the process that your initial limited knowledge will achieve relative limited results. The next effort creates more knowledge and more success.  This growth is used to make even more success until the knowledge needed to create the circumstance of expected success takes the process full circle.  That’s what must happen in order for the process of success to work.

Understand what all these life quotes are saying.  It is this hidden message that must be understood in order to make the obvious, simple message clear.  By the same token that is why is it easier to get a new job if you have a current job.  There is a confidence, a self assuredness, about looking for something better than what you have, rather than looking for anything at all.  You have a certain sense of validation when you are looking for a new position while you still have one.  If the process of perseverance didn’t work then no one would ever get anything.  It’s the old “catch 22”.  The key to any catch 22 is answering the riddle of the paradox. 

A paradox is an inconsistency, an absurdity, as well as a contradiction in terms.  The paradox of your success may lie in subconscious reality.  Your subconscious reality may be your connection to the universal flow of energy to support your efforts and expectations.  This paradox may need to be addressed and the control over your subconscious reality must be in your power.  You want to accept that your life changes, both mentally and physically, should take place consciously in order for the subconscious to be placed under your control.  If your subconscious controls your energy flow to all that is you may find your path to your desire is restricted by the subconscious ask, believe and receive interpretation.  Remember, if the subconscious does not have a solid hold on your birthright to the flow of the bounty of the universe it will sabotage your channel of communication with negative frequencies through body placement.

An example of a paradox would be if you have to be in the acting union to get a union job but you can’t get a union job unless you are in the acting union.  If this is the case  you go to the answer of the paradox by asking, how has anyone gotten into the union.  If only a producer can get you into the union then your answer is to become a producer yourself. Or, put yourself into the situation of knowing how to get a producer to hire you so you can join the union.   If your response to this is, “It is easier said than done,” then you are missing the joy of the challenge. You are playing into your own subconscious defeat.  You are working from the physical plane rather than the spiritual plane and, you do not understand the Law of Attraction and its process.

Don’t place too much power on others who may have their union card.  You may be assuming they got that card by being discovered by a producer.  A large number of card carrying members figured out a creative way of getting around the union’s “no job no card” policy.  Know why a union, created for actors, by actors, would not want to make their union available to all actors.  Think about it.  There is an inherent fear by many union members that excludes aspiring actors from being admitted into the union.  By fearing the competition you create a sense of desperation which in turn cuts off the flow of universal energy.  It will cut off that needed place of confidence. 

Those actors who inform friends of upcoming auditions, letting actors of similar type be aware of a role being cast, are part of the active participation in the secret of life success.  They understand that the universe is limitless in its bounty.  Like tithing, giving must be done out of the love that comes from knowing it is part of the secret of success.  It is the secret of the universal flow of energy that connects ability, desire, and completion through the Law of Attraction.  It is real, it is yours and it is divine.

Knowledge for Film and Television

Note:  Now that the unions have been consolidated your work should be easier.  They still need to be approached individually as styles and expectations of employment.

If film acting is a desire and income source for your acting company then you may need to create courses of study that will clarify for you the paying circumstances of the film business.  Like stage acting, there are union, and non-union jobs.  Let’s look at courses for the union actor first.  “Making a Secure Living in the Screen Actors Guild.”“The Different Contracts for Screen Actors Guild.” 

Contracts for theatrical release films, video release films, movies of the week, film for TV dramatic series, film for TV comedy series, industrial film contracts, low-budget film contracts, deferred payment contracts, documentaries, filmed commercials, filmed commercial extra work, etc.  You want to know who the participants are under each of these union contract circumstances.  If you have decided that film acting is an employment circumstance you desire then you must give yourself the competitive edge by taking advantage of the secret of success that is activated by placing knowledge of the opportunities and participants into your mental and physical reality.  Get a talent for the knowledge base needed to place your life energy into the flow of the universal energy for your desired efforts.  

Knowledge for Television

Course titles will lead you to the knowledge you need to know.  “How to Make Money as an Actor in Television.” “How to Make a Good Living as a Non-Union Television Actor.”“How to Make a Good Living as a Union Television Actor”. Know what you would expect to learn from the non-union course.  You would want to know the kind of paying jobs that are available in the non-union arena… local radio and television jobs.   You want to know how you could get a local radio or TV job.  The course would tell you how creating a local personality show, local dramatic show, local quiz show, local variety show etc., could make you a living.  These are acting jobs as a non-union actor that you could do.  Most of them you will find should be created by the actor as well as controlled by the actor.  Know what else you would get from this course. 

