In the months since my last entry, there’s been a lot of work on getting the pending wedding details together to throw the big event (now just a smidge over 2 weeks away) and I received an incredible job offer to work service and support for the rad-tac-u-lar gang at Wufoo. With the wedding alone being a large event to tackle, in tandem with getting into the flow of a new gig meant I had to put VO on the backburner for a little bit. While I have still been reading up, and practicing here and there, I’ve not been actively auditioning too, too much. But even then managed to successfully land a solid chunk of work.

Once things settle down after the wedding I plan to jump back into it full force, and will likely be all fueled up by the great experiences that await me at this weekends faffcon (the voiceover unconference). I’m incredibly excited to meet a lot of the voices and avatars I’ve been interacting with on Twitter for the past several months as well as bring my skills and experience in marketing, social media, and knack for navigating the internets to the table in order to help and teach all those who wish to learn.

I’m in particular looking forward to learning how other talents have thus far been utilizing their social profiles for their personal businesses and brands, and where they’ve found they’ve had successful as well as ponderous outcomes. All in all, it should be pretty stellar.

So stellar that it’s nearly 2 a.m. and last I knew I was planning to hit the road by 6.

I should possibly look into getting some rest. I’ll do that now… Atlanta awaits.

Over 80 pages of material… didn’t seem like it’d be such a huge undertaking at the beginning. But then it swallowed my week whole… But I digress… on to playing catch up with #reverb10 prompts.

December 2 - Writing.
What do you do each day that doesn’t contribute to your writing — and can you eliminate it?
(Author: Leo Babauta)

Not quite sure how to answer this in a way that doesn’t go with my off the cuff snark response of “breathe.”  So I’ll stick to that,  as doing so is what enables me to exist, and my brain to have crazies. Notably in the form of that beloved, asshole inner critic lots carry around with them.

While I do enjoy writing, holy crap do I ever get in my own way. Particularly if I’m on a computer with internet access. If I’m not ADD afflicted and checking multiple other streams of information unrelated to the task at hand (but oh-so-interesting), I’m already engaged in editing the entire post while it’s still being written. Re-reading and reprocessing everything before this word, as the next stiltedly flows out. Maniacally fearful of misspelling (though most software is tracking it for me on the fly, whenever I see those red squiggles pop it’s like it triggers a mental ruler strike to my hands), improper context, and those times when I do just let go and happen to accidentally do something like double double up on a word by accident, or use the same core word several times in the same phrasing.

That last sentence? While even actively attempting to set it up as a “cute” example of my brain crazies, I saw the squigglies 5 times, and tabbed out of this WP page to use the “define: [type yo word here]” function in google search at least 3 times.

I get in my own way.  As if it were my sole purpose for being.

Some days are certainly better than others, and being well rested absolutely helps.  While I have installed a myriad of tools, apps, and plugins that are designed to help me focus on writing by being a gate between me and anything else on the internet, as well as converting my entire screen to a Doogie Howser, M.D. style word processor, it still has yet to take. I’m sure it’d get better over time through consistency. “Just showing up” as it were. But I don’t currently have writing within the top 5 list of my focused priorities currently. Though I probably should, as it is rather therapeutic, and clearly that’s something I could benefit from.

I have journaled on and off for almost 20 years. I usually fill up the first 10 – 15 pages, and then break the habit, and the rest of the book is blank. I have at least 15-20 comp books, fancy journals, and Five Star First Gear College Rule EZ Tear notebooks in this very condition in a storage bin.

My current fave, and the one I’m doing my best to be more actively on top of, is an awesome leather bound journal that Tara gave me as a gift last year, the back binding page inscribed with some of the sweetest and most loving words that I’ll spare you from the syrupiness of. (Just make a mental note that in my small, crazy world, she’s the bee’s knees.)

It was my intention this evening, after being at my iMac from 6 a.m. – 8:45 p.m. sweetening and bouncing out nearly 1,000 different mp3s of my own voice, to stay off the computer for the rest of the night and catch up on my prompts in this journal.  As I was flipping through, I found something I wrote last year around this time, the catalyst of which I can’t recall. But it was clear indication that even disconnected from distraction, were words can flow more freely, and I don’t worry about the red squiggles, I have the inclination to get in my own way.

So I’m back at the computer, because I felt impulse to scan this short, self indulgent entry and share it. Because I found it kind of funny in a “where ever you go, there you are” kind of way.

It’s been an excellent year of progress since writing those words, fo’ sho. But same as it ever was, and hopefully will be… I’m a guy in progress. Always striving for the “best version” of me.

December 1 One Word.
Encapsulate the year 2010 in one word. Explain why you’re choosing that word. Now, imagine it’s one year from today, what would you like the word to be that captures 2011 for you?
(Author: Gwen Bell)

“Slide.”

