Jen’s POV:

Great advice from Will Smith on the Youtube. Sometimes when I’m still awake at 3am my fails come crashing into my memory and I shudder at them only to hope that they haven’t completely ruined everything that I have built up over the years of my acting career. But then again everything usually looks bleak at that time of morning when you have a serious bout of insomnia.

But now that that I hear this bit of advice from Will, I feel like I can let go of this worry and actually learn to celebrate it. I’m trying. I really do believe that fails are not really failures but lessons, and something good can be taken from any kind of experience. Fail early though? Does that mean that it’s too late for me being middle aged in the middle of it all? I hope not. Seems you never can tell when a fail is gonna creep up on you. I figure that I’m still growing and learning no matter what stage of the game I’m at or what age I am, so I’m just gonna skip over that “early” thing and give myself a break. At least I can count my really epic fails in this business on just one hand… I think. You never do know why you didn’t get the job after the audition though. There are so, so many variables. Hell, you could have nailed it but maybe you reminded the director of their ex-partner.

So, I figure what works for me is to celebrate and be grateful for all auditions and gigs alike. Soak up every minute and learn from all of them, big or small, fails or not. I’m going to be easier on myself from now on too, and just keep going forward. Enjoy the journey. I’m always excited to see what will happen next…

About Jen: she studied at Ryerson for performance and has been in a number of films, commercials and TV shows.