Feeling Stuck In Your Acting Career? 7 Steps To Set You Free

Do you ever worry that you might be too old, don’t have enough credits, or aren’t good-looking enough to succeed as an actor? Where are those thoughts getting you?  They’re probably not helping you get acting jobs.

Here are 7 steps to help set you free…

Our brains are like computers. The good news is that we choose what to program. Put negative thoughts in, negative experiences come out. When you consciously choose to focus on new thoughts, feelings or images, you can then create new neural patterns in your brain. Since every word you speak and every thought you think is an affirmation, it’s up to you whether you program your mind with the negative or positive.

7 Questions To Set You Free:

1) What Program Am I Running?
How do we know what beliefs are running our lives? Look at what is going on in your life. Notice what are you saying to yourself today. Whatever you think about, picture in your mind daily and put emotional energy towards is what you are now experiencing. Become consciously aware.

2) Who Installed My Old Negative Programs?
According to Dr. Bruce Lipton, most of our beliefs about ourselves are formed during our early childhood years, and most of it was from outside influences. A parent, teacher or even your culture may have labeled you ugly, stupid, a show-off, untalented or unworthy. You formed beliefs about yourself based off of these non-truths, and often they are still running your life. In fact, most people will go out of their way to make themselves right about a belief that was wrongly planted during childhood, without even knowing it.

3) What If I Questioned My Negative Beliefs?
Try using this as your guide when dealing with your negative beliefs + self talk:
If it feels good, it’s true for me. If it feels bad, it’s a lie.

So, does “I’m too old, I don’t have enough credits, or I’m not pretty/handsome enough” feel good or bad?  I’m guessing, bad, which means it’s a lie.  If you are tempted to explain (and even back up with evidence) why you are right about it being true, then that is exactly the problem.  Again, how is choosing this belief serving you and your career, and are you ready to change it?

4) What Evidence Can I Find To Affirm The Positive?
With every negative belief, it is now your job to ask the Universe for evidence of the opposite. Here are a few examples of actresses who didn’t allow these negative beliefs to dominate their minds…let them inspire you to believe it IS possible.

“I’m too old” 
That’s not what he late and great Kathryn Joosten chose to think when she moved to Hollywood at age 42 with no agent and no contacts and went on to win 2 Emmys.

“I don’t have enough credits” 
Gabourey Sidibe surely didn’t bring that energy into the audition room when she read for “Precious.” In fact, her Oscar winning performance in this film marked her FIRST acting credit!

“I’m not good-looking enough” 
Is a statement Allison Janney heard from an agent in the beginning of her career, but she obviously never made it true for her and went on to win 5 Emmys.

The great news is that your subconscious mind is completely neutral and impartial. It can’t tell the difference between what is real or imagined and it will carry out any instructions that you give it. So, if you are constantly telling yourself, “I’m too old, I don’t have enough credits, I’m not good-looking enough,” this is the reality you are creating for yourself through affirming it as so.

Our beliefs become the rules we live by and THEN we make ourselves right. That energy walks in the door at every audition. And then it is mirrored back to you when you don’t get the job. See how powerful a negative affirmation can be?

5) How Can I Reprogram My Mind?
Allow these examples to be a reminder to you of how valuable installing new programming can be, and get excited about what might show up with your new mindset in place. Begin by telling yourself “my negative beliefs are just lies that I (or someone else) made up to seemingly keep me safe. Remind yourself, “If it feels bad, I no longer believe it to be true.”

“Your thoughts and beliefs of the past have created this moment, and all the moments up to this moment. What you are now choosing to believe and think and say will create the next moment and the next day and the next month and the next year.” 
-Louise Hay

Affirmations can help quell the critic inside you and help you make positive changes. With constant repetition of uplifting statements we begin to replace the negative thoughts with positive ones. If resistance arises when doing this practice, it is a signal that there is a false truth deep in your unconscious mind, probably planted from that early programming by you or someone else. When you say positive affirmations often enough, you will ultimately believe them. They are a form of “acting-as-if.” (And I don’t know anyone better at doing that than actors!!)

6) What If I Really Believed I Was Powerful?

Marianne Williamson said it best when she stated,
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world…”

We have been trained to be afraid of our light and our greatness, for fear of what others may think, that we will not be accepted, and ultimately unloved and abandoned. This false belief keeps us from becoming great. Use this quote as a reminder of your greatness. When you begin to believe in the true amazing essence of who you are, your natural gifts will emerge. At your deepest core, start to believe you are amazing, and everything that goes against that thought, know it is a lie that you or someone else created.

“The greatest revolution of our generation is the discovery that human beings,
by changing the inner attitudes of their minds, can change the outer aspects of their lives.” 
~William James

7) What Can I Say To Myself Now?
If any of the above statements ring true for you, here are some affirmations to help you begin the journey to a new thought and a new belief.

“I am too old.”
BECOMES
I am the perfect age to succeed in this business.
I am the perfect age to succeed in this business. I am the perfect age exactly as I am right now. I embrace my age and my looks. As an actor, I get to tell stories, and for every age, there are millions of stories to tell. I no longer buy into the lie I have been telling myself that I am too old to succeed in this business. This statement only keeps me stuck and it is a lie. I take a deep breath in and own my age and all the wisdom and life experience that I now bring to the characters I play. I exhale and release any and all energy around the feeling of being too old. I am the perfect age exactly as I am right now. 

“I don’t have enough credits.”
BECOMES
My credits are constantly evolving and growing.
My credits are constantly evolving and growing. I make peace with whatever credits I have, and I no longer allow the habitual thought of “I don’t have enough credits’ to replay in my mind. No one was born with credits, and on this acting journey, I now embrace that I have exactly the right mount of credits and I am evolving every day. I no longer use the story, “I don’t have enough credits” as my excuse to not show up fully for myself. I no longer allow this statement to sabotage my work. The right credits are on their way to me. 

“I am not good-looking or thin enough”
BECOMES
I am beautiful inside and out.
I am beautiful inside and out. I no longer allow myself to feel that I am not good-looking or thin enough to succeed as an actor. This story is a lie I have been telling myself to keep me stuck. When I bring my inner beauty into the audition room, my outward beauty is noticed immediately. What if I am far more beautiful than I have been giving myself credit for? Anything that brings up, and anywhere I have been putting myself down or comparing myself to other’s looks, I now let go and release it all. I am free.

I hope you feel better about what is ahead for you, and that you are beginning to feel more free.  You are in control of it all.  Just remember it takes awareness, a willingness to change, and repetition. It’s all a practice. Begin now and see what happens.

Here’s to your success,

~ Wendy Braun