What are you uniquely qualified to do as an actor that NO ONE else can do or be?  Have you ever thought of that?  What’s your brand, archetype, bread and butter niche range of characters that you’ll become known for and reliable and counted on to create time and time again?  This is where the rubber meets the road.  Having this down pat is not an option.  It’s what will inform and feed the actions you take in advancing your career. Your actions determine your results.  This is a big CLUE here so if you haven’t taken this important step, this is your reminder to do it now!

In my last post I began to offer some thoughts on figuring this out for yourself using the well-known (and well paid) actors on the series Friends as an example.  But words don’t teach.  Only experience teaches so…

Take on this inspired action if you want to start the process today.  Don’t just think about defining your product, take ACTion.  Start by watching the performance of another actor in the area of your focus.  Find someone you enjoy and see what qualities and characters they have built their career on.  What is their archetype and/or brand?

Make a date/time commitment with yourself to watch a film you’ve been wanting to see (if your focus is film), go to a live theater performance (if your focus is theater), purposefully watch commercials or listen to voiceovers on camera or on radio/podcasts (if your focus is commercials or voiceovers), etc. You get it, right?

I know you’d give almost anything to have the careers of the many actors that you respect and admire right? So check out their IMDB page or Google them.  Do your homework and you’ll see that that with little exception, they have a niche.  They’re the “bad guy” (Devil) or the “femme fatale” (Lover) or the “funny one” (Jester) in just about everything they do. Yeah, there are the exceptions like Meryl, Johnny, and RDJ but you’re probably not going to “buy” Steve Martin as a killer or Mark Walburg as a scientist.  How about Julia Louis Dreyfuss as a political leader? Only when it’s a comedy!  Get it?

So what is YOUR brand or niche?  I’d love to hear in the comments section below!

Want to quicken the abracadabra of your career?  The truth is, you already inherently know what to do.  Before I move on to my next set of posts with the content “to-dos” of your career, you’ve first got to realize that trusting your own intuition is key.  It won’t matter if I give you the Keys to the Kingdom if you don’t know how to unlock the door.

All the magic you need for a magical life is conjured by being and expressing who you truly are – with a sense that there is always more of you on your way from the eternal into time. You have unseen assistance and assistants who guide you.  They would say to stand center stage in your story, play an authentic role in every scenario, surround yourself with cast-mates in lead and supporting roles who help your presence to be magnified, use any antagonists as foils for defining and strengthening your character – and be aware of the cues that life is always providing you! (Your emotional guidance system).

Playing your true self and acknowledging your personal power and knowledge within, quickens a magical flow in not only your acting career but you own life story.  It also, by association, impacts positively the lives of everyone around you. For trueness in one inspires and begets trueness in others. You are here to follow a star in the sky of your own heart, to walk the path to which your inner light calls you and to offer the treasures of your uniqueness to the world. For this is how the Divine comes to Earth – not only through you, but as the uniqueness of you!

It’s time to tap in, turn on, and tune into the dreams you have for yourself and manifest them into glorious reality.  You DO already know how…by letting your internal guidance system be the GPS.  Though I’ll be offering many distinctions and many concrete ways in upcoming messages to hasten your journey by sharing my own experience and what I’ve learned, please always remember “words don’t teach”.  Only your own experience teaches.

By the way, most of what I’ve just written comes to me via my own Law of Attraction education via Abraham-Hicks.  It is this context that allows me to design the content of my extraordinary life.  And I’m so very pleased you are on this journey with me!

I’m glad you asked! The truth is, staying motivated is very difficult for most actors.  We deal with on-going rejection, slow results, stretches of time without paying work and more.  What’s the difference between the actors who are able to stay motivated and those who don’t?  It comes down to one primary factor…

It actually boils down to only three letters and one word: Why?

Many actors are unmotivated because they don’t have a why that resonates with them. They don’t have a REASON for being motivated. Yes, you’re talented and creative but so are many, many other people in the world who are not pursuing an acting career. When I ask many of my coaching clients the question why they want to be an actor for a living, they simply don’t have a good answer.  At least not “good enough” to keep them motivated when times are tough.

The Law of Momentum states that a body in motion will tend to remain in motion and a body at rest will tend to remain at rest unless acted upon by an outside force.

This means you’ve got to get yourself moving in the direction you want! And that’s why you’ve got to have your why. You need to have your reason for why you want to do what you’re doing.

This can relate to not only your acting career but also your health, relationships, changing cities, and changing jobs; it could be about anything, but the bottom line is you’ve got to have a clarified why.

Jim Rohn once said, “The bigger the why, the easier the how”, meaning that if we have a good enough reason or a good enough purpose for doing something, the how will come. You’ll get it done and it doesn’t have to make sense.

Scientists have done research on this because of the extreme creative ability that we have to motivate ourselves in times of need – meaning the why or the reason.

Miracles can happen when you have a big enough why. You’ve heard those stories about people who have lifted the weight of an entire car off of a loved one by themselves?  They were motivated!  That’s a HUGE why.  What’s yours?

Why is what you want important to you? Why is money important to you? Why is acting important to you? Why is making money acting important to you?  I mean, after all, you could have a great income producing job in another sector and act in community theater, right?