Yes, I fit the somewhat contrived demographic of the 25 – 34 year old who has an affinity for subconsciously relating most facets of every day life to Fight Club.  And yes, I am referring to the scene in which Jack, the by the book, clock punching, societal norm abiding protagonist enters his cave and communes with his “power animal.”  This tightly wound character is being told to loosen up and let go… to release himself from mundane conformity. In one word. From a penguin. Anarchistic overtones of the third act aside,  it’s a story that resonates.

At the start of this year I found myself supremely blessed to be in a position where I was brimming with joy about most every aspect of my life, but one.  I was oh so, oh so terribly, incredibly, awfully, no good, very bad days in loathe with my job.

I knew something about this wasn’t right. I’d known for a few years, but I didn’t know what to do about it.  Because I didn’t even dare think there was something that I could/should do about it.

I was to just “suck it up”, “keep my head down”, “shut up and be thankful that I even have a job in this economy“, punch in, check out mentally, punch out, commiserate with co-workers, collect a paycheck so I can continue to pay bills and buy things I don’t need, accept that I was spending a huge portion of my waking hours contributing to pursuits that left me feeling empty and completely drained, “living for the weekends”, rinse, and repeat.

It’s a common, readily accepted, and easily identifiable tale. But why?

Always having been the patience testing asker of “Why?”… something just felt really shady about this entire circuit of being. I had a strong hunch that there had to be another way.  Hell, at this stage in the game I KNEW there had to be another way. (I touched upon this during a post for last years #best09)

The seeds were planted, I had the burning passion and desire… I just didn’t know how to apply it to my specific situation. I wasn’t quite sure how to make my escape from this particular den of unhappiness.

If any of you are calling bullshit on me and believe I was just self sabotaging and making excuses to abstain from breaking from the comfortably mundane… CLICK HERE.

I spent the last few months of last year, and the first half of this year, filling my head with case studies. Seeking examples and by proxy tutelage from those who’d thrown convention to the wind and opted to live on their own terms.  ”Lifestyle design” was a topic that lit me up like a Christmas tree and I could talk at length about with most anyone, even brain storm and muse on areas of opportunity for others to enrich their own lives, but it was something I’d yet to truly enact for my own self.

My brain was so full of examples as to what worked well for others I rendered myself impotent looking for similar windows of opportunity, not yet accepting the reality that my opportunity would most likely be completely different.

Oddly enough… a significant catalyst that enabled me to get out from the quagmire of my own head occurred when hearing the breaking news of a disgruntled Jet Blue flight attendant by the name of Steven Slater. The guy who after being chewed out by a passenger on the flight, calmly approached the intercom system, told aforementioned passenger off, gave a kiss off to the remaining passengers, grabbed 2 beers from the galley, popped the side hatch and rode the inflatable emergency slide out into the unknown.

While perhaps a simple, and crude way of altering the parameters of one’s situation it was effective.

I too needed to be a man of action.

About a month later I gave my resignation from the coveted “stable job” I’d held for nearly 5 years, to not only unpause my dreams of becoming a professional actor and voice actor, but also to work night and day for a guy who I’m just not so sure about sometimes… Myself.

Was I scared? Hell yes. Do I still have the occasional internal freakout due to periods in time of not knowing where the next paying project or gig is going to come from while I train, train, train, and build a book of business? Oh.Good.God.YES.

But I can’t recall a time which I’ve ever felt more alive, more free, and not just living for the weekends, but  living in profound excitement for each and every day.

Oh… and the word I’d like to capture 2011?  Awesome… er.

So perhaps I bit off more than I could chew at first, and this client is getting his work at a steal, but I’ll chalk it up to a learning curve on my part, and initial error in oversight. So what if I’m working a bit over 40 hours for $400. As long as I don’t dip too terribly below minimum wage it’s not a huge loss, just something that’s keeping me from the rest my body’s making a grand stand of informing me I desperately need.

Onward…

In other quick news, I’m excited that today is the start of the prompts for #reverb10, a month full of prompts to incite reflection on this past year. And what a doozy it was. I also threw a click through button on the side menu over there ———->

Which unfortunately no longer appears to have it’s fun and fancy hide/reveal slide function. I need to get back to working on this voice project before I slip down a time sink of attempting to novicely troubleshoot javascript. [UPDATE: That ess is fixed! Thanks to the theme developer for reminding me to stop being a knucklehead and trouble shoot my plug-ins.]

Before departing I’d like to share a quote that hit my nets today that basically sums up the essence of my recent self discoveries:

When a resolute young fellow steps up to the great bully, the world, and takes him boldly by the beard, he is often surprised to find it comes off in his hand, and that it was only tied on to scare away the timid adventurers. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Of course it’s an Emerson quote… Of course.

“Soon” became nearly 3.5 years. While a lot of life has happened in that time, this “quick little project” has been festering in the back of my mind all the while.

Finding myself up and alert at 4:30 this morning I decided that now was the time. Today would be the day.

