Overcoming Psychological Barriers

A Changing Mindset

• “The critic and the creator cannot exist at the same time. The critic’s voice is too loud.” James Brill

A Changing Mindset

• We can be our own worst enemy when it comes to doubting and second-guessing ourselves. We’re afraid that we’re dull and uninteresting and that we have nothing special to contribute. This theme gets repeated over and over again with actors. We fear that we are not enough and need constant reassurance that the stage is our rightful place.

A Changing Mindset

• Even when we are ready to take the bold step of allowing our voices to be heard, another psychological barrier rears its ugly head: the fear of what to do with that newfound attention once we’ve earned it.

• We underestimate ourselves. It may stem from an incident earlier in your life that undermined your confidence because you had to put yourself out there and in doing so failed.

• Was it a harsh comment from a teacher? Humiliation in front of friends?

A Changing Mindset

• It shattered your confidence at a time when you were most impressionable.

• Worse yet, although you might not realize it, it may still be holding you back today from pursuing your dreams.

A Changing Mindset

• Metaphorically speaking, we’ve erected walls around our fragile egos as a way to keep out some menacing “creature” lurking outside that is waiting to devour us whole. I analogize it to the “big bad wolf.”

A Changing Mindset

• Like a turtle recoiling into its shell to protect itself from a predator, we put up psychic veils to protect ourselves from emotional pain – the pain of rejection, the pain of humiliation, the pain of criticism, the pain of betrayal, the pain of ostracization.

A Changing Mindset

• Out of these three, none is more destructive than rejection.

• In fact, studies show that the same areas of our brain become stimulated when we experience rejection as when we experience physical pain.

• That’s why even small rejections hurt more than we think they should, because they elicit literal (albeit emotional) pain.

A Changing Mindset

• A tip that one of my acting instructors gave me before I went out on my first audition was not to tie my insecurities to rejection, otherwise I won’t last very long. There is a lot of rejection in this profession! You need to have a thick skin.

A Changing Mindset

• We dread these emotions not only for the emotional pain and suffering that they cause but also for the havoc they wreak on our mood and our self-esteem.

A Changing Mindset

• For example, the greatest damage caused by rejection is actually self-inflicted. Our natural response to being dumped by a dating partner or getting cut from a team is first to lick our wounds and wallow in our self pity. Then we turn to self-loathing where we become intensely self-critical.

• We call ourselves names, lament our short-comings, and wallow in our self-pity.

A Changing Mindset

• In other words, just when our self-esteem is at its lowest point and needs the most nurturing, we kick it into the gutter. Doing so is emotionally unhealthy and self-destructive, yet every one of us has done it at some point in our life.

A Changing Mindset

• Herein lies the tragedy. Outside of these walls lies a vast landscape, which symbolizes our untapped potential.

A Changing Mindset

• Sadly, many of us will spend our entire lives stuck inside this cocoon without ever venturing out and living up to our full potential because of the security that it seemingly provides.

• But, as Gerry Spence warns, “it is more dangerous for us to live within those walls than to live free, for the risk of living in this chicken house is that we may never have lived at all.”