4 Ways To Maintain Your Artistic Energy | The Great Acting Blog

Only Do That Which Inspires Commitment And Purpose In You

Because this means we’re doing what we really want to do, we’re doing what’s meaningful to us, and we feel strong. Alternatively, we function much less effectively when we undertake work that does not inspire us. Think about how differently we prepare for an audition for a role we’re dying to do, as oppose to when we audition for dreck. When we’ve got a script we love, we feel competent, we’re hungry to begin work. Whereas the other kind of script is a chore, we can’t concentrate, it’s tediousness may even give us cause to doubt our commitment to our art. It’s the same when we’re playing a scene – it’s the difference between making a choice that excites us versus one that is merely acceptable to us. Stop going through motions, no more making up the numbers, cut expediency. Only do that which inspires commitment and purpose in you.

Don’t Do Business With People You Hate

Better to be working than not. Actually that’s not true, doing the wrong kind of work, surrounded by people who we don’t trust, understand or like, and who probably feel the same way about us, is acid for the soul. Working with people we hate is a spin-off of expediency – doing something is better than doing nothing. Not if that something has the corrosive effect of making you and your work weaker. Working with people we hate is usually the result of time pressure: that we must get a result by a certain time and so we take what we can get. It’s better to eliminate the time-frame, bide your time and wait for the right opportunity. Impatience shortens your shelf-life, while patience, paradoxically, lengthens it. Only do business with people you like, or, at least, avoid doing business with people who creep you out.

Always Know What You’re Doing.

Knowing what you’re doing is choosing what you’re doing, deciding, giving it a name. Because once we decide what it is, everything we do will tend toward accomplishing it. It comes back to acting: once we’ve decided what our action in the scene is going to be, we’re activated to do it. It means that all problems and all opportunities can be measured in relation to our action, and therefore we can deal with them more effectively. Why? Because we know how to think about them. There are always unforeseen problems but they needn’t send us into a spin, and opportunities rarely arise just at the moment we were expecting them but we needn’t bungle them when they do. And it means we’re better placed to deal with the people we hate, as well as the people we love. Always know what you’re doing.

 

Read And Study Those Artists You Admire

Great artists infect you with their sensibility – that’s what great artists do. Whenever you lose your thinking then, go to your book-shelf, select one of the masters – a book of interviews or essays – and begin reading. These people have lead a life of massive artist accomplishment and consequently possess a profound belief and confidence in what they do.  This will be transmitted to you the reader. The effect will inspire you, refresh you, strengthen you and remind you about you’re supposed to be doing. Read and study those artists you admire.