Cookies and Milk and Shadow Work; A Podcast --- Episode V

The Title of Today’s Episode is called -- Categorical thinking will get you nowhere except everywhere, but in the eyes of society, you will still be considered a failure. 

 

No, I’m just kidding.

 

The Title of Today’s Episode is called, “Acting Was Cool for a Minute, But Now It Is Not Anymore”

 

You’re listening to Cookies and Milk and Shadow Work, I’m your host, and my name is Will. 

 

In late 2022, I realized I had an unprecedented opportunity to quit acting forever, and shift my focus to music journalism.  I was sick of all the senseless confusion that comes with acting and auditioning, I was fucking sick of it.  I did not seem to have even the slightest interest in actually creating a character, let alone interpreting dialogue, which used to be my favorite thing on earth.  All I fucking cared about, was this stupid puzzle called having a career in the performing arts.  I felt like I just wanted to solve the puzzle, but had no actual interest in acting at all. 

 

But about a year ago, in the summer of 2023, it started to seem like people around me in my state of Connecticut, had been bitten by the acting bug for the very first time.  And you, the listener, might not believe me about this next part, but I really started to get the feeling that some people in my local community just wanted me to tell them literally everything I knew about acting, for free, as soon as possible.  In fact, it felt like I was supposed to tell them faster than is even possible, like I should just upload the information into their brains using some sort of Neuralink style technology that I thought we were supposed to be afraid of. 

 

I decided that I would just write a short e-book kind of thing, maybe share some useful information about my time as an actor, and make some suggestions about how people could get involved in local productions.  The truth is, I don’t blame anyone for wanting to know more about acting, and I don’t blame them for changing their mind.  But I think it’s time for we as people to admit that we are more susceptible to what is Trending, or cool, or glamorous, than we would like to believe. 

 

For example, a few years ago I wasn’t very interested in sports, but now I look at so many sporting events differently than I did in the past.  Suddenly there are people I can talk to about soccer, or tennis, or even baseball.  It seems like our values as a collective have really changed, but sometimes I wonder if any day now, our values will just change back to whatever they were before, or whatever they are supposed to be in the future.  But all the same, I think there is value in acting.  Acting is an opportunity to do shadow work without really doing shadow work.  Even though you’re creating a fictional character and their fictional emotional landscape, there is a catharsis to it that is almost addictive.

 

Okay that’s plenty for shadow work, let’s get into… cookies and milk.  I’ve actually been really jammin’ on the chocolate milk vibes lately, it’s just an easy treat when you’re not feeling very hungry.  Also, I know that I normally talk cookies first and then move onto the milk portion, so please let me know in the comments if you prefer the milk segment before the cookie segment.

 

For cookies, honestly, I’ve had this podcast going for like a week, and I did go pretty nuts on a package of Chips ahoy cookies sometime around Episode III. 

 

Alright, thank you for listening, this has been the fifth episode of Cookies and Milk and Shadow work.  It was a little long for my taste, but I’m not perfect person, so ---