Failure to back yourself will badly limit what you can accomplish, it’ll badly limit your ambition. I’m not just talking about career ambition, or the desire to be rich, I’m also talking about ambition in terms of the choices we make within our work. It’s the choice between choosing an action so exciting to us that it makes our heart race, as oppose to playing the scene in a way that enables us to fax our performance in. The second way of doing it is safe, we’ll most likely avoid criticism, and even in the unlikely event that we did incur any, it’ll be water off a ducks back, because we didn’t offer up anything of great importance to us. But the main reason we choose the second way, is because we don’t back ourselves to be able to handle the excitement.
Backing yourself is not only more productive, it’s also more exciting. Why? Because we need to back ourselves when we are attempting something new, or when we are overcoming a new limitation, which is often for actors as we regularly have to step into the unknown. Too often however, self-doubt kicks in and pulls us down, it lures us into the protection of the comfort zone, and we stay within our limitations.
Back yourself and make choices which excite you, back yourself and feel the thrill of new possibilities, and back yourself to cope with the ensuing roller coaster, and back yourself to deal with the flak, and know that the torrent of emotion you will feel inside of yourself as a result of backing yourself will only be known to you.
Failing to back yourself means not believing you are worthy of doing the work you love.
Subscribe to The Great Acting Blog
RECENT
False And Dull Or Thrilling And True?
The Great Acting Blog 