Attach to the outcome not the means
It’s advice I’ve been given as an actor.
An actor can play the same scene night after night because she has the same objective as the character each performance. It feels fresh every night because the means always changes.
In life we don’t need to know the ‘how’ either. We just need to have the outcome and the reason.
That’s plenty to get you there.
Prime your best
If you’re always doing things half pie to save yourself for the ‘important stuff’ you won’t be ready when the important stuff comes along.
How you do anything is how you do everything.
Sparkle Noticer
What is a sparkle noticer?
It’s what I call the people out in the world that notice real presence. I’ve been to 5 different states in the US across the past few months and everywhere I go I’m trying to make connections with strangers.
Buying a coffee, passing a stranger, getting in a lift; these are all opportunities to connect with another human.
And the rule is you can’t just say hi and look away.
You have to actually be present. You have to SPARKLE.
Sadly, most people are quite closed off to strangers. I turn on my sparkliest most present eyes and give them a sweet little hello… and there’s often not a response.
And that’s okay! I get it, it’s a bit weird.
But now and then… you get a sparkle noticer.
Someone who catches the sparkle and notices the real life presence you’re bringing to a moment.
They see you seeing them and thus you see each other!
The goal for me isn’t to be the person always saying hi with a warm smile.
The goal is to become the person who notices the sparkles when they fly my way.
We all get caught up and walled off day to day. But if we let ourselves, we can be a sparkle noticer and the world is a deliciously good place when you let that in.
Wrapping paper
I’m a big believer in wrapping paper.
I’m mostly fine with people speaking their mind. If I’m in the way, tell me. If I’m being too loud, please let me know.
My problem comes when people put it in the wrong wrapping paper.
For example, someone is speaking a little too loud. You can tell them to ‘shut up’. Or you can gently let them know know.
It’s not what you say, it’s how you say it.
You can say the difficult thing, but you can do it with kindness, levity and generosity.
I’m a BIG believer in wrapping paper.
Give not get
You go there to give.
Your work is a place you go to give, not get.
A relationship is a place you go to give, not get.
The world is a place you go to give, not get.
This simple shift changes it all
How you sit is how you work
It seems so simple but it really works. I can’t get the best out of myself when I’m hunched over a laptop in a dark room.
When I sit up, my brain does too. And so does my work.
I can’t focus when my eyes dart around from thing to thing.
When I focus my gaze in one direction, my work hones in as well.
I love paying attention to the ingredients of effective performance. When you have ingredients and cook books, you have delicious meals when ever you want them.
You just have to follow the recipe.
Wisdom of magazines
Why does reading an article in a magazine feel better?
I think it’s because of finality. A magazine article says “here, someone wrote this, we printed it, stapled it together and now you’re holding it- you should read it”
A magazine is physical artifact that demands to be taken seriously.
I enjoy it more, it feels better and I absorb the ideas more.
Why?
Well I think we can just steal the finality in what we do.
“Here, this is what I made. I put it together like this (not like this) and it should be consumed like this”
The world’s best
I’m in New York City and the past week I’ve been watching musicals. It’s been awesome.
These are the world’s best performers on the world’s biggest stages doing the world’s best shows.
Right?
Well, yes they are.
But I also realised this week that holding them in this position in my head was limiting me. They certainly are incredible. But sitting in the front row of a show the other night I saw myself up there. I saw the sweat. I saw the performers’ eyes behind the character. I saw the foot hitting the mark on the stage.
These are just people. They are at the top of their game, sure, but this is not unattainable. I realised that by putting them on a pedestal in my mind I had created a gap between where I am and where they are.
I think these kinds of gaps are useful when they encourage you to work to close it and keep you hungry. But the gap can be unhelpful when it makes you think it’s not possible.
I think we’d do well to remember that if we see something outstanding and amazing, we don’t immediately believe that it’s unattainable.
It’s outstanding, yes. And you can have it too.
Every moment is an oppurtunity
My acting mentor has a great phrase:
Use everything as an opportunity to act.
He’d use it when I’d lament about a task in class or a ‘small’ role (no such thing). It was his reminder that as a practitioner and crafts-person, you always have the frame of your own practice to meet anything with.
A visiting tutor asking you to express the text from your toes? Yup, that’s your chance to act.
You’re only cheating yourself and your own growth when you pick and choose the moments to apply yourself.
Grumpy service people
They say grumpy service-people are only that way because they’ve been burned in the past. They’ve had to deal with lots of difficult people, so they front foot it, I guess, and are mean first.
This is backwards.
I’d rather be nice to mean people than be mean to nice people.