Chapter 13
What is your pain tolerance? What is your pain tolerance for missing out on social events? From hanging out with your friends? From your girlfriend or boyfriend being mad at you because you aren't spending enough time with them? From your parents or your spouse or other loved ones wondering when you're going to give up this crazy pipe dream and do something productive with your life? For criticism, for doubt? For embarrassment and hurt egos? How much pain can you deal with – emotional psychological spiritual, and sometimes even physical? That was a real bummer of a paragraph, huh?
I believe that pain tolerance or lack thereof directly correlates to success or failure in the long run in any endeavor we decide to embark upon. Everybody has ideas. Tons and tons of people hustle and work hard. You can always be sure that there are more talented, smarter, more connected, better‐capitalized people than you.
One of the key things that sets me apart from others is my tolerance for pain. As you try to do something original or innovative, you are going to be faced with all of the scenarios that I mentioned above. What I have seen over the course of my career is that the people who could push through these painful situations have been the ones who more often than not come out on the other side and find success.
This is not just metaphorical pain that I am talking about. This is pain that you really feel. When your boyfriend or girlfriend is mad at you because you are doing yet another series of shows on the weekend and you are missing another night out with their friends or a special event, you feel a pain that is real.
When someone you love or respect or care about doubts what you are doing or thinks you are making mistake, you feel that loss of trust just as powerfully as any physical hurt. When you see all your peers finding a certain amount of success and security, marching on in their own careers while you are still stuck at the start in a world where success is not guaranteed, and is even unlikely, you will feel it like a punch in the gut.
Nobody would blame you if you quit or gave up, and many will probably encourage you to do so.
I would love to sit here and tell you that pursuing your own path is nothing but pure pleasure and a sure way to achieve personal and professional bliss. That, of course, would be utter bullshit. And I am not here to bullshit you. There are many other wonderful professionals you can turn to if that is what you are looking for.
Is charting your own path fulfilling and gratifying in a way that may be difficult to achieve working for the man? Oftentimes, yes. Can it be exciting and mentally and emotionally stimulating to a degree that is tough to find in a safe and ordinary world? Absolutely. Could I or would I choose any other approach? 100 percent no.
Setting an original course cannot happen without a certain amount of pain, Self‐doubt and nausea‐inducing anxiety. The execution phase of making shit up for a living is far more difficult than the ideation phase. To be blunt, it ain't for everybody.
Then again, pain is all relative. What is painful for me might not cause you any trouble, and vice versus. It is all in the tolerance. The more you can withstand the discomforts that come along with doing your own thing, the further along down the road you will get. Just like with alcohol, you can build up your tolerance to this kind of pain.
One way is by rethinking what pain means. Most of us associated pain with negativity. Pain is something to be avoided at all cost. But what if we change our perspective on what is painful and what it means?
One of the most common comments I get from people when they learn what I do is “Man, what you do is so hard.” Another common refrain is “Making it in show biz is really tough.” Yeah, I guess. I mean, yes, it certainly is. But ultimately, what isn't?
Seems to me like going to law school is super tough, and med school, holy shitballs, that is hard. And I cannot think of too many things harder than working on the auto factory line (my mom) or driving trucks (my dad). Now that is hard. That is working for a living.
What is perceived as hard or difficult is all relative. For me, the idea of having to get up every morning and be at the same place at 8:30 a.m. and not be able to leave until 5:00 p.m., well, that seems almost impossibly difficult. And yet others look at performers and say that there is no way they could ever go on stage in front of a bunch of strangers and try to make them laugh, without a script, no less!
Yet there is something pleasurable in “hard.” It is what gives the thing value. It is what makes us feel like we are accomplishing something or doing something worthwhile. When we can start to change what we perceive to be “hard” and actually connect good feelings to that sensation then we start to look at that endeavor in a whole new light. We look forward to the challenges that the task or the day presents. No longer is the idea of something being “hard” a negative or a deterrent form doing something. The whole idea that something is “hard” is actually a motivating factor for doing it.
It is the same idea with pain. If we remind ourselves that the pain we are experiencing in the immediate moment or in the short term is a symptom of the growth we are experiencing, then it gives us reason to push through it.
We all understand the pain we feel when we first begin to work out. We know that it is there because we are stretching and strengthening our muscles. As we go through the inevitable difficulties that come with doing something out of the ordinary, we need to remember that the pain we are experiencing in the moment is not permanent and will make us stronger and more resilient down the line.
Without being a masochist or a martyr, if we can associate some of that pain we are experiencing with pleasure, kind of an S‐and‐M thing for the mind, the pain we are feeling no longer has such an intense negative connotation.
What is something that you have always wanted to do, but thought that was too hard or seemed like it would be too painful? What if you changed that thought and instead said, “I'm going to do it exactly because it seems hard or difficult”?