People ask me this question all the time. They say, “Lisa, you’ve shared a lot of your early struggles and searches for more fulfillment, even once or twice saying you wanted to quit Act Outside the Box. Why didn’t you give up?”

The answer is because I had a bigger why than any struggle or obstacle that I could entertain or have come over me. My why, although not overly enlightened, was very simple back in the day: I had something to prove to someone, though won’t say who.

I needed to prove that they were wrong when they told me I’d never amount to anything and that I’d be broke and begging them for help, support and/or money.  I was shamed by them and spoken to in ways that when I think about it today, still twist my gut in knots.  So my WHY was huge.  Success is the best revenge.  I’d never give up.

Again, it wasn’t very enlightened because that why came from fear, even though it was a great motivator! Once I started getting an education in the Law of Attraction and awareness of what truly matters most to me in life, my why turned into something different.

I wanted to be able to do what I wanted with my time, my energy and my life. I didn’t want to have to be beholden to anyone or anything and I just wanted to be free.  All I wanted was freedom to travel, create, contribute, be with family and friends on my schedule…so that became my new why.

Let me give you one more clue here about your why, because it’s one of the most important things you can ever do. First, your why should have two sides to it. First is you. What is this doing for you? Why for you? Second, your why has to be bigger than you.

It’s why for yourself and then why for something bigger than you, whether it’s your community, your family, your team, your country or a charity or a wellness situation.

If you have those two why’s, one for yourself and one to help others or the world, you’ll be motivated.

Without a why, you will be unmotivated. It’s as simple as that.

So I’ll ask you again: what is your why? Why do you do what you do? Why do you want to be successful? Why do you want a great relationship with your family, friends, or significant other? Why do you want freedom? Why do you act? Leave me a comment below, I would love to hear from you!

You‘ll be faced with a thousand obstacles in this career, many over which you have absolutely no control. Didn’t get the agent you submitted to? Can’t seem to get a call back or haven’t gotten any auditions from your online submissions lately?  None of those are under your control.

Researching and attending an open call audition, submitting to 6 agents, doing your best work at the call back…those things are under your control.

But you have to know the difference…and when you figure that out you’ll be able to see there is always and really only one thing that you are in complete and absolute control of – your attitude.

Attitude is a choice. When you surrender control of your attitude to what seems to be a negative situation, you will react to that situation. More often than not, the reaction is a not so cool over-reaction. On the other hand, if you could keep your cool, you’d respond to the situation appropriately, creating a winning situation. What do I mean by this?

Attitude is such an important word and very few people truly understand it.

To be honest, it wasn’t until I was in my late 20’s when I finally understood its full impact. All through my teens and into my early adult life, I can’t tell you the number of times that I heard, “Lisa, if you’d just change your attitude, you would be a lot better off.” In retrospect I can easily see the cause of my problem. I didn’t know what attitude really was, let alone know how to change it! Looking back I’m fairly certain my search to find working solutions to my problems is what began my life-long obsession with learning.

Attitude is the composite of your thoughts, feelings and actions. Your conscious mind controls feeling and ultimately dictates whether your feelings will be positive or negative by your choice of thoughts, then your body displays those choices through action and behavior.

Thoughts = Feelings = Actions = Results

I’ve said it over and over and over in my seminars, workshops, coaching programs and will continue to in these posts.

I hope taking control of your attitude begins a magnificent journey in pursuit of you having everything you want.  But you’ll have to wisely choose your attitude to gain some altitude!

Now tell me some of your favorite stories where attitude has come into play with regard to your career.  Good and bad, there are lessons to be shared!

Just like the struggle I discussed giving up in my last post, I also gave up effort.  I used to think that consistent daily effort without all the negative mindset and emotions that struggle brings was all that it takes.  Since then I’ve added effort-less-ness into this delicious mix.

I had to realize over the years that my thinking about effort and struggle as a necessity was off base, not helpful to my goals, and filled with mistakes. So with no efforting and no more struggle, what’s the switch I flipped to move in the right direction with grace and ease?  Inspiration.

Inspiration is often looked at as observing something outside yourself that moves you. Actors and audiences alike are inspired when watching great performances, which stirs something deep inside and that excitement causes a response, an action, a desire to duplicate what you’ve seen or even create something different and unique.  However, I’ve come to realize after much examination and practice that true inspiration is created, organic, and comes from within.

So how do you create inspiration?

The first step is awareness. When you are aware of a negative recurring thought you’re having, take a moment to reflect how it’s holding you back today. This thought is most likely years old and has quite a hold on you, and being on the look out and on purpose about identifying these persistent negative thoughts is key.

Once you’ve realized you’re having this thought, just let it go. YES, you can let it go. It will most likely come up again later today, and tomorrow and later this week. When it does, let it go. It’s a process, never ending, but eventually it gets better and easier to identify and let go.  When you’ve got the grasp of this you will begin to replace the negative thought(s) with a blank slate with which inspiration and creativity are naturally occurring.

Many times we don’t even realize so many of the things that are holding us back. After years, or even decades, they become invisible to us. Today you have a decision, a choice.

You can stay with struggle and effort or move closer to inspired actions that bring you greater fulfillment, greater calm, and better results. Which will you choose? I think I know, but I’d love to hear!