Summary: [inevery day in our private and professional lives we are confronted with irritants and annoyances. The problem with these things is that they are as sticky as superglue and if you engage them foreven a moment it is hard to get unstuck from them and then they become more than annoyances. As actors We need to learn to un stick ourselves from these unimportant things before they distract us from the real business we have to attend to, mind over what doesn’t matter is learning to disregard irrelevant things that get in the way of doing the work we need to do sometimes an actor arrives at a audition so distressed by traffic and parking they can’t really think about the audition instead during the audition, all they think about is the parking meter and that’s not going to help the audition so the goal is to to learn how to focus on the important things and let go of the unimportant distractions that crowd the brain — maybe you show up at the audition and there is that same actor who is at all your auditions and he or she seems get cast more often then you and that rat got the last freeparking space an d his or hert car is nicer than yours, thinking about this actor all during the audition and how much you hate them is not going to help your audition so you have to learn to let go of your resentment and focus on s giving the best audition you can. Sometimes an actor shows up at a rehearsal and is so distressed by a by a costume or a prop that whe or she can’t rconcentrate on the rehearsal and what is going on withwhat other actors are doing they givecan’teven pay attention to or think about think about the character o rtheir ines or they are so focused o n inot liking the costume or prop that they give and get nothing from the rehearsal sowe can’t work until weare are able to disengage from these distractions so we can focus on the things that matter.surprisingly something as ordinary and gentle as breathing can break the bonds of these distractions. So as an annoyance keeps repeating itself over an over in your head ifocus on your breathing and inale for 2 counts hold your breath for 2 beats and then exhale for 2 beats . inhale ,2 and notice the air as it hits the inside of your nose(by paying attention to specific elements of your breathing the distraction will begin to loosen its grip. When the distraction has let go then bchange your focus to some specific area of the work at hand again focusing on specific elements will enable you to get to work and it will improve your work for generality, as Stanislavski said , is the death of art.It is best to practice mindful breathing regularly so youcando it when you need it. if you only practice when you asredistracted it will be hard to overcome the distractions, they’ll win every time. for more on this idea reviewthe earlier podcasts on meditation and mindfullness.