The course would let you know your expected income.  The course would let you know what the different market places are, based on size and how the use of the market place size could affect your involvement and financial rewards.  The course would also include the more commercial aspects of acting to make a good living.  That would be the commercial market of product.  The course would tell you about non-union commercials in the local market and how you could use your wits and personality to get your own sponsors.  The course would teach you how to get your own clients and how to create commercials that are effective and financially rewarding.  The course would also tell you how to find the industrial market for TV and radio, as well as, how to create a market that, at the moment, might not exist.  The course would teach you how many of the non-union paying circumstances can be controlled by the actor if he knows how those areas of the business operate and how he can take advantage of the needed service.  The course would teach you how to create a service that could be developed. 

The course would let you know that many of the non-union circumstances for the actor are just waiting to be realized.  This course would tell you how it works and how to make it work for you.  It would also show you how to find the participants involved.  Who they are, where they are and how they can be reached.  The course would also show you how they can become clients. 

You would realize how much of the actor’s effort should be spent trying to get an acting job.  The fear of this could cause the actor to neglect the knowledge base needed to understand the various markets.  It could cause the actor to neglect how money works in relationship to the actor’s efforts. 

Another course for television and radio that you might want to create could be called, “How to Make a Good Living in Union Acting Jobs for Television and Radio.”  Know what you would expect from this course.  You would be told what being and union member means.  You would learn how to become a union member and the benefits that you should expect by being a union member.  You would learn what is expected of you as a member. You would learn what talents you are supposed to have to justify the “buyers” using a union contract. 

You would be instructed about the various union contracts from daytime drama, to under-5’s to extra work. You would learn how, when, and why AFTRA, the American Federation of Television and Radio Actors was organized. You would learn how spokesperson contracts work as well as contracts for voice-overs, tape series, taped sitcoms, and taped commercials.  You would be taught the minimum pay you could expect to make under each of these contracts. You would be evaluated as to your competitive expectation for each of the contract areas. 

You would know what a franchised producer is and why it would benefit the producer to use union actors.  You would be taught how to break the different production elements into levels of expectation.  That would mean the “A” level which includes networks and higher budgeted productions.  The “B” level which would include cable and lower budget productions.  And, the “C” level which would be low-budget productions that work to infiltrate themselves into any available production slot.  You would be taught how the actor moves from one level to another. 

You would be taught how you can take advantage of the knowledge of how the levels operate to move with more speed and efficiency. This course would teach you how to find the participants of each level and how to integrate your professional expectations into the reality of their circumstance. Having this kind of knowledge of the business would help your efforts to become an active participant with expectation of a solid financial reward. 

The Equation

I know many actors who have proven, under nonpaying circumstances that they have the gift of storytelling and the power of make believe.  Yet, the same actors have little or no success in finding paying jobs on a consistent basis.  Be sure you have familiarized yourself with all the parts of the equation needed to be a successful participant in this business.  The equation is “talent”, which is your ability to do a specific job, plus “business knowledge” which is your ability to know what the marketplace expects from you and how to connect yourself to the market place, equals “professional success”.  So the equation is T + BK = PS.  Know the areas of your life where you understand the equation of success. 

Time

If your time is not used to learn, experiment, take risk, create action in relation to your clarity of purpose and defined expectations, then your chances of success are greatly reduced.  Remember time used for this purpose is called discipline. You may know the reason for financial lack has little to do with your ability.  It has little to do with desire.  It has little to do with intellect or your willingness to work. It may be the sabotage that you bring about yourself.  Somewhere in your thinking process you may believe that having money will lead to more pain than not having it.  I know this is true.  

Remember, all your actions are based on your desire to have pleasure or avoid pain.  Not making money means you feel that it would cause more pain than the pain you have by not having it.  This may sound foolish but it is true.  However, you may need to look at the lack of logic involved with this concept.  It is not logical to believe that lack will cause less pain than abundance.  Yet, look at all the illogical thought processes you may be using to run your daily life.

