Justin Prescribes

The worst and the favourite

December 22, 2025

Here’s a game, make your least favourite thing the favourite thing.

What is something you’ve been avoiding? What is a task or activity that either completely bores you or you may even dread?

Would you be interested in changing that? Okay, here are some questions for you…

-What would you have to do to that experience to make it your favourtie thing?

-How would you have to picture it?

-What would you change about the way you approach it?

-What would you have to believe about what it’s giving you?

-In what ways could it be fun?

-What about it actually benefits you?

-How could you make the worst part of it actually the most interesting or fun part?

Most people don’t want to do what it takes to get where they want to go. Life get’s pretty interesting if we can make the undesirable and necessary things unbelievably easy and fun for ourselves.

I’d say that’s an advantage worth working for, wouldn’t you?

Specific vs Broad

December 19, 2025

There’s a time for details and there’s a time for broad strokes.

I find this balance really difficult, but when people get it right things really take off.

So when is the time for each one? Well, there’s no hard and fast rule sadly, that’s my difficulty. But there are some guidelines to help…

A mass of work.

If you have a monumental amount to get through, that is definitely a time for broad strokes. Writers say you shouldn’t edit as you go. Potato farmers say you shouldn’t count the potatoes as you’re throwing them in the truck (do they say this..? Potato farmers, let me know). When we have a lot to do, we should err on the side of broad strokes. There’s simply too much to be fussy.

Preparing.

This requires detail I think. Sometimes we’re encouraged to launch in fearlessly to a project and this might make us think broad strokes, but I think that’s wrong headed. We can launch ourselves in fearlessly and still do so with detail at the forefront. Fearless launching doesn’t have to be synonymous with ham fisted action. We can be bold in our attention to detail.

The best approach of course is to be awake to our tendency to be broad when we must be specific and be specific when we must be broad.

I think finding this balance unlocks some exciting stuff.

Becoming the phone

December 17, 2025

Opportunity is attracted to movement.

Ever notice how job offers, new clients and requests come flying in the moment you decide to focus on your own creation?

This seems to be true in the acting world. It’s like a Murphy’s law of sorts; you wait for the phone to ring and it never does. Then you decide to go build a sand castle and it’s ringing off the hook.

We have to be careful though…

We mustn’t make the sand castle to try and coax the opportunity; it doesn’t work that way.

We also mustn’t create movement for movement’s sake; creating more busy-ness doesn’t help.

The real secret is building a sand castle so grand and so exciting, that when the phone rings you genuinely consider not answering it.

That’s where the real juice is. When your sand castle is more compelling than someone else’s (and it will be, because you made it the way you like) you end up leaving them to do their thing and guess what?

You’ll be picking up the phone to call in some talented people looking to apply their skills.

Don’t wait for the phone.

Become the phone.

Indirect Paths

December 12, 2025

Some of the most sought after things have indirect paths. I’ve heard it described like a cat- the more you chase it, the further away it runs.

Its difficult to relax by pushing or forcing it- an action directed toward that outcome is counter to it’s realisation.

The same goes for money. If you chase money you will rarely find it.

If you want to be liked by others, you won’t get there by focussing on being liked by others.

If an actor wants a scene to land as sad, they don’t go for the emotion.

Great results come from indirect paths.

To relax we have to let go. To gain financial abundance we must create value. To be liked by others we must care for them in a way that speaks to them. To play the sad scene, the actor must fight tooth and nail to hold on.

What are you going for directly that actually requires an alternate route?

“You are interesting to the extent that you’re interested”

December 10, 2025

This is one of my favourite acting ideas. I heard it first in an early interview with Jeff Goldblum and he had learned it from his teacher Sanford Meisner.

It’s the idea that as actors one of our key jobs is to put our focus outwardly, on the world, the task and, most beautifully, on our scene partner.

They say there’s nothing more captivating than watching someone tying their shoes. They are unselfconscious and completely wrapped up in their simple objective- tying their shoe.

This is the gold standard we are going for as actors. We want to honestly have our focus, energy and intention on doing something.

I say ‘honestly’ because we must fight the natural human urge to be liked and thought of as good. And there’s the extra thing for actors of auditioning, where we have to somehow forget we are seeking to be cast.

Part of acting is learning to ‘honestly’ place our focus.

That’s it.

It’s riveting when someone does that. Don’t worry about being interesting, get interested.