If we wait for everything to be easy before we try to do it, then we probably will be waiting forever. Don't wait for the easy thing. Look for something hard to do and attack it with enthusiasm and passion. When we do that, we redefine what it means for something to be “hard.” The pain that comes with it is just a symptom of our own resilience growing, and confirmation that we are pushing outside of our own comfort zone into new and exciting territory.
I will give you a personal example from my own experience. As an actor in a cast at Improv Asylum you are required to be able to do more than just make the audience laugh. You have to write, be able to perform written material, master the art of improvisation, and be able to technically work with your cast mates. Sometimes you have to dance and you almost always have to sing.
As a performer I generally did not have that much difficulty with everything listed above, except for one thing. And that thing was singing. I have been funny in one way shape or form since I was a kid, so in the grand scheme of things I've never been overly worried about that aspect of the job. The writing process is always enjoyable to me, so I have been able to pick up that fairly quickly. I had done plays in high school and college and hundreds of TV commercials, so I've always felt comfortable working with the written word. Singing? Not so much.
Holding notes, hearing notes, finding the pitch, following the melody, all those things were very foreign to me. I learned early on that singing was not my forte and it never would be. That was more than okay because I wasn't looking to become a star of musical comedies. The problem arose when I began to find myself getting cast in comedy troupes.
Turns out, a lot of people in comedy troupes have legit theater backgrounds and training, and many of them love to do musical comedy. So much so that they were always creating some kind of parody song or group number or improvised musical piece. Being part of the ensemble, I was expected to contribute like anybody else. Problem was, I kind of sucked at it. The other actors are usually quite nice about it, but you know when you are the weak link in something. People's voices change when they talk to the weak link. It becomes softer, a higher pitch, slower and sadder. They don't mean to, but they begin to talk to you like a dunce. When it came to singing, I was a dunce.
I had a choice to make. I could either accept the pitying encouragements of my castmates, all the while knowing that they were cringing every time I open my mouth in a song, or I could try to tackle things on my own and try to get better.
So that is what I did. Whenever I was in a show that featured some kind of singing, I made sure to enroll myself in private vocal lessons. Twice a week for 30 minutes or so I would work with someone who would take me through the “me me me's, la la la la's” and the “tip of the tongue on the top of the teeth” exercises.
At first these lessons were excruciating. I could see it on my instructor's face whenever I had to sing something. He was encouraging, but I'm not an idiot. I could also hear myself. Yet in another instance, proving that consistent dogged persistence at something will result in some kind of improvement, I was able to get myself to be able to at least reasonably blend with the rest of the cast on the group numbers. Now, I never had a solo, nor did I want or deserve one.
That was, up until that point where I decided that I should be able to at least sing one thing on my own at some point in my life. I needed to face this fear to prove to myself that I could in fact do it. I knew it was going to be both hard and painful. But I also knew that the confidence I would get from doing something that I always told myself I couldn't do would be invaluable. So I signed up for a far more intensive singing course at a local university in Boston.
Beyond just private lessons, this class ended with each student singing a solo piece to live audience in a theater on campus. When that fateful evening came I stood on the stage all by my lonesome and sang a solo number from Les Misérables. The Hollywood version of this story ends with the audience rising to their feet amidst thunderous applause an intermittent shouts of “Bravo!” and “Encore!” Alas, that was not to be. My performance was mediocre at best and was met with the polite indifference of people who are forced to sit through uninspired performances from amateur singers.
When I came off that stage I felt like a badass! I just sang a song in front of hundreds of people by myself, something that in a million years I thought I would never do. I had faced down a fear and proved to myself that I could push through the pain of this very personal obstacle and accomplish a goal that I had always thought to be impossible.
Did I become a great singer? No. A good one? Not even. What I no longer had was the fear of musical numbers. The worry and anxiety that came with having to perform those pieces were gone. The hard work and the pain made me stronger and more confident, and that allowed me to be a stronger and more confident performer when it came to singing songs like “Jesus Christ, Superstore,” “Kindergarten Pressure,” or “Bingo with Nana.” In case you had forgotten, we aren't performing things like Les Misérables in our stinky basement theaters. We make stupid shit up for a living
How can you practice this? Pick something you have always wanted to try but thought would be too hard or too painful to do. Maybe it is learning a new language or playing an instrument. Maybe it is singing. Sign up for a class and see it through. Don't focus on or particularly care about the end results. The goal isn't to be amazingly awesome at whatever it is you are learning. The goal is to do something hard and push through the pain to prove to yourself that you can achieve a goal that is difficult.
By first experiencing this when the results are ultimately inconsequential (at the end of the day, who really gives a shit if you become proficient at the ukulele), you start to develop a tolerance to pain and an ability to push on through when things become hard, because you know how good it will feel when you reach your goal.