Last night in class we did this goal-setting thing. Every so often we do something related to the business-side of acting and last night was one of those nights. At least last night went much better than the past two times we've done something similar. The first time I had a nerotic episode follwed by a minor mental breakdown. The second time I attempted to avoid the whole topic by saying my survival job was sucking the life out of me. So when I found out that we were doing that I was dreading it.
I have problems with the whole goal setting thing. Not even gonna get into it here, but it has a lot to do with feeling overwhelmed by lists of things and feeling like I should be a lot further along in my career than I am. Although about a month ago I did get a completely new perspective on goal setting which made me a little less afraid of it.
But instead of trying to avoid the whole thing last night by saying some generic crap like to book more, I decided if I didn't say what my goals really were it wasn't going to be of any help to me. We could pick one goal to talk more about. I had a hard time narrowing it down - there's so many - get an agent, book a co-star, get my SAG card, etc. etc. etc. But I decided I needed to say something that I had more control over, a smaller goal that I could actually accomplish so I decided to go with getting my demo reel together, something I've been putting off and putting off and is loooong overdue. Also, by the time I read my goals out the other big one - getting an agent - had been discussed.
As we're going along and people are listing their goals (and a lot of them were really, really good - stuff I'd like to work on too) that moment of self doubt came over me and was like, uh, these people are so much further along than me, I feel so stupid. I mean, when people in the room are saying how their goal is to move up from co-star to guest star roles, or how to control their nerves because they just booked a re-curring role, and I can't even get called in for a one or two liner (although I did get some new insight on that too) it's so hard to sit there and not judge yourself. I'd like to say I didn't do that, but I did, but got past it and read my goals and said "screw it, who cares where other people are in their careers, I need help with this right now," and decided I wanted to talk more about the demo reel.
And I was glad I did. I got some great ideas and some insight about what should and shouldn't be on it, and why I was procrastinating about getting it done, and basically came to the conclusion "just put the damn thing together!" Yes, I still have more questions, but got some major ones answered and just need to do it and get opinions on it.
I felt really really good after the whole thing was over.
So, in keeping with the whole, New Year, New Blog, Goal Setting theme I'm posting my "2008 Year In Review" and will post my 2009 goals in the next few days because I'm still trying to figure them out. One year I did an extensive year end wrap-up - there were graphs, charts, flowsheets, all cross-checked against goals set at the beginning of the year, deep analysis into why I didn't accomplish certain goals. etc. etc. etc. But I decided that was just a little too much for me and since I didn't really set any goals for 2008 just going through my calendar and listing them will do for now.
So here are my accomplishments for 2008:
4 Plays - 2 of them were one-day things so the comittment was minimal and the other one was 2 runs of the same play which I really really wanted to do
18 Auditions
9 Bookings - 3 were off my pic alone and 1 was someone I had worked with before recommended me to a friend who was directing something
3 of those bookings never happened - one I was actually happy about because it was WAY too unorganized, one was a MAJOR thing that I was horribly disappointed about, and one was a VO gig that might have been ongoing (supposedly this one is just on hold and will happen but I'm starting to think it's a no) And on top of that all three of them were paying gigs, ugh...
I stayed in class the entire year - took 4 different classes over the course of the year including a commercial workshop which I had been putting off forever
Joined a theater company and attended 1 workshop and 1 play reading
Started doing CD workshops and attended 7 workshops
Met with a potential scene partner to shoot our own material for our demo reels but that didn't work out
Found a new scene partner and re-wrote an old scene I had to potentially film it
Attended 2 topicals and 2 industry guests at The Actors Network (sad, sad, sad...I should be going to WAY more of these!)
Met 4 new industry people who came to my acting class and did a workshop
Went to an all-day networking event
Volunteered for a program that teaches filmmaking to high school students
And, what I consider my BIGGEST accomplishment for the year:
Met 3 working directors who now know me AND have seen my work!
Whew, so there it is, not bad for someone who admits they didn't really try and just let stuff happen in 2008.
The good news is I'm revved up and ready to go in 2009! Bring it on!
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