Sometimes, half the battle in life-and in our acting-is to become aware of when we get scared and how fear actually stops us from really going after what we want. I’m not talking about the kind of fear that one experiences while watching “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.” I mean more subtle forms of fear thatRead more
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I don’t know where I saw a quote recently-in a magazine somewhere or online-but it was such a beautiful and simple life philosophy that can be applied to all areas of your life-in dating, creating, career, acting. But I’ve actually found that every life philosophy also holds true to acting because what is acting, really,Read more
I received an email from a fan of a recent Backstage blog (“Get Clear in Your Intentions and Get What You Want“) and she expressed the most beautiful sentiment. In part, she had an “Aha!” moment about her high school self. She was a chunky pre-teen and though she outgrew that “awkward” phase, as sheRead more
Morgan Freeman says, “Acting is reacting in my book.” That’s really what it is. We hear someone say something to us under different circumstances and it makes us react. We cry. We lose our shit. We laugh. We express feeling. We follow an instinct. Sometimes our reactions-when they aren’t planned and controlled-are surprising to us.Read more
Why are we so scared to say what it is we want? A student recently expressed what his intentions were for his career and he was unspecific. He said something like, “I want to get into rooms.” Now we understand what that means at one level. He wants to get opportunities. He wants to beRead more
All we’re trying to do in acting is to stop “acting” and allow ourselves to be. This is simple-but it’s not easy. Just like most things in life, I have found. The basic truths and understanding of many things is born out of simplicity. Human beings overcomplicate to the point of rendering things confusing, pain-inflicting,Read more
I was teaching at our New York studio a few days ago and had what I thought was a thunderous aha moment. In this amazing, beautiful, miraculous universe in this incredibly energetic, dynamic, wonderful city filled with so many creative people doing their things…why don’t we believe that what we want is possible? I mean,Read more
If you’re going to think thoughts you might as well think big ones. First off it’s free. Second it feels better to think in terms of possibility and creativity, rather than thinking thoughts that are tethered to our conditioned way of seeing things. That is, incorrectly. Third, that’s how science works. Scientists call their experimentsRead more
VIDEO LESSON HERE Confidence. What is it? How do we get it? Malcolm Gladwell talks about the 10,000 Hours Rule and that it takes around that amount of time until you become an expert at what you do. Just by putting in the hours, you will naturally become more confident because you’ve been doing it.Read more
I was on vacation in Mexico last week and I swam in the ocean that was recovering from a west coast hurricane-like condition. The waves were massive. Formidable. The recent eruptions of Iceland’s Bardarbunga volcano have been described as awe-inspiring and incredible. When we look at nature and respond to its power and force,Read more