Life since presuing acting

Everybody at some point in their life has dreamt about themselves being famous. I mean the glitz, the money, the girls/men, the ability to do whatever you want, when you want and having millions look up to you. it is for sure a power trip and gives the thrill of the drug. the idea of being famous is sold and pushed but nobody ever really discusses the reality of it, the process, the things that happen in order for you to get there, the other side of the glitz and glam.

I always knew I wanted to act. I fond myself acting even when I wasn’t intending to act. I would watch movies and become so intrigued by the character I would go for days and watch the movie and act as if i was my favorite character from the movie. When I was 5 nobody could convince me I wasn’t one of Charlie’s Angeles. I was obsessed with Drew Barrymore’s character (Dylan) I carried my Dylan obsession through my whole life in a way and found myself acting as her when I went to tour acting schools. But it was the moments before the acting, and the camera cut on, or before the script was being passed out that you expierence a nirvana feeling of what you’re doing one is either the fakest moment of your life or the few minutes of your day where you get to be your raw authentic self.

One school I went to tour the director had told me all about the actors who came and went,the peoples he met and trained. the ones he loves to work with verses ones who he could care less to see again. He was just being really open and socialble about what makes a actor a good actor and when he had me tell him about myself. I sold a whole lie, he thought I came from the cookie cutter all American family. I had sold the dream so well that when I finsihed and told him “ all of that was a lie” and started to laugh he laughed to becasue he thought I was just trying to be funny. But when I stopped laughing he stopped and we stared at eachother in silence for about a good 2 minutes.

I will never forget his face and how he told me “ I was batshit insane but I had the gift of acting.” I remember laughing when he said it because he was spot on about both, I knew both of those things already but I knew eventually I was going to have to let him see the real me and in the world of entertainment they’re going to tweak all they seek best to tweak.

The thing about acting is you can go after one role and get assigned one you had no interest in and you better act like you won the lottery and study the shit out of that role, and invest into that script. i had one script where i was the happiest person on the planet, and another being one where i hated life more then Lucifer himself. I would read the lines and make myself feel what they feel and after awhile i felt like all that i was feeling wasn’t even a character but my own personal feelings.

I had ended up getting drinks one night and I had finally got the perspective of this life from the eyes of somebody who works behind the scenes but in the same industry and it was like finding the lost piece of the puzzle you been waiting to finish. I remember I let them do more talking then me and I love talking and leading conversations. The person was talking and going on and on about his work and accomplishments and all these things and I was listening but at the same time thinking how in the hell are we at the same place, with each other conversing when we both are at completely different levels of life. That man hasn’t driven himself in over 5 years and here I am a person who refused to get a Uber during the surge charge times. It was when I was listening to him and getting lost in my own head and thoughts I had came to the conclusion, all of this I didn’t just want because i simply wanted it, I was made to do this shit.

The saying goes dreams don’t fall in your lap, but what’s meant for you will never miss you, and that is the hard truth. My life has never been less complicated until i started listening my to myself and following what I wanted to genuinely do. I have acted when I convinced people I wanted to be a Doctor. Granted i love medicine, I hate school. I hate dealing with various people everyday all day, and I hate playing God because I feel like it brings out the biggest bitch in me, and I hate letting that side of me out on people who I know cant handle it but certain times they have to learn. Hell i even acted in friendships. There were times when I wanted nothing more then people to exit my life, and instead of being like “ hey, you kind o disgust me now.” I would simply just begin to ignore them. It wasn’t until i started to act that I had no desire nor feeling to act outside of a role assigned to me.

The moment of Nirvana that hit me like a bus was when I had brought up doing a YouTube as a class assignment and my mentor chewed me all the way up. I remember I sat on the phone and thought about how I loved YouTube, how my friends suggested I should do YouTube and all of this,and I sat and thought to myself did I love YouTube becasue I loved it, or was I told I should love it becasue I was told I was good at it. I was never a person who was compared to other people, but i was always facing the problem of people being compared to me. “ Oh youre always laughing at everything like T’yanna.” “ oh you always have something to say, like T’yanna.” “ Oh you think you know it all , can’t tell you nothing like T’yanna.” The shit drove me mad. So when I was talking to him about YouTube he hit me with “ why do you want to be like everybody else so bad, why can’t you just be yourself, be fucking original, you’re best when your original.” and straight hung up on me. I remember standing there looking real stupid at my phone, but what he said 1. I needed to hear that and eat my feelings hurt to wake up and 2. I hated being in front of the camera if it was in regards to me and my own personal life.

It was when I was talking to one of my classmates about why I chose New York over LA to study and learn acting she told me she had read my blogs and been watching how I talk to everybody in class and was doing what I did becasue she liked the responses I got from people and how I always in a way got what I wanted or didn’t and always needed up with something better. Now when she told me that I was thinking wow you little weirdo, but then it hit me, she was doing to me what I had did to drewbarry Moore’s character Dylan. I was inspired by how she carried herself and how she always got what she wanted and never backed down, I had used her ways and transformed them to fit my own style and thats what this women was doing, and it is what a lot of females I know have done to me, like I have done to other women. I have learned you can’t want a meaningful and powerful life/career if you aren’t comfortable with others taking from you and mimicking it in their own way.

Just getting started and I feel like it has been years. I have been myself but also still multiple other people. I have been critiqued in ways I didn’t even think could exist. I have picked myself into millions of pieces beyond the surface level. And mostly I have finally really began to see people, truly see them. i find myself studying them and their habits and attitude and have never been so turned off all while inspired by people. The dreams you chase I hope their yours, and not something that you see working in somebody else’s favor. I hope that you are living your life authentic and lastly I hope the life you chose to live and the dream you chase has a purpose. Becasue when it is all said and done, people can decipher the real from the fake, and the fake shit never prospers.

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