Summary: It’s Summer Olympics time and I love the Olympics. I’m amazed at what the athletes are capable of both physically and mentally. Plus, I know that they can teach us great acting lessons; lessons about training, living in the moment, performing under pressure, and dealing with setbacks. The most important lesson they have for us is that to be great we must train regularly and prepare our minds, bodies, and spirits for our acting. It seems obvious to say that practice makes you better at the things you do but it does. Just like athletes, training every day will enable you to get ‘into the zone’ when you act, so that living in the moment and responding to what is going on around you becomes natural and instinctive. Only through regular training, will you feel comfortable taking the risks needed to make your acting interesting and compelling. Only by training regularly will your work become instinctive and adaptable to every script and acting situation that you find yourself in. Research shows that the biggest difference between elite performers and lesser performers is the amount of practice they have accumulated. In other words, hard work is more important than innate talent and what top performers really have is a talent for practicing even when they don’t feel like it. Therefore, you have to make the effort everyday to work on some aspect of your acting and gradually a disciplined approach to your acting will become a way of life. A day won’t feel right if you don’t spend some time doing your own work. So for the next couple of weeks, watch the Olympic athletes and think about the work that went into their training. Then heed the words of the Olympic coach who said, “You don’t win an Olympic medal by being gifted. You win it by working your ass off.” Link: Becoming an Act-lete
