“If you think you can win, you can win. Faith is necessary to victory.” —Willam Hazlitt, British writer, painter and philosopher
Actors hear “no” a lot. We are turned down for auditions and roles, and turned away by managers and agents. There seem to be hundreds of things (real and imagined) that hold us back at every turn. That's why confidence is so vital.
When I was in college, my professors told me the statistics for actors, how so few of us make a living or even get work, and I thought, Yeah, right, They haven’t met me yet. Little did I know. It took me years before I started to get work, and still today it’s not as steady as I’d like. The career we chose can be a challenge, and roadblocks seem to constantly be thrown up in our way.
So what keeps us going? Why do we continue to work at something when the deck is stacked so clearly against us? Simple—we have faith.
Faith is a crucial component in confidence. Without faith, despair sets in. When that happens, it’s only a matter of time until we give up mentally and in our hearts, and that is fatal to any dream.
Faith is what keeps us going despite the odds. Faith has us dig deeper, work harder. A blind faith that we have something to offer, and more, that we will persevere and attain our goals no matter the difficulty or time needed.
However, that faith doesn’t just appear one day and then you have it forever. Your faith will be battered and bruised. There will be times where you might begin to think, “Maybe this just isn’t going to happen,” and that’s when faith becomes a practice. You stop, go for a run, take a day trip out of town, do some yoga, whatever center yourself—and then get back to work. Only by getting back up on your feet and seeing how good you are will your faith be restored.
Practice is the key. In order to trust yourself and your audience, you need faith. In order to have faith you need to practice, and practice will develop trust. It’s cyclical.
That’s why the third and last leg of developing confidence is practice.
With your newfound confidence, apply for one of our musical audition listings! And watch the video below for more great advice!
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and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Backstage or its staff.