When the going gets good

December 8, 2025

I noticed recently I only wrote in my journal when things were difficult or not going the way I wanted. I supposed it’s why we have the phrase ‘nothing to write home about’.

The problem with this is it’s training my brain to not notice when things are going good. The journal becomes the ambulance at the bottom of the hill, something we reach for as a tool for fixing things.

That’s okay- that’s part of why we journal.

But here’s a note to myself to remember to journal when things are good. Often when things are running smoothly we simply don’t notice. Then when we look back we don’t perceive those long stretches of smooth sailing.

If your perception of your life is just what you remember at the end of it all and you only stop to take note of the hard times, what do you think your perception of your life will be?

We must notice when it’s hard and we must MUST notice when it’s good. Our poor little brains put so much effort into creating an ideal environment for us, we have to do them a favour and spend time focusing on that stuff!

What is really working for you right now that you are not paying attention to?

Be the boss of your notifications

November 30, 2025

Here’s the easiest way I know to be more productive:

Don’t let any apps send you notifications.

Smart phones are awesome but they’re also annoying. If anything happens on any messaging, email or social media app, it tells you.

There’s a noise and then that enticing red-apple-looking-notification sign with a number of how many juicy messages you get.

I’ve removed them all. My phone doesn’t tell me if I get an email or message.

The apps are still on my phone, they just don’t talk to me.

They can wait, thank you very much.

A number in a little red bubble doesn’t have the right to divert my attention.

I let them all accrue- messages, dms, notifications, emails.

And then I go and visit them when I’m ready.

I’ll look at you and deal with you when I’m good and ready. And some days I’m simply not ready. I can check tomorrow or next week or never.

Of course it does take some training to fight the urge to check. But once you get over that, you’re a bit free aren’t you?

And that’s pretty nice.

Less time reacting to red number bubbles and more doing things that matter to you.

Output is the outcome

November 23, 2025

We have to do something over and over again to get good at it.

Trying to paint the ‘perfect’ picture today is hard.

Trying to paint ‘a’ picture today is easier. And it still might be pretty good… or not.

But that’s not the point. Great pictures are rarely the result of an artist sitting down with the intention of creating a masterpiece.

The ‘masterpiece’ is one of a long line of drafts, sketches, doodles and scribbles.

You can’t have the masterpiece without the scribbles.

Make repetition your resolve. Invest in iteration. Output is the outcome.

Titles and highlights

November 18, 2025

Time has a funny way of getting on, doesn’t it?

Often I’ll meet Monday with the best of intentions only to find it’s suddenly Monday again and I can’t quite remember what I actually did during the week that past.

Here’s two strategies I use to prevent time slipping through my fingers and actively perceive the weeks as they pass:

1)Title your week.

Any self respecting Google doc has a title so your week deserves one too. Think of what you want your week to be about. Is it major progress on a project? Spending quality time with your family? Having an adventure with your colleagues? Giving your week a title sets it up to be different from any other week. What we want to avoid is each week blurring into the next. You probably remember how you spent that glorious week around Christmas last year- without you knowing, it was titled “Do nothing but swim and eat for a week”- yup, that’s memorable! Name every week to tell yourself why it’s special.

2) Highlight the moments

To continue with the stationary/ office theme, I like to think back and highlight moments in the week that was. What cracked me up? What surprised me? When did someone go beyond the call of duty? When did I live into my desired identity? Highlight all these things, they happened during that week! And when you highlight them, not only does it feel good, but it also helps to idividualise the days and weeks. That’s the goal!

Letting your weeks go by as an anonymous procession is letting your life go by without you seeing it.

Title it. Highlight things.

Don’t miss a moment.

Unusual results require unusual actions

November 16, 2025

If you want something not a lot of people get, you have to do things not a lot of people do.

If people look at you strangely for the things you do, you may well be on the right track.

Or not…

But of course you can’t know unless you try.

Let everyone else do what is normal; they are running millions of experiments for you that you are welcome to observe and learn from.

While they’re doing that, you may as well run some experiments of your own.

What remarkable result do you want to create in the world?

And what is the thing you will do that people will ‘remark’ upon? (Whether they are being judgy or not in their remarks doesn’t matter- it still fits the definition of remarkable!)

Dare to do things vastly differently and you will have a life vastly different to anyone else.

JUSTIN ROGERS

Post Category: