Tag Archives: perspective change

GO HOME.

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Recently, I asked a client what they wanted, and they immediately lit up. (A good sign.) With an ear to ear grin, they said that they wanted to feel the way they felt when they were their most successful. They described with delight how each win attracted another win, causing their confidence to skyrocket through the roof. They basked in the memory of this feeling, then asked me to help them be successful again.
Honestly, for a second, I was thrown.
I was witnessing this beautiful sharing of a feeling – something they really wanted – until they switched gears on me, and asked for a success strategy.

There’s a common misconception that is probably the number one selling point of most self-help books: When you get want you want, you will be happy. Even when they teach about non-attachment, they include a story of how someone got what they wanted, because they weren’t attached, and then….they were happy.
This makes even my programs and workshops questionable. But ask anyone who’s worked with me and they’ll tell you that I point to how life actually works the other way around — When you are happy, you will get what you want.
Happy…. What does that even mean? Too often it’s described as a positive state (as opposed to a negative) that makes cameo appearances in between our usual, day-to-day states of being. It’s something that’s triggered by life situations and circumstances. Yet, deep down we know that’s not true, because we’ve experienced happiness seemingly out of nowhere, and for no apparent reason.

Here’s what I think: Human beings are not after a state of being called happiness, but rather a feeling filled with humor, peace, and a sense of freedom. A feeling that I like to call Home. Just like Dorothy Gale from Kansas, all we want is to go home.
When we’re Home, we’re our truest selves, comfortable and connected to the world whether we’re amongst crowds or simply alone. We’re plugged into the Wisdom of Ages and the Infinite Creativity of children. Free at last. Free at last.
When you decide to go after what you want in this incredible playground we call the physical world, start by going Home first. Because when you start from Home, everything is possible.

Here’s Your Answer

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In September 2024, I was nearly broke. Despite having learned financial discipline (fifteen years ago!) from Abundance Bound, I found myself slipping again. I thought I was doing all the right things, but something was off. I knew something — not sure what — had to change. Hiring a financial coach was out of the question—what sense did it make to spend money I didn’t really have? So, I crossed my fingers, closed my eyes, and hoped for the best.

My passion – my business – is helping those who know they have something they want to do, or have, or change, but need a way to see it through. When those people come to me, we sit together, and things start to quiet down. The noise of “shoulds” fades. The pressure lifts. Clarity takes shape. They stop spinning, and finally they focus on one true want—the one that actually excites them. And from that moment on, things start to move. Unless… they’re left to their own devices.

So why don’t we take the necessary steps even after finding our one true goal? One client expressed their block as the weight of childhood trauma. With me and money, it’s a sticky kind of embarrassment that whispers: How can I be so smart… and still be so dumb? My identity feels threatened. It freezes me.
But here’s what I’ve come to understand: (Analysis)Paralysis is a symptom of limited consciousness. We’ve come to believe the stories we’ve made up in our heads:

I can’t afford it. 
I’m not ready yet.
People won’t like my choices.

Indiana Jones contemplates taking the first step.

In spite of all of this, I managed to take off the lens of financial scarcity and took a step forward — hey, if your boat is sinking, you don’t haggle about repair costs. I re-invested in the financial wellness program, and once again, began the hard work.

A funny thing happens when we take that first step — we get answers, and our consciousness expands. It’s so obvious, yet we doubt it.

The Answers are in the Doing.

Until we take meaningful actions, we doubt that we ever could. But only after we do, do we see how capable we actually are. So then we take another next step. Then another.

By the end of December 2024, I was steadily on my way to financial wellness—and I had even managed to save money! The moment I took that first step, my energy shifted, I was open to new opportunities, and I booked several acting jobs.

By starting with just one step forward, I found the answers and the clarity I had been desperately seeking.

STRESS – it’s what you think.

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On the regular, I hear people apologize for their unfocused, rude, or emotional behavior. “I’m just under a lot of stress,” they say. Then they list everything that’s causing them stress.

“My workplace is short staffed, so now I’m doing two jobs instead of one”.
“I got hit with an unexpected bill that I can’t afford”.
“I’ve got this thing coming up that’s gonna totally suck”.
“Whenever I try to get finish something, I hit a new road block”.

Contrary to popular belief, stress is NOT caused by life circumstances, but we can tell when it’s coming by our reactions to life circumstances. Such as:

  1. Being too rigid with our expectations.
  2. Taking things personally.
  3. Dreading an activity before we even do it.

Let’s look at the first one, If we go through life, leaving no room for mishaps (computer crashes, car troubles, cancelled appointments, etc.), clinging to the notion that “this shouldn’t happen”, we’ve become too rigid with our expectations. What if we let go of all expectations, knowing that life is unpredictable no matter how well we plan? And with that knowing, what if we also knew that we are built to handle any situation?

If you’re familiar with Don Miguel Ruiz’s The Four Agreements, then you know that taking things personally is one of the worst energy sucks we can experience. So then why do we do it? Why do we take it personally when a person cuts in front of us? Or a friend makes us wait when we were on time? Or a co-worker leaves us to do all the work? It’s because we’ve forgotten that we’re gonna be just fine. We’ve put meaning where there is no meaning. If someone is thoughtless, it has nothing to do with us – that is how they choose to go through life. We’ll be fine. We’ll get our turn, we’ll go on with our day, and we can choose to set boundaries. But we forget.

Finally, when we’re about to do something we don’t want to do – like a project that’s gonna take a lot of time, or an activity that’s out of our comfort zone – we’ve already decided that we’re gonna be miserable doing it. We’ve chosen to predict the future in a worst case scenario. Stress is created by imagining how awful something will be long before we actually do it. Believe me, the more I fly, the more I know this to be true.

Stress is 100% thought generated.

1. Quit thinking so much
2. Just show up, and
3. Play!

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There’s No Such Thing as a Self-Made Success

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What if you won the lottery? The really big one.
Would you take a different approach to your career? You might take more risks knowing you had a safety net. What if, as a child, you went to a private school for gifted students? You might have more confidence. So the next time you compare yourself with someone who’s more “successful”, remember they got there because they had help – as far back as a well-supported childhood.
 
 

For most of my life I’ve worked in a “dysfunctionally independent” manner. I foolishly believed that if I asked for help, it meant that I was

Fifth Grade Me

incapable or lazy. I actually believed that successful people were those who only did everything on their own. If it’s meant to be, then it’s up to me! …..right? When I was a working in Chicago, I had it in my head that if I took a class from a casting director, then I was “cheating”. For me, the only way to be a respectable actor was to get an agent, audition, and prove myself worthy with a long resume. Yeah…

In preparation for my move to L.A., I took an on-camera class from a casting director’s assistant, but never expected him to help me. Turns out, that’s how life works. While I did well at my first TV audition, it was his good word to the CD that tipped the scales in my favor, and I got the job. (Some gal named Tina Fey was also up for that role. I wonder whatever happened to her?)
 

Once I landed in L.A., a friend turned me on to CD workshops, and by gum, they worked! Later, an acquaintance cast me in a staged reading of his screenplay which got me an audition/booking for a national commercial! So random. An old friend from Chicago got wind of my little successes and walked me into her agency where I landed an agent! Then the dry spells came, then success, then – you know the drill. I started to wonder if there was something missing, something that I still didn’t know? At my age, what else could there possibly be? Turns out, a lot.
 
So I invested in career coaching. I used a system that worked well for awhile, but doing the same thing over and over again, hoping for different/better results eventually lost its flavor. Without knowing were to go next, I released the need to figure it out. And as life would have it, a perfectly timed email arrived in my inbox that gave me my answer.
 
I immersed myself in a higher level of coaching. It taught me the difference between being a “list doer” and being an explorer. When we explore, we learn through real-life experience. We move from knowing about something to actually knowing something. My decisions came more quickly, my creative flow became easier, and my definition of success completely changed. But it’s not just the exploration that brought me rewards. It was the letting go of the idea that everything was solely up to me.
 