Use of Logic

It stands to reason that logic is not the prerequisite of your life.  Every act that you perform as a human being that is based on your personal belief system can be justified by thousands of reasons.  Logic may not be one of them.  Yet the one belief that will ensure you of a logical outcome is the one belief you may aspire to and rarely achieve.  That belief is called the golden rule.  You were taught it as a saying when you were a child. You learned from example not to trust it.  Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

There may be a problem with your being able to understand the power of this adage.   It could be that instead you live the adage, “Do unto others as you would do unto yourself”.  The thought of this is quite frightening.  You are often cruel to yourself.  You are often unforgiving to yourself.  You are often intolerant of yourself.  You, therefore, should not be surprised when you do not succeed with the things you believe you want to achieve.

Self Doubt Mechanism

You can not expect to achieve your goals when you have within you a self destructive mechanism that has the power, without thought, to override your greatest desires.  Those desires would be to have health, happiness and security.  It is possible that somewhere in you, as illogical as it may be, the belief that having money will lead to people not liking you or feeling uncomfortable around you.  This could make you feel uncomfortable about having money. 

The belief that being financially successful will not bring happiness is true.  But you know that it is not the money that brings about the unhappiness.  Nor is it the lack of money that brings about the unhappiness.  It is your perception of yourself and how you evaluate your beliefs through the eyes of others.  Having money should be fun.  It should be a part of life’s obstacles that you don’t have to concern yourself with.  However, if having money and the extent you will go to get it results in pain and suffering for others, the problem of financial security is not your issue.

Excuse Use

The issue could be the fear that you will discover things about yourself that you are afraid to know. From my own experience I have learned that any excuse is a bad excuse.  The word excuse negates its own value for being used for not doing something.  There may be many reasons for doing something but, there can never be an excuse for not doing something.  You may have certain beliefs about money that are not the beliefs that you wish to have.  These beliefs may not be in your conscious reality but they could be in your subconscious reality.  If subconscious reality is your connection to the universal flow of energy to support your efforts and expectations, then the control over your subconscious must be in your power. 

You need to address the paradox.  Remember, a paradox is an inconsistency, an absurdity, as well as a contradiction in terms.  The paradox of your success may lie in your subconscious reality.  Your subconscious reality may be your connection to the universal flow of energy to support your efforts and expectations.  This paradox may need to be addressed so the control over your subconscious reality is in your power.  You want to accept that your life changes, both mentally and physically, should take place consciously in order for the subconscious to be placed under your control.  You know you want certain things, yet it appears that some of your own efforts are designed to sabotage them.  Therefore, the paradox of your life should be understood and realized.  You want to accept that the changes in your life, both mentally and physically, are consciously accepted in order for the subconscious to be placed under your control. 

Earning money should become a pleasurable and positive experience for you. You do not want it associated to pain.  Do not allow yourself to consider the negative aspects of having money before you even have it. Dealing with fear of taxes or relationships or vultures are only excuses for not having money.  You may well have to deal with these things after you have money but they are part of your learning experience.  If you are prepared for them, if you understand them, if you accept them as part of the game they will be part of those things that empower you.

Fear of the Unknown

I am going to accept the fact that you are now at the stage in your life where you are no longer willing to be controlled by your fear of the unknown.  You no longer wish to use excuses for not having money that you may have used in the past.  I am going to accept that you are willing to become financially secure working within your career choice.  I choose to believe you are prepared for abundance, even the enormous wealth that this career field offers to those who have reached its peak.  With that acceptance you are now ready to say no to your previous attitudes about money. 

You are going to look at money, not from the desperate need of not having it, but the joy of not needing it.   You will want to condition yourself for money because to be successful as a professional actor means you’re going to receive it.  If you don’t prepare for it then you may not achieve wealth or if you do there is a great possibility that you might lose it.  Free yourself from being conditioned to being poor.  The first thing you will want to do is accept your perception of lack may be based on the idea that wealth is measured by financial worth.  One kind of wealth is measured this way but it is by no means the only aspect of your life that indicates wealth.  It certainly is not the most important.

Preset Personal Wealth

I would like you to reevaluate your understanding of wealth.  Include all the areas of your life where you are wealthy beyond belief. I want you to know what those areas are.  Please, go over the top seven areas of your life and acknowledge what you have.  Remember, they are all contributing to the wealth of your life.  Your being able to physically, emotionally, spiritually, financially, intellectually, personally, and professionally pursue this business is a wealth all to yourself.  Accept it as such.

