The Acting Business Boot Camp Podcast
Episode 235: Letting Go of What We Want as an Actor
Free month of The Weekly Adjustment Coaching Group
"It is important to identify what we want and what we need, but where does this concept leave us? Well, generally, what it leaves us with is a large but clearly identified package of currently unmet wants and needs, but we've taken the risk to stop denying and to start accepting what we want and need.
But the problem is now that the want or the need hangs there unmet. This can be frustrating. Painful, annoying, and sometimes obsession producing."
After identifying our needs, there is a next step in getting our wants and needs met. The next step is letting go of our wants and needs after we have painstakingly identified what they are and the steps to achieve them.
We let go. We give them up on a mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical level. It's not always easy to get to this place, but this is usually where we need to go."
I'm not talking here about giving up as an actor and giving up your dream.
...
Episode 234: Keeping at it as an Actor
Keeping at it as an actor.
For me, that means continuing to practice healthy habits as an actor, meaning a devotion to training, business skills, to core work, which is the work on yourself.
We need to work on these things with diligence, effort, and repeated practice.
But every time we go just a little bit out of our comfort zone, that's where we get stronger, and that's where our new boundaries end.
We can practice our acting training, do business skills, and work on ourselves even when we don't quote-unquote feel like it.
And again, I would say especially then, because if we don't feel we are worth it and we do it anyway, we are acting our way into right thinking and sending a very powerful message to not only to ourselves, but to the universe as well.
We can act as if it is worth it. We can act as if we are worth it, but we need to do it and do it, and do it, and do it, and do it day after day, year after year.
It's unreasonable to expect this a...
Episode 233: Actors Who Try to "Make" It Happen
Today I'm going to talk about making it happen or if you're me forcing it to happen.
"Stop trying so hard to make it happen.
Stop doing so much. If doing so much is wearing you out or not achieving the desired results, stop thinking so much and so hard about it.
Stop worrying so much about it. Stop trying to force, manipulate, coerce, or make it happen."
Now around an acting career, it feels like so much is out of our control, so I get it. The actor mentality is, well, I'm going to make it happen. But again, it's out of our control.
"Stop doing so much if doing so much is wearing you out or not achieving the desired results."
Recording a podcast, I need number eight, nine, and ten energy, and I was operating at four, so it wasn't working.
Also, there's obsession. Oh, obsession. You know, one of the things that I used to suffer terribly from was that my thinking was unbearable because I would just obsess about wanting to be a working actor or a...
Episode 228: Control and the Actor
Ken Rea’s Outstanding Actor Workshop
Last week I talked about the potential writer's strike, and I also talked about control.
This is a business of practicing self-control.
But what I think is far healthier is really learning how to keep the focus on ourselves.
“Control. Many of us have been trying to keep the whole world in orbit with sheer and forceful application of mental energy. What happens if we let go? If we stop trying to keep the world orbiting and just let it whirl? It'll keep right on whirling. It'll keep right on whirling. It'll stay right on track with no help from us. And we'll be free and relaxed enough to enjoy our place in it.”
“Control is an illusion. Especially the kind of control we've been trying to exert on our acting career.”
Your exercise for this week is to list out what are the things that I am trying to control in my acting career that will happen whether I try to...
Episode 224: Is This Good Enough? The Self Tape Saga
We have a problem because we are looking outside of ourselves to get validation.
The only validation that counts is getting validation from the hardest person on the planet to get it from, which is ourselves.
What do you need?
And it's the same for our self-tapes, and it's the same for auditions.
I also need to say, from a casting point of view, from a casting director's point of view, if I see somebody posting something and asking if it is good enough on social media, I am immediately not interested.
Because what that tells me as a casting director is you don't think it's good enough and that you need to go and get validation somewhere else.
As a casting director, I am only interested in auditioning and only interested in booking actors who know that their work is good and doesn't don't need to put it out on social media.
You are good enough.
I always say that I am good enough is the one affirmation you can't say enough.
Our...