I no longer resist the undeniable give-and-take between me and my wisdom, all of mankind, and the Universe.

The Secret Value of Joy

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Survivor’s Guilt.

It’s what happens when a person finds themself to be the only person who’s survived a tragic event. This past year, in spite of the pandemic, my auditions have surprisingly increased. Sometimes I feel guilty that I don’t feel guilty about this, so I try keep it to myself. Are you keeping the good things in your life a secret?

As soon as I came back from my family vacation, I was hit hard with non-stop auditions. In July, I had fifteen of ’em in nineteen days, including two callbacks (see video above). Some say it’s not cool to mention this when so many actors are suffering dry spells, but attempting to control other people’s feelings is a losing game.


 
Two years ago – when I had 22 in-person auditions in 21 days – I had some wisdom to share. Now confined to at-home auditions, I have something new to share: Discouragement seeps into our psyche when we no longer see what it true. What I know to be true is that there are infinite possibilities. I’ve lived too long not to see that anything is possible. (Don’t confuse this with the folly of “This could be the one!”) I see possibilities, but am attached to no specific results. Even if I suspect that some of these potential jobs might have already been cast, or that my tape may never be shown to producers, the only thing I see is opportunity. Opportunity to have fun.
 
There is value in joy.
Yes, auditioning two to seven times a week can be exhausting, – especially when some of them are deeply emotional and/or several pages long – but acting is what I love, and so I also relish in the “art of the audition”. From first downloading the script, to recording it on my audition app, to planning my wardrobe, to setting up the camera, I love the process of creating character and story. In fact, we’re all here to create, no matter what our profession. And now that I’m working in an age range that spans over twenty years (40s to 60s!), I get to add yet another layer to the creation process. How fun is that?
 
When we allow ourselves to experience joy, we feel connected to every living thing. This connection has us feeling/seeing the world differently. During a worldwide pandemic, we can either grab on to what is wrong with the world, or what is right with the world. So instead of assuming the future is bleak, why not grab on to what is true: The future is full of possibilities.

Ever ask, “Am I the only one who sees this”?

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I drove home from an acting gig this past year, like Carrie walked home from Prom – desperately needing to wash it all off of me. It took me awhile to figure out why. No, I didn’t set anything on fire, and I sincerely enjoyed the work. but the plainest I could tell was that even in the so called “grown-up world”, high school cliques still exist.

Artist’s rendering of Carrie walking home from prom.

 
In every YA book, there’s the kid who doesn’t fit in, but ultimately becomes the hero of the story. I’ve decided that I’m that kid. But then again, I make up stuff for a living.
 
Most of the industry was shut down last year, because many producers couldn’t afford to implement the new COVID safety protocols. The few that could afford it, implemented regular COVID testing, special food handling, hourly sanitizing, extra personnel, zoning, etc. It was tough, but when they got it right, it was impressive. They knew that any missteps could have serious consequences. So when this particular production refused to check any cast or crew member’s COVID test results, I was speechless. They insisted that “HIPAA law states they cannot see anyone’s test results”. In my head, I was like….yeah…no, that’s not how it works. I then asked playfully, “Well…would you like to know if I tested negative?” They looked me straight in the eye and all super-serious-like said: “We assume that responsible people would not show up on set if they tested positive!” Wowza, they just told me that their safety standards were based on…assumption!
 
Only three of us consistently wore face masks. It was about 50/50 for everyone else. The day they added fourteen (untested) extras on set, I had to walk out. No drama, I just laughed at the absurdity of it all, and waited outside until they were ready to roll. The COVID Compliance Officer (CCO) apologized profusely, but I could feel I was becoming a “problem” for them.
 
According to safety protocols, I was due for a re-test along with two other actors. In the clinic, I pointed out that we were about to be administered the wrong COVID test. (Why am I the only one who actually reads stuff before signing it?) One actor agreed with me, while the other remained silent. Our CCO spoke to the nurse to see if she could give us the proper test, and she said yes. The three of us went in for our “swab up the nose” only to find out minutes later, that production did the old bait & switch – they gave us the rapid, cheaper test after all. Oh, and they still didn’t want to know our results. I just laughed and laughed.
 