Use the power of this wealth to motivate and stimulate your goals and efforts.  Once you have realized that you have the right to expect and achieve financial abundance in this craft you will be able to use your current life wealth to help you realize your financial wealth.  Look at the abundance you have as an American.  You live in a free society that provides access to knowledge.  It provides countless opportunities for the leveraging you need to realize your goals of financial security.   This access to abundance is only limited by your refusal or inability to take advantage of these opportunities. 

Think of it.  You are free to pursue this career field. You are free to seek out the knowledge needed to become competitive.  You are free to use unlimited access to materials from public libraries.  You are free to be the best that you can be.  Look at the wealth this freedom gives you.  Perceive your circumstance and life as “abundant” and you can have it.

Grateful

In an earlier lesson I discussed how the your Mind can be used by your brain to prove your thoughts correct even if they are wrong.  I hope you understand the philosophy behind that.  So, one of the primary ways to prevent this is to be consistently grateful. Allow yourself to be constantly grateful for all that you have.  Remind yourself daily of the many things in this life for which you are grateful.  This should be an ongoing assignment to acknowledge the power of your being grateful.  Be sure that you are conditioning yourself to follow up on all the continuing exercises I have laid out.  This conditioning is the ground work that allows for new habits to form and change to take place in your life. 

Change

Change is fundamental to your success.  Change is the way you approach all areas of your life.  Those changes could include your sleeping habits, your eating habits, your relationship habits, your action habits and your thinking habits.  Actively change the circumstance of your life patterns in order to take control over your conscious and, most important, subconscious mind. 

Accept the fact that you are already wealthy and move forward with that mindset.  I am not talking about fantasizing that you have wealth.  Or, those visualization exercises that are already a part of your daily routine.  What I am talking about is appreciating that you are wealthy because of the life circumstances that you have been given.  You have the right to achieve financial abundance as an actor.  It is right for you to expect to be accepted by the acting profession as a valuable and necessary participant. It is right for you to enjoy the process. 

There is nothing remotely wrong with your expecting to achieve financial security and abundance because of the joy you get from being an actor.  There should be no guilt within you that has connected payment for your acting gift as a betrayal of your universal energy. 

Make yourself aware of the many non-supportive comments that have been made to you or by you in relation to making a good living as an actor.  Make sure you counter those thousands of comments with enough positive input to neutralize the negative thought power over you. Reverse your subconscious beliefs in your ability.  Support your right to achieve success financially as a professional actor.   Many actors have achieved major success financially without the opportunities and abilities that you may have.  There is no one path or background that seems to be a common denominator for those actors who have succeeded financially.

Common Denominators

There are common denominators shared by those actors who have achieved celebrity status as well as financial freedom.  Successful actors come from all ethnic backgrounds.  They come from all socio-economic backgrounds.  They come from every possible physiological makeup.  They come from all possible human needs.  They represent the entire spectrum of the human condition. 

What they have in common is their ability to achieve and maintain a following for their career.  They are able to make a good living as an actor.  They are able to be of value to the buyer.  They are able to take their characters to make believe.  They are able to do their job.  That does not mean all actors who are successful show up on time.  That does not mean that all successful actors know their lines.  That does not mean that all successful actors don’t cause trouble.  It means their Talent, as a power, will be offset by their own destructive efforts. 

You can be sure that at some point the successful actor who does not provide the fundamental responsibilities of this craft will finally pass the breaking point of his talent’s ability to override this effort to self-destruction.  They will self destruct as the history of our profession has proven time and time again.

Avoiding Sabotage

Financial sabotage is the act of damaging or harming your financial security.  You do not want to achieve success and financial abundance only to lose it all because you sabotage yourself with your subconscious.  You do not want to regret that your subconscious was never brought to your support.  To avoid this you want to make the knowledge of wealth part of your learning and to accept abundance with grace.   You do not want to achieve success and financial abundance only to lose it all because you sabotage yourself with your subconscious.  You do not want to regret that your subconscious was never brought to your support.  Many of my topics of discussion are designed to prepare you for success.  They are to free you to expect success and to control success. 