And, well… it almost was.  Apparently I didn’t capture all the footage, and had I started this edit closer to the time of filming, I may have been able to tell G, “Oh, hey… we need to do some pick up shots.”

Better incredibly late, and incomplete than never?

Anywho, here’s the eternally unfinished version featuring a nearly 26 year old me. I might go back and attempt to finalize the color correction and redo the titles (maybe even track down the source DV tape) sometime before the end of the world. But I wouldn’t hold your breath.

In which our hero describes:

• His trip to LA for Pat Fraley‘s “Voice Over in Video Games” workshop
• Overcoming puke inducing irraltional fear and anxiety
• kingpanpan.com is wicked awesome. GO THERE NOW.
• Shopping thrifty for books/course materials for acting training
• Feels like a douche for talking about P90X
• Receives an e:mail
• Confesses he needs to incorporate a diet in order to look “Brad Pitt in Fight Club” fit.
• Gushes about the Dubstep remix of quotes and scenes from Tommy Wiseau’s “The Room” the epic film directed, produced, written by, and starring Tommy Wiseau

Finally back to posting  & talking about new developments:

• Resigned from previous job of 4.5 years
• Now Freelancing full time
• Back to pursuits of being an actor/voice talent
• Nerves, Nerves, Nerves
• Vommy, vommy, spew, spew.

If this is your first time visiting the site, Thanks!  But if you’ve been here before, you might notice there’s a new coat of paint on the mofo.  I still have some additional tweaks to make, but this is a good place to start. I do intend to be posting more about my journey into the world of voice over, as the usual rantings on video games, movies, and various thoughts/reflections/fears born of taking a stand to live a life on my own terms.

Let’s see how it goes.

Please pardon the generic minimalist theme whilst I go back through the current content and fix broken links/embeds and clean up the style sheets… not that anyone’s likely to mind anyway.

Tires are being kicked, I’ve crossed yet another thing off my task list for the day, and we’ll see you back here soon when things are a bit tidier and more situated.

Ka-Boom.

For the past week or so there’s been an old adage rolling around in my brain: “Dress for the job you want.”

I practically applied this concept years ago when I needed to seek more gainful employment, and put the aspirations of being a professional actor/whatever to rest.  I had debts to pay, and the few and far between low paying, non-union gigs weren’t enough to supplement my occasional temping assignments or part-time job at Starbucks.  When searching through job postings I caught wind of a new Target store opening with some positions yet to be filled.  So, I applied and then within a few days received a call for an interview.

My usual m.o. for the interview process is to adorn the professional looking slacks, shirt, and tie. But this time I was desperate, so I tried to pull off a mind ‘eff of sorts.  Instead of the typical “Joe Schmo Need-A-Job” wear I threw on khakis, and a red button up.  I would go to the interview dressed as a Target employee with the intent of implanting the visual cue for the hiring manager to see me as a Target employee, and to a degree I do believe it worked.  I went in to apply for a staff position and to my surprise went through 3 rounds of interviews that day and was offered a department lead position… and so began my journey into retail middle management, but I digress.

While I’m sure that days “success” didn’t hinge entirely upon my choice of wardrobe, I know it couldn’t have hurt.  By dressing like that, I was able to not only better project myself as a solid Target employee during the interviews, but I also made it a lot easier for them to see me as such.  They saw me as a Target employee, and I became one. And I’ve recently come to realize I’ve been co-opting my dreams ever since.

I want, and need that to change.

I’m the one who needs to make the change, and I do believe I can.  I think I may just need to rework my scientific method a bit.

Dressing for the Life I Want

Last week on formspring.me I was asked by a friend “When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

My response was reflexive: “An actor in TV/Film as well as a Voice Over Actor for Cartoons… Still do.”

When I look in the mirror in the morning, it’s rather plain to see that golly gee… I’ve grown up.  So, what the hell am I waiting for?

I’ve made efforts in the past to pursue those dreams, but they ultimately went deferred for the pursuit of just making a buck to get by.  Which is certainly a means to an end, but not the way I want to go about doing things.  Being handcuffed to a paycheck, trying to feel satisfied with spending the bulk of my time doing something I’m not über passionate about, and telling myself that I’ll get around to all my other aspirations during some magical, future oasis of time.  That “future time” does not exist. All there is is right now, so I need to get cracking. I need to take the steps to embody the life I want.

For almost 10 years I’ve been stifling the desire to see these dreams through.  Casting them off as folly, because I managed to fall into the trap of convincing myself that it wasn’t practical… that I just needed to keep my head down and work a job and collect a paycheck.  And while I know that I am capable of that, I also know that it makes my heart throw up on itself.

And that’s just gross.

Progress

In the past week, I’ve found and updated the old acting resumé, and submitted it as well as other materials to a local casting agency.  I’ve also sought out and am receiving help in regards to assembling a voice over demