We all live in fear.

Foreboding isn’t it.  But it’s true!  As artists we all live in fear that we are going to miss out on that huge, career changing moment.  Yet it never fails that no matter how hard we try to always be available to everything, the second we decide to go out of town for a vacation, family event or last minute road trip is when our agent or manager calls with the biggest audition we’ve had in months.  If you want to get an audition… leave town.

It happens every time.  You plan a huge trip, one that you have been dying to take for years and years.  You tell all of your agents and managers that you will be out of town for two weeks at the end of September.  They have lots of advance notice since you told them two months out and reminded them two weeks before.  The DAY before you leave you will get a call from one of them trying to confirm you for an audition in two days… the exact time when you are in barthelona… oooooooo aren’t we fancy in this blog.

Of course, you have a minor meltdown and wonder if you should cancel your trip.  Is your agent going to take this as a sign of you not being committed to the business?  Is the casting director going to take it as a personal insult and never call you in again?  Have you torpedoed your career?

A couple of years ago, a very smart actor gave me a great piece of advice:  live your life.  If you spend all of your time worrying that you are going to miss that big call or that big audition or that big interview, you are never going to do anything.  You will sit by the phone all the time just waiting for that call.  Part of being an artist is experiencing the world, learning about different people, places and things.  That simply can’t be done sitting by your phone!  So go, DO!

Of course if you are constantly leaving town at the drop of a hat your agent or manager might have a problem with it, but everyone understands the need to get away for a bit or a family emergency.  Just make sure you tell them and give them notice before you go.  They will probably forget, but that’s to be expected, they are really busy people, cut them some slack, Jack.

I’m just as guilty of this as everyone… I’m an actor… I’m insecure.  Right after I got out of grad school, I was scheduled to go on a vacation with my wife’s family.  It had been planned and our departure date had been set for months.  At the end of our studies, we did a showcase for casting directors and agents in NY, Chicago and LA.  As it always happens, the day before we left I got a call from a theatre company in Chicago that I had been dying to work with for years… they wanted me to come in for an audition two days after we left. 

When I hung up the phone from the casting director after telling her I couldn’t make the audition… I was devastated.  I had blown my one shot with that company.  I was done.  The second stage of my career was over before it even started. 

The week after I got back from vacation… the company called me in to read for another role.  Because people understand that we all have a life to live.  If we are not living our life, we are not doing our job as artists.

Since I constantly need to remind myself, I figured it would be a good thing to remind all of you as well:  get out there and live your life.  Don’t live in fear, live as if you had an entire world to experience, because you do.  Your career will be there when you get back… even if you did miss out on one audition.  There will always be another.

Thanks to Bill Crounse (@billcrounse) for the idea for this blog.  Since I’m planning ahead, I can give a bit of a tease for the next topic:  we get by with a little help from our friends.  Great song.