I recently did something that took me way beyond my comfort zone. In a couple of months — when I know the outcome of this brave thing I did — I’ll let y’all know what it was. But for now, I’m doing that superstitious thing that actors do after testing at network for a series regular role on a pilot: I’m keeping this thing pretty quiet. What I do want to share with you — about this recent experience — is something that I now better understand about Actor Mind Taffy. And a potential risk we face, when we’re “new” at something.

What I learned in going through this new scary experience is that, when we muster up the courage to do a “hard thing” it is really “easy” to do two other things: obsess about the stuff we don’t control and look to others for advice, no matter how “clueless” those others might be.

Here’s how it hit home for me.

I was in the middle of doing the equivalent of the whole “staples or glue stick” debate. This is something that is so easy for me spot, when I see an actor doing it. I am quick to say, “Hey! Snap out of it! You’re engaging in Actor Mind Taffy and you MUST stop to save your sanity. You will never do it the ‘right way’ for all potential recipients of your headshot and resumé, so you need to find the way that’s right for YOU and then let the rest go. Believe me, no one cares anyway. They’re way too busy to look at such things. No one in the history of casting has ever seen the headshot and resumé of the exact right actor for the role and then said, ‘Oh, too bad. Can’t cast her. She used two staples instead of four.’ Never. Never, never, never.”

But somehow, I found myself in the thick of that Mind Taffy stuff, simply because I was in an area outside my comfort zone. As I put together a package to mail, I started worrying about whether a paperclip inside the envelope might snag on a postal machine, sending my package through a shredder instead of on to its intended destination. I looked at the base edge of the envelope and questioned the strength of the factory-stamped glue. Like, “What if I’ve sealed the envelope sufficiently, but the envelope itself is weak? What if it comes apart in transit and this thing I’ve worked so hard on is somehow exposed and vulnerable? Maybe I should deliver the package in person. No, wait. I can’t do that. They don’t allow that. Maybe if I made a friend in the mailroom, I could hand deliver it to that person. Oh, crap, why didn’t I start this process earlier?”

And somewhere around the moment when I was pressing down on the factory-glued side of the envelope — with a look of concern over its chemical integrity certainly creeping across my face — my husband said, “Actor Mind Taffy, Bon.” And it all clicked.

I don’t think I had ever thought about how hard it must be to SEE that you’re engaging in Actor Mind Taffy until now. I always assumed that actors obsessing over staples vs. glue stick or mail vs. drop-off or vertical vs. horizontal were aware that they were micromanaging things they couldn’t control about the casting process but choosing to do so anyway. I don’t think it ever occurred to me that it’s the NEWNESS of it all that might make that Mind Taffy place so dang easy to get to!

Oh, and by the way, a mom of a young actor emailed me to ask about attaching her child’s headshot and resumé using staples or glue stick. I replied with a link to the Actor Mind Taffy column. She replied, “Oh, thank you. That’s very helpful. So, I take it YOU prefer glue stick?” *thud* I guess in that column I mentioned “glue stick” more than “staples” or something and she decided that meant a preference for one over the other. Holy bejeezus, are you kidding me?!?

BUT!! Now I get it! It’s actually really easy to “get there” when you’re new. You read a lot into everything. You basically use a microscope to do the job of a low-powered magnifying glass. You want to be SO SURE you get it right that you will scrutinize everything obsessively.

And that brings me to the second part of my recent epiphany.

In working on this mystery project, I consulted a few message boards and did a little Googling to get some basic questions answered before I charged in. I don’t like to do anything NEW without about 99% likelihood that I’m going to either be successful at it or learn something really great from it. When it comes to new things, I’m NOT good at the whole “the adventure is in the journey” thing, no matter how Zen I try to get about my life. So, before jumping in past the point of no return, I looked up a few things. Now, I’m pretty good at sniffing out the more reputable sources of information (defending a Master’s Thesis before a committee of Peabody Award fellows will do that to a Georgia gal), so I started there. Learned a lot. Got started.