Often actors who have been working for years suddenly find themselves with financial abundance.  Many will be destroyed by this abundance because of their subconscious beliefs about wealth and fame.  That is why you want to make the knowledge of wealth part of your learning. And, to accept abundance with grace.   It is important to use abundance with wisdom. 

Sharing the Knowledge

As you make the changes in your life patterns and beliefs, be certain that you understand what these changes are so you will not fall back into your old patterns without knowing it. 

You are creating a path for yourself to follow.  Be capable of telling others searching for a path how you found the path that is working for you.  Tell other actors or aspiring actors what they can do to create the path that is right for them.  You will share your knowledge so that others won’t waste valuable time trying to learn what you already know.  You will make this knowledge support the life changing power of the world of story telling.  Knowledge builds upon knowledge.  That is how progress works.  Someone takes something to a new level which becomes the new standard.  That new standard then can be advanced by someone else.  If the knowledge is not shared the standards cannot be expanded with the speed and purpose that the power of story telling needs.  This can be one of the problems for the aspiring actor. 

The mediums and techniques for the industry have changed dramatically. The middlemen have dictated the standards.  If the actor is not in the loop of knowledge and change he will find himself being window dressing rather than the heart of the machine.  That unfortunate position could lead to being dependent on someone else for your work and for your survival.  Get yourself to the point where you are fed up with the way your career efforts are going.  Demand of yourself an awareness of the thought process that has allowed your career efforts to be non effective.  Use that awareness to create the change. Change the way you see yourself as a person. See yourself as a successful member of the acting community.  Know what you are missing out on and know what you are unable to do without this actor-generated financial achievement. 

Would you feel respected by your friends and family?  Would you be able to use your reputation to help a special charity?  Would you be able to learn more about your craft from the best?  Would you be able to create opportunities for yourself?    Acknowledge how you feel about having a survival job that is supposed to keep you available to pursue acting jobs but in truth only keeps you constantly in the state of financial lack. Acknowledge not having the finances to pursue your acting business.  This is not acceptable to your expectation. This is not acceptable to the expectations of those whose respect you need. 

What are some of the things that you would expect to have achieved financially if you had chosen any other profession?  Do you know what things your friends from high school have now?  What about your friends from college?  Are they buying a house? Are they buying a car?  Are they buying two cars?  Do they have children?  Are they putting their children in private schools?  Make the list as complete as you can.  What about new furniture?  What about traveling?  What about gifts?  You want to become consciously aware of those things that your subconscious may believe you should have and you want to know what those subconscious expectations are so you can support the power of your choice to pursue your professional goals.

Material Misdirection

Material misdirection is spending your money on material things that do not support your effort for a successful acting career.  When you look around your apartment do you see all the things that you expected to have?  If you do then you are independently wealthy, have a great survival job, or you’re spending your money on the wrong things. 

This need to have may be part of what needs to be changed.  You may have allowed yourself to have these material things at the expense of your credit or career investments.  You may begrudge your career choice because you have had to sacrifice these things.  There is a happy medium.  Many people have become successful actors and still have managed to live decent, non-impoverished lifestyles during the process.  It is very important that you find that medium.  A new coat of paint is not expensive. 

Using your imagination and the knowledge of illusion will allow you to create a lifestyle of apparent affluence in your effort to trick yourself into financial acceptability as an actor.  If you find yourself with free time to watch TV, you better figure out a way to make that TV watching business connected.   Determine which roles you could play.  Use your time as if you were already the professional successful actor you plan to be.  Make your own destiny.

A Truth about the Now


You are living in the most opportunity available time in history.  The turn of the 20th century make thousands rich because of oil, oil fields and oil wells.  Once an oil field was discovered it was purchased and exclusive to the oil company.  The turn of the 21st century has provided an unlimited oil field known as the Internet.  It is free.  All you have to do is claim your spot and place a well.  That well is any personal project you wish to create.  The more you work on that project the deeper the well goes.  There is oil there.  You have the ability and the power to drill for it.  It takes time, energy and dedication.  But, as you know, most of all it takes imagination and discipline.  Don't forget you have the power to make the invisible (your goals) visible.  Knowledge is reviewing the past... imagination is defining the future.

Have a glorious week.
I wish you well.

Russ