Friday, November 13, 2015

Be grateful, it’s good for you and your career!

In these Thanksgiving times, I am reflecting about gratitude and what it means for actors. Over the years, I found that actors often spend a lot of time and energy complaining. I hear things like:

  • The movie business is not fair!
  • I don’t have enough auditions.
  • If only they would give me my chance!
  • Agents and Casting Directors are too hard to reach and don’t respond to my calls and emails.
  • Nobody understands my talent!
  • I don’t have enough money.
  • My part is too small, I can’t show my talent in this role.
  • The script is bad.
  • The director I work with is not creative enough.
  • The theatre is too small, I should be on Broadway, not off Broadway...Nobody will see me here.
However what these actors fail to realize, is that by complaining and looking at the negative aspect of things, they give energy to negativity, and by doing so, they make negativity stronger, and attract even more of it. Like attracts Like, which means that «what you focus on, you get more of»

Conversely, gratitude will attract abundance. The energy you give to others and the universe by being thankful, is going to come back to you ten fold.

When you are grateful, not only do you please others and spread good feelings by saying and meaning Thank You, but you also reap the benefit of abundance energy coming back at you like a boomerang. If you focus on abundance in your life, you will grow more of it. It is like giving sun and water to a flower. It will bloom.

So instead of focusing on the negative, why don’t you try focusing on the positive in these times of Thanksgiving? You have a few weeks to practice, and then wow to make it a daily habit for ever!


To help you, here are the opposite statements to those above turned into 10 simple gratitude statements that you can use every day. Try this for a month and see the results for yourself.

  1. Anyone can make it in the film industry, unknown people have become stars, I am thankful to have a chance at it. 
  2. I am grateful for this audition, I am going to have fun and play in front of these people!
  3. I am grateful to follow a path in an artistic career. Any opportunity to act is a piece of happiness!
  4. I am grateful have technology that makes it now possible to share my news directly with casting directors and agents. How amazing!
  5. There are a few selected people in the world who genuinely like what I do, my ‘special circle,’ and I am so grateful for their support and encouragement. I thank them for coming to my performances and faith in me. I will keep them informed of what I do, because they are my best allies.
  6. Food in the fridge, a roof over my head, a clean bed and hot water in the shower makes me part of the richest people in the world! I feel so lucky.
  7. No part is too small, because there is a human being behind any part. I will let this person come alive in me. I am so thankful to play!
  8. This script has potential if I bring life in the subtext, the silences, the behavior. I am thankful to have work.
  9. The director is not saying much to me and this gives me the freedom to bring my creativity to the role. I am grateful for this opportunity.
  10. This theatre is intimate. I can have a close relationship to the audience. I am thankful for that specialness.

And I am thankful to you my readers, to be able to share my point of view on acting, on life as an actor and on the world. I am grateful to be of service to you, and help you regain balance in your creative pursuit.

Happy Thanksgiving times !

Yours truly,

Emmanuelle Chaulet
author of A BALANCING ACT