Then I hit a snag and needed more information. I was not coming up with the answers I needed from the sources I trusted. So, I began digging deeper. I started hitting the sites that might be lower on the accreditation scale but that at least provided some information about what I was looking for. I went in knowing that I was about to read posts on a message board from people whose creditability might be shaky, whose professional credits might be unverifiable, and whose identities might even be wholly fabricated. I went in KNOWING I was looking for info not at the library but at the stack of coverless used books and random scraps of paper heaped up by the dumpster behind the building that used to be the library. But in I went. I needed the 4-1-1.

I fell down the rabbit hole and started reading. I was starved for information that would answer the many, many questions I had about this new venture I was flirting with. I read everything. EVERYTHING. And within a half-dozen hours, I found myself scared out of my wits. I was certain that I had made a huge mistake thinking I could handle this new project. It was time to abort and reboot. I was in over my head. I had done everything wrong. And I knew that because I was reading posts in which people “spoke” with authority, talking about very similar situations to the one I was facing. “They” said it had to be done this way. “They” said there was no way anyone would have a shot without X or Y.

I hadn’t done it “this way.” I didn’t have “X or Y.” Dangit! All of this work I’d put into this project and I was going to have to scrap it. No way I wanted to get on anyone’s radar as the green newbie who couldn’t be bothered with doing at least the very basic things correctly! This was too important for me to make a bad first impression.

Time to take a break. I was overwhelmed.

To clear my head, I visited a message board for actors where I know at least 50% of the posters in person. As for the regulars I don’t know in person, I know enough about their hit/miss ratio in terms of advice to weigh some posts as more credible than others. Basically, I know who’s a pro and who’s a wannabe. And I do my best to add to the good, solid advice on that message board in such a way that encourages newbies and (hopefully) prevents them from heading off down a trail with an advice-giver that’s doing nothing more than providing advice in the same way that armchair quarterbacks “play” in the Super Bowl.

I’m not saying there’s not value to “hearing” from all points of view. Believe me, I get it. You can learn a little something from everyone! But suddenly, in the comfort of a message board whose denizens I knew well, I saw a light that shone so brightly that I had one of those really cool “a-ha” moments!

Here I had been engaging in Mind Taffy. And now I was letting advice from people who may have NEVER EVEN DONE the thing that I was researching tell me “how it is.” I was trusting them. I was letting their authoritative stance be sufficient proof that I had no business even attempting this new thing, because my instincts had led me so far astray as to have such newbie questions.

A writer friend of mine emailed me recently with an actor question. She asked, basically, “Is this the equivalent of asking how many brads to put in a script?” And that further drove the point home for me.

It doesn’t matter to what area of this business we’re new. When we’re new, we’ll have questions that feel stupid to ask, we’ll obsess over the things we can’t control, and we’ll believe every crackpot theory out there — even if the person espousing the theory as fact is the crackpot! This experience was a wonderful gift for me. Not only did I challenge myself in a way that made me terrified (and ultimately very proud) but I learned something I had either forgotten or never knew about the way we feel when we’re starting out and seeking answers.

Don’t let anyone sell you the line of bull that there are hard and fast rules in this business. Guidelines? Sure. Recipes for a more professionally enriching experience? Absolutely. But rules that, when broken, lead to failure in showbiz? Not on your life. No such thing. Don’t believe that mess for a second. Your instincts are there for a reason. Do research. Check in with those whose track records are verifiable. And then go with your gut.

Hey, if nothing else, you’ll learn something really great from that experience!

Bonnie Gillespie is living her dreams by helping others figure out how to live theirs. Wanna work with Bon? Start here. Thanks!

Originally published by Actors Access at http://more.showfax.com/columns/avoice/archives/000755.html. Please support the many wonderful resources provided by the Breakdown Services family. This posting is the author’s personal archive.