An Expanding Post for Actors
This is a long-winded one for the ACTORS in this community (I know there are many). I've learned a very important lesson recently and I wanted to share in case others find it helpful or expansive. So, I've been pursuing acting professionally since 2013 after graduating from an MFA program in NYC. In 2016 I hit a great stride and worked on 14 episodes of TV (including a 10-out-of-13 recur on a network series and a 4-episode recur on another). After that I had a three-year dry spell.
It was deeply frustrating and my self-worth took a nose dive because it was so deeply contingent upon my "success". I kept auditioning all the time and even getting callbacks often, but nothing stuck. I definitely felt stuck though. I was nannying, living in NYC and feeling so out of alignment, wondering if this was just my cue to move on. I kept doing this work, I did the artist's way, I took classes. Finally I felt called to move from NYC to LA to mix it up. After 6 months on the west coast, I felt it was time to fire my NY manager. No bad blood I just needed a stronger presence in LA. It was terrifying. I'm a total people pleaser, but I'm a damn Manifestor and undoing a lot of that, but it felt so good to take control of my team.
A month or so after that, my agents set me up with the manager of my dreams who has changed my life in less than a month. I'm totally back in the audition game and just worked on a my first big studio film and got to be in a little scene with an academy-award winning actor. The 3-year dry spell broke and I feel SO expanded and I feel that my dream career is inevitable. I HAVE to say though, all of this came in conjunction with me leaving nannying where I made good money, ADORED all the children and was relatively safe, but felt energetically drained and off. I got a ping to check my favorite clothing brands' site one day, they were hiring sales associates. I applied and immediately got an interview. This retail job didn't make logical sense for me, it required an east to west side commute, it was a pay cut, but something about it lit me up, so I made the change. I LOVE IT. I'm having so much fun, I feel great in the clothes, I'm making more than I expected to, I love maintaining the space and being around adults, AND they've been flexible with my life as an actor.
I booked the movie job a week into working for the clothing brand AND to top it off I got to meet Lacy and tell her about all these manifestations in person. ALL THIS TO SAY, I learned that as an actor I have to have a holistic lens through which I look at my life. No acting job is going to come save me from my life. I have to choose things that light me up in ALL aspects of my life if I want to bring my brightest light into auditions and meetings, and that means trimming the fat and only saying yes to things that feel great. Uplevel rut helped SO MUCH with finding my authentic code and committing to honor it. Grateful for this work and this community and feeling lighter that I have in YEARS.
