Hey Reader, I went to a retreat this weekend. The theme was "shifting." To go to this, I stepped back from everything: the invoices, the projects, the calendar, all of it stopped for a weekend. Once I learned the theme, I was thinking about driving stick: clutch down, into neutral, into the next gear. I recognized how this was my life: I've been in one low gear all year, pushing hard, revving past what the engine can hold. Moving for sure, but feeling limited. I've been burning fuel and not...
6 days ago • 3 min read
Hey Reader, Most of my life I've been petrified of cold. When I was at summer camp (not the one I'm running this year), the hot water shut off. I stood at the edge of that shower knowing the cold was coming, and my body absolutely refused. I screamed. I shuddered. I barely got through it. A few years ago I decided I wanted to take cold showers on purpose. I wanted to know if I could choose the thing my body resisted. I'd stand at the dial, knowing exactly what was coming, and make myself turn...
15 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, As a kid, I was intimidated by getting into good shape. I thought about the workouts I had to do, and tried practicing on my own, even got a gym membership. I showed up, and everyone knew what they were doing. They were in great shape. I felt unwelcome; new, so far behind I didn't even know where to get started. I hired a trainer many years ago, and I got the form, how to do the exercises, but I felt uneasy at the end of the session, it felt transactional. He knew what he was...
17 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, Every time I offer a workshop, something slips through. A typo. A wrong date. I check and recheck and still find it after it goes out. Last week, someone in the coaching Lounge said it plainly: you need support. Someone to be an extra perspective. I've been doing this for 20 years, and I still need someone in the room. I've thought about it in the context of my own career. In the rooms I ended up in, the work I got, the relationships that mattered, none of it came from a demo reel...
19 days ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, Here’s what tends to happen by week four. The math drops away. You stop counting frames and start feeling the scene. You're landing inside the cues instead of chasing them, slowing down without announcing it, getting out of the way when the moment belongs to the picture. That shift comes from doing the work in front of someone who can hear exactly what you’re doing and tell you the truth about it; then doing it again, the same week, while the feedback is still fresh. That’s the...
21 days ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, Using context and intent is how performers connect with our audience. That's how AD performance, when it works well, feels like it's already inside the story, instead of at a distance. Context is everything available to you before you open your mouth. Intent is what you do with it. Together, they're the difference between words that move and words that sit there. Before I open registration to the public, you get first access. Think of it like a friend saving you a seat before the...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Hey Reader, I've always loved the ocean. The waves, the space, the surprisingly cool air at night. But the first time I drove Pacific Coast Highway, I wasn't ready for the road itself. The bridge that felt hundreds of feet above. Curves pressed tight against the cliffside. A sheer drop sometimes, right at the edge of the lane. I remember it didn't scare me. I could get close to this edge. Really close. And I didn't need to go over. I've been thinking about what it means to know where the edge...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, I’ve been thinking about legacy. Specifically, I’ve been sitting with a quote from Alan Lightman’s The Transcendent Brain, shared by Maria Popova at The Marginalian in 2023. It's like a physics scientist talking about legacy: “If you could tag each of the atoms in your body and follow them backward in time, through the air that you breathed during your life, through the food that you ate, back through the geological history of the Earth, through the ancient seas and soil, back to...
about 1 month ago • 3 min read
Hey Reader, After a lovely train ride along the coast of the Pacific Ocean, my niece picked me up in San Diego last weekend. Her boyfriend was in the car. In front of him, she turned around and asked: "Did you work on The Last of Us TV series?" She was glowing; a big smile, wide eyes, expectant, and also knowing the answer. I said yeah, I did. She lit up even more. She wanted to know more -- what it was like, what I actually do. And I watched her explain Audio Description to her boyfriend....
about 2 months ago • 2 min read
Hey Reader, I have a dear friend who won't say "I hope you're well." He says "I trust you're well." He'll say "I trust you had a good weekend." He's clear about why, and I can feel the difference. Hope has something earnest in it. A positive longing. I still like hope. But trust has a confidence to it. An expectation. I think of a trust fall -- you don't know exactly when you'll get caught, but you're making the leap anyway. That's something more connected than just hope. I've caught myself...
about 2 months ago • 1 min read