Growing up, I was very passionate about many things that were usually unwarranted.
I was passionate about my favorite sports teams and would readily debate anyone for hours if they dared to have a difference in opinion.
I was also passionate about silly things like my favorite color (which has changed many times through the years), the coolest car on the road, Pepsi VS Coke, and tons of other stuff that were of little importance.
Like any other kid, my focus was on being a kid.
Sure, I had big dreams and always wanted to get out to Hollywood to pursue them… but that was always something I would do “one day.”
In the small town I grew up in, there were only a few of us that thought this way. Some of us wanted to be actors, others wanted to play professional sports, and some wanted to serve in government on a high level.
There was exactly 1 of us that was actually working towards it and ended up making it big time!
If you are reading this, you have definitely seen her on TV, or while surfing Netflix. You have probably even seen some of her film work too.
When she left town midway through High School, with a Disney deal in hand, it was the talk of the town and everyone kept saying that she was so lucky.
Over the years, I thought about how she was able to achieve so much so quickly.
It wasn’t luck at all and that’s the great news. She only did a couple things masterfully and if you do them too, you can absolutely skyrocket your career!
Here’s how…
She started actively working on building a career at a very early age. While the rest of us were playing “cops and robbers” she was at home, working on her craft.
The motion of this activity let her feel like she was on track, long before she had any evidence of that.
The feeling of achievement allowed her to keep going, in spite of the lack of progress. Many of us get discouraged after feeling a lack of progress for just a couple of weeks or sometimes, even just a few days is enough to have the doubts start creeping in.
When you’re working on big goals, it’s important to keep your mind’s eye on the prize always!
Aim to fill up your time with targeted activities, of which I’ve given many, many examples and resources. Free time is the enemy of achievement.
If you have a couple hours between auditions, don’t go home and rest. Walk up and down Sunset and see who you can bump into.
Bring supplies with you and set up shop at a Starbucks to do your marketing mail outs. Just work on targeted activities instead of simply filling up time and before long, you will set yourself on autopilot and it will become your modus operandi.
You will in effect start to compress time and get more done, quicker. That was a big factor in how my former classmate was able to accomplish so much, in a very short amount of time.
She was also one of the most confident and courageous people I have every met. We worked on a show together once and I noticed that she missed a couple cues on opening night. She was clearly disappointed afterwards, so I approached to ask if everything was ok.
She shared with me that she had always battled a horrible case of stage fright. I was a bit confused by that because her performances were always impeccable.
“How can you of all people have stage fright” I asked.
She told me that stepping out on stage required a conscious decision to feel the fear and then go out and perform anyway.
Today I realize, that’s what courage is. It’s not about being fearless. It’s about doing what your fear anyway.
Courage is seeing Ari Emanuel walk into the restaurant, getting up and introducing yourself anyway, even though you might be terrified of talking to one of the most powerful people in the industry.
Courage is picking up the phone and calling Bob Iger’s office even though he has no idea you even exist.
It takes a ton of courage to breakthrough in the industry, because you will constantly face situations where you will feel the fear and have to carry on anyway.
Start flexing your courage muscle today. What scares you? Is it picking up the phone and calling your dream agent or showing up at their office unannounced?
The worst that can happen is they don’t pick up the phone or are out of the office, so you would end up right back were started except that you will have flexed that courage muscle.
Perhaps you do catch them in the office or actually get them on the phone, setting off what could be a chain of fantastic events.
I used to hate calling anyone on the phone. Even ordering a pizza, I couldn’t let the phone ring more than 3 times before panicking, hanging up, and getting a burger instead.
It took thousands of phone calls but because I chased the fear, now with few exceptions I can get any one on the phone and I have made some really valuable connections.
I once called Michael Eisner’s office day after day and after call #107 I got through to him and spoke to him for about 10 minutes about a project I was developing. He put me in touch with the people in development who took me seriously since the CEO told them about the project.
Ultimately, they passed on the it but I ended up making valuable connections that I rely on to do this.
You never know what can end up happening after a simple phone call.
Will Smith said “the most beautiful things in the world are on the other side of fear.” So go to where the fear is and chase it relentlessly. Often, it’s the fear that lets you know you are on the right track.
Something I figured out early on is that if you have the right story in place, then it’s a way you can sort of hack your brain into pushing towards fear.
I created a tool to help you do just that. It helps you approach auditions with superior confidence, knowing that your reputation matches your potential. Here are the details on that.
Lastly, I wanted to talk about something very important but for which there is a lot of noise and many misconceptions.
If you want to achieve a big goal like becoming a full time actor with more opportunities than you even have time for, then it’s important that you master the art of thinking big.
Recently I heard a story, about a group of elementary school kids. Their teacher asked them to draw a picture of what they wanted to be when they grow up.
Excitedly, the kids went to work drawing pictures of firefighters, police officers, doctors, etc.
Except for one student. He drew a picture of a pizza delivery driver. There’s honor in working hard regardless of the occupation but the teacher was confused about the student’s choice because it didn’t match what one would expect.
His mother said that the student’s uncle was a pizza delivery driver and the only man in his life that wasn’t incarcerated or on drugs.
Humans, regardless of age, tend not to reach for the highest branch on the tree of life. We reach for the highest branch we can see. The young boy couldn’t “see” himself as a CEO or a doctor because to him it wasn’t real. It was for other people.
That’s why it’s difficult to make it out of the Southside of Detroit, if that’s all you have ever known.
It’s no different for actors. Most of us are not rubbing elbows with Leonardo DiCaprio and Meryl Streep.
We tend to surround ourselves with people in the same professional place as us. It’s one thing to know that a branch exists, obviously we all know that becoming a marquee actor is a real and tangible thing, it’s another thing to see it.
If you lived in a building were everyone else was a successful actor, it would uplift your career too. Winners recognize winners, so it would propel you to win along with everyone else.
You would also get to see firsthand, the mechanics of what they are doing. You would see them going to gym at 5 am every morning, dropping off their mailouts every Tuesday and Thursday, ordering in from Sur La Table instead of In N Out, and running lines on the balcony.
There is real power in having this kind of a network so you must always put effort into building one.
You will be surprised at who you can attract into your network. It follows the principle of thinking big. Leo needs a few friends, just like everyone else.
The only caveat is that no one wants a friends that always needs something and brings nothing to the table, so be sure that your backstory and your reputation match what you want to accomplish. Here’s a quick way to do that.
I put together this special report for you, because we tend to focus on the mechanics and often ignore the soft skills.
However, if you sharpen your soft skills and get your mindset right, the mechanics will follow. You truly can’t have one without the other.
Think of it this way, you can push the power button on a laptop 1000 times but if there’s no software loaded onto the hard drive, it’s never going to turn on.
But, when you have the right software and the right mechanics that’s when dreams start to come true.
Then all that’s left to do is pour fuel on the fire and do this to skyrocket your career.
I always aim to cover all the bases and bring you everything you need to succeed in the industry because my goal is to…
See at the top,
Scott