Episode 223: How to Set a Boundary
Setting Boundaries
"Boundaries. Sometimes life and people. And the business seemed to push and push. But because we are used to so much pain, we may tell ourselves that it doesn't hurt. Because we are so used to people controlling and manipulating us, we may tell ourselves that there is something wrong with us. There is nothing wrong with us. Life is pushing and hurting to actually get our attention. Sometimes the pain and the pushing are pointing toward a lesson. And the lesson may be that we've become too controlling, or maybe we're being pushed to own our own power and take care of ourselves. When this comes up, the issue is actually boundaries. If something or somebody is pushing you to your limits, that's exactly what's happening. You're being pushed to your limits. And a different way of thinking about it is we can actually be grateful for the lesson that's here to help us explore and help us to...
Episode 222: Realizing Your Full Potential
The longevity of the work.
You helped me to see how strong I could be and how secure and how confident, and how you have to teach people how to treat you.
And from that advice, I have continued to use it when negotiating clients and contracts and, you know, dating, you can't assume people are going to treat you right, and you have to stand up for yourself and ask for what you deserve.
You just gave me the right tools for me to realize that it was all in my control. I didn't have to be a victim of other people's bad actions or negativity holding me back.
You stand in your own way.
Let's say when you came to coaching, you were operating at 30%. Of where you were at, of where of what your potential was—30%. I helped you to see—the other 70%.
And on the good days, it's 100%. And on the bad days, it's 80 or 90%. But it's a heck of a lot more than the 30% that was being operated with.
Life and work are hard enough. Why...
Episode 221: When You Hear "We're Passing..."
Guide to Booking Commercial Voiceover
Introduction to Commercial Voiceovers
What to do when they “pass.”
Leslie Jones/ Chris Rock Story:
- “You’re not ready.”
- Basically what she said is, what the fuck does that mean?
- But, she kept following him. She kept, you know, making sure he saw her work, and then one day he basically got her an audition for SNL.
And sometimes a pass means just that by that one person.
That you're not ready. And sometimes it means, “Hey, I can't do anything for you. I would like to, but I can't do anything for you.”
I cannot tell you how many times I have said to an actor, “I don't have anything for you right now.” And I can tell that Actor believes I am lying, but I genuinely don't have anything for them at that moment.
The Language of Letting Go.
And I'm going to talk about the emotion of sadness.
“Ultimately...
Episode 220: Resisting Negativity
Today I'm going to talk about resisting negativity.
I want to talk about preserving in you a spark. No matter how many times you get beaten down. That is never extinguished.
The Language of Letting Go
“Some people are carriers of negativity. They are storehouses of pent-up anger and volatile emotions. Some remain trapped in the victim role and act in ways that further their victimization. And others are still caught in the cycle of addictive or compulsive behavior. Negative energy can have a powerful pull on us, especially if we are struggling to maintain positive energy and balance.”
HALT: stands for hungry, angry, lonely, and tired.
And when it becomes more difficult for me to resist negativity, is when I'm hungry and when I'm tired.
If I let my blood sugar get too low or I get too tired, resisting negativity from other people around me becomes more challenging.
But negative energy is a powerful pull on us when we are struggling to maintain positive energy...
Episode 219: Financial Fear of the Actor
The Language of Letting Go.
“I sat in the car looking at a sign on the door of the food shelf office. Closed until Friday. It was Wednesday. I had two hungry children and myself. I had no money. I laid my head on the steering wheel. I couldn't take it anymore. I had been so strong, so brave, so trusting for so long. I was a single parent with two children, recently divorced. I had worked so courageously at being grateful for what I had while setting financial goals and working at believing I deserved the best. I had put up with so much poverty, so much deprivation. Daily, I worked the 11 step. I worked so hard at praying for the knowledge of the universe's will for me and the power to carry me through. I believed I was doing what I needed to do in my life. I wasn't lollygagging. I was doing my best, working my hardest. And there just wasn't enough money. Life had been a struggle in many ways,...