But I felt alone. Stupid and alone. No one else asked questions. No one else seemed to care. Some of you may be asking, Why didn’t you call the union? Why didn’t you just walk away? The best I can come up with is this: I got a strong sense that this was a defensive bunch who would double down on how right they were, I felt a bit trapped being on location, out of state, and quite frankly, I was stunned. I also know the importance of “playing well with others”, so I never pointed fingers, I never got super serious, and I never pushed the issue. I honestly didn’t know if they were arrogant a-holes or just plain stupid? I did know, however, that I was turning into that hall monitor no one likes.
 
So when I was finally wrapped – cut a day early – I felt like a social leper. I hadn’t discovered their nightly bar visits until four days in, because dummy me was going straight to her room every night to be safe. The one night I did join them for a quick beer, it was only the sound guy and me who wore masks. They memorialized a karaoke night a few nights later in an email. Hmmm…. everyone sharing mics and singing/shouting between swigs of alcohol – Thank you for not inviting me. Seriously, thank you.
 
My drive home was…freeing. I could breathe again. I wasn’t being judged for asking questions or wearing a mask. I was giddy to the fact that I wasn’t in their high school drama anymore, and the mean girls – I felt the most disparagement from the women – were just girls.
 
It is usually that kid who is comfortable in their own skin, that kid who marches to the beat of their own drum, who ends up being the hero. So when you happen to be the “only one” who sees something out of place, relax in knowing that the truth always come out.

Hermione Granger reads a book.

P.S.: The union was called and they took swift action.

How I Did It (My Life Strategy)

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Ian and I were enjoying the oceanside pool at a five star hotel in Hawaii, when he sheepishly said to me, “I’m just waiting for someone to tap me on the shoulder and say, ‘Excuse me sir, you don’t belong here’.” (c.1997)

While in Hawaii, I pose like King Kamehameha.

That I’ve been lucky enough to travel all over the country (and beyond) because of my various acting gigs, has not gone unnoticed. But how did I do it? When I was finished with conservatory, I took classes – just for fun – at The Second City, but a few years later, they hired me to tour. Just to keep sharp, I took classes at ImprovOlympic (RIP), which led me to performing with Boom Chicago in Amsterdam – because the producers knew me from the iO stage. While playing with new scripts at Chicago Dramatists’ Theatre, I met a producer/actor who was establishing a live industrial business. I ended up working with him for the next ten years, and made good money as an actor while traveling to many states including Hawaii, and later to Europe.
 
In March of 2020, I once again landed an out of town gig, but my flight was suddenly cancelled. I felt the rug burn my feet as it was pulled out from under me. The silence that replaced auditions over the next several months was deafening. There was nothing for me to do except… surrender. Every business – including show business – got busy figuring out how to work safely amidst a deadly virus. Slowly, auditions – in the form of self-tapes – began to ramp up. Productions were actually happening – virtually, or with masks, or with social distancing, etc. My three day gig that was canceled five months earlier was offered again in August. That three day trip transformed into a seven week job, escaping Los Angeles’ historic heat wave. Even in the middle of a world pandemic, I was traveling because of an acting gig. And that same departure week, I shot a national commercial.
 
So you want to know how I did it? Well…um…I guess by now, you can see that I had no real strategy. There are strategies galore out there; books of “how tos” flood the market, but when we follow someone else’s path, we do NOT get the same results. Authors cite statistics showing how their method is the best, but most methods’ effectiveness decrease the more times we use them. If I had a method to teach (and I don’t), here’s what I’d say: Show up. Explore, try stuff, experiment. In physics, it is said, For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. But in life,
For every action, there is…a reaction.
 
Look at the good stuff in your life. Ninety percent of it was unplanned, but it happened because – on some level – you just showed up.

Negativity Rules

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I recently posed a question on social media: What motivates people to re-post negative news stories regularly? I got several responses that could be summed up as such:

  1. Our nation needs to be informed in order to vote correctly.
  2. In order to prevent becoming numb, it’s important to hold on to outrage.
  3. The reality is that negative news stories are our reality.
  4. We need to make others aware that “negative news stories” are shaping our future.
  5. It’s a way to warn the dimwitted about what’s happening.

