13292: Kostroff Asks: Are You In An Abusive Relationship With Your Career?

Raw transcript:

My friend Michael Kostroff
asks the best questions in the best
ways. And I’m going to ask you a
question that he recently asked of his
peeps. And we’ll do that in this episode
of the VO Heroes podcast.
Michael Kro teaches a course called
Audition Psych 101 and it’s all about
the the mindset around auditioning, the
process of auditioning. Uh he famously
says you’re not getting the job. He
famously says, “I was afraid of
auditioning. I wasn’t good at it. I I
you know avoided it in some cases and
then I set about learning how to do it
better.” And if you haven’t been to
auditions101.com,
please do so. It is an amazing class and
you should take it and you should be
part of his community if you’re not
already. Even if you’re not an actor,
I’m telling you. I’m I’m just telling
you his he’s just he he fills his his
output with gems. And this is one of
those gems.
And yes, it applies to acting, but it
applies to voice over. It applies to
writing. It applies to any other uh
career that you might have. And the
question that he asks is,
are you in an abusive relationship
with your career?
Um,
you could be in any pursuit, not just
the weird, odd, crazy,
uh, cool, awesome, creative pursuits
like acting and voicing and and and
writing, but like customer service or
you’re a teacher or you’re an auto
mechanic.
You know, are you in an abusive
relationship with your career is a
universal question.
Are you doing this career still to this
day simply because it’s what you were
trained in even though you may have lost
the joy of that career
or
are you not like you know is there this
do you have this attitude that the your
career is out to get you or the rest of
the people in your industry are treating
you poorly are are you know are you in
an abusive relationship with the choices
that you made to pursue a particular
career and he followed it with
uh identify that abuse. This is how he
solves it, right? Identify that abuse
and concentrate on locating and removing
that grain of sand that is in your shoe
and irritating you or in your under your
clothes and irritating you. All right.
Now, you can continue this metaphor ad
nauseium and say, “Oh, well, a grain of
sand that irritates an oyster uh creates
a pearl.” You know, uh well, you could
do that if you want to, but I think most
of the time it’s about removing the
speed bumps and removing the pain.
And the overarching question that I
think he’s asking is, are you still
happy doing what you’re doing?
And if you’re not,
what’s causing that? What’s what’s
irritating you about it? Is it truly
that you’ve lost the joy of pursuing the
career that you’ve pursued? Uh has the
industry that you’re in moved in a
different direction? Like say, oh, I
don’t know, self tapes, you know,
massive casting calls, you know, has
that ruined the joy that you have for
your career? Um, in terms of performance
anyway, I mean, every career can uh turn
on a dime. You know, think back to the
late 1890s when the automobile was
created. A whole bunch of people who
created products for horses and
horseback riding and bicycles and so on.
Well, they, you know, they found
themselves in a very different uh, you
know, commercial setting. All of a
sudden, their products weren’t as in
demand as they were before.
So, things can change very much. So,
things can change uh very quickly. And
so how you identify that is an
interesting uh exercise to take before
you quit. That’s the thing. Some people
go, “Ah, I’m done because I don’t love
this anymore.” Some people don’t. They
refuse to quit. I will never give this
up. This is what I trained for. This is
what I love doing. I’m not going to let
some stupid self tape uh thing stop me
from Okay, great. But what are your
options? What what can you do? And the
answer is you can do anything you want.
You really can.
So maybe this will start a conversation
on vioheres.com on the page that this
episode lives on. If you’re watching on
YouTube or somewhere else or you’re
listening in, you know, Buzzprout or
Apple Podcast or wherever, go to
vioheres.com. Let me know what your
thoughts are. Have you thought about
quitting the business that you’re in?
Whatever that business is, have you
thought about it? Uh, what changed your
mind? Or are you in the process of
quitting? What What’s going on with you
on this?
Has anything gotten you so upset that
you’ve decided, “That’s it. I’m out. I’m
out of here.”
Or have you said, “No, I’m going to
stick it out. I’m going to be dedicated
to this. I’m going to roll with the
punches.” I’d love to know how this sort
of thing has or has not affected you.
Have you noticed other people doing
this? Tell me what your thoughts are in
the comments below this video or this uh
audio on the vioheres.com page that it
lives on. Uh hit the like button while
you’re down there u you know making
comments and and creating a conversation
and also um subscribe to the channel. Uh
join my mailing list if you’d like. I’d
love to you know let you know when these
new episodes come out. You can click the
notification bell for that as well. Uh,
and you can pass this on to another uh,
person that might be thinking to
themselves, I’m done. I’m so over this.
Or, I’m not done. I’m going to stick
this out. I’m David H. Lawrence the
17th. I thank you so much for watching
and for listening. And I will see you in
the next episode of the VO Heroes
podcast.

(from YouTube)