I was surprised that…I was surprised to see people referring to only two things: our current administration and racism in America. While everyone answered to the logic of posting negative stories, few responded to the need for posting – the motivation. This reminded me of a phrase I stumbled upon while in high school:

“Don’t ever think you know what’s right for the other person. He might start thinking he knows what is right for you”.

                                     ~ Paul Williams, Das Energi

Moral outrage can produce great change, but when we point fingers at our neighbors for not thinking the “right” way, we lose our minds either trying to control their POV (an impossible task) or gleefully watching for their comeuppence (schadenfreude, anyone?). Ignoring negative news is near impossible, but allowing it to rule our state of mind is insanity. As Einstein once stated:

“The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe.”

Feeling Sad Today? Maybe not.

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I woke up feeling sad the other day,

but didn’t know why.

I just knew that it felt bad.

 

     I thought, “If I can figure out why I’m sad, then I can fix it”. I began a data search in my brain, picking out this and that, mulling over missed opportunities, lost loves, bad behavior, etc. Nothing clicked with what I was actually feeling. Instead, bringing up these memories just made me feel worse. I then woke up to a new thought: The sadness I’m feeling is all based on my thinking, and so I quickly switched gears. “OK, good. All I need to do is change my thinking. Think about something else…” I lay in bed, not wanting to get up until I solved this, so I mentally searched for an activity that would get me out of this “stinkin’ thinkin'”, something that would change my thought pattern. The only ideas I came up with were shallow distractions. Then I woke up again.
OMG – This is about judgment! For years, I had decided that feeling sad was bad for me! My whole life I saw sadness as something to be endured, avoided or fixed. “Hey, what if I didn’t judge it anymore?”, I thought. “What if I didn’t see it as something wrong?” In that moment – literally in that instant – my sadness disappeared, and I smiled.

My experience wasn’t about correcting the sadness, but rather about how I judged it. I laughed as I saw the simplicity in it all. Could it really be that easy? Yes, because I felt it.

(Originally Published January 6, 2020)

R U Leaving Your Soul in the Seat?

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“When someone fears losing your affection, he or she will strive to keep it. Perhaps you have strived to keep someone’s affection, too. Fear of loss is not love.” – Gary Zukav, The Seat of the Soul

So you’ve got all of your tools in place. You’ve explored your Brand (I like to use the term, “Essence”), you’ve got your perfect headshots, your reel is up to date, you’re in class, your resume is growing. Congratulations! But there’s something no quite right. There’s this intangible part of the business that seems to open doors for everyone else, but you haven’t quite got it yet. What is that?

An actor friend of mine spoke about his early career mistakes, and it took him awhile to understand the biggest one. He had the looks, confidence and talent, but every time he left his seat in the waiting area to walk into the audition room, he said he left his soul in that seat. He didn’t know why, but he chose to leave the most authentic part of himself outside the door. Perhaps, he thought, no one wanted to see that? He thought professionalism was the ability to compartmentalize. In his mind, “Leave your sh&t outside the door” also meant “Leave your self outside the door”. He paid the price for hiding his best parts.

When I was in my twenties I knew that it was the time for making mistakes. I loved turning thirty, because I knew I was done making mistakes. Boy, was I in for a big surprise! As my mistakes continued, I mistook that for not being good enough. Thus began my downward spiral of contorting myself into a more “palatable” me. I played small and stayed safe. While my peers’ careers got sidetracked by starting families or dealing with serious life issues, my career got sidetracked by my lack of self worth.

Life immediately changes when we relax into who we are. When we relax into our own skins we no longer need to prove anything. The adolescent cry, “You don’t know me!” morphs into the quiet knowing that it’s perfectly OK if most people don’t get me. The most attractive people we know are those who know there is nothing to prove. And when we can enter the room with our whole self – free of the need to book the job and free of outside approval – doors will open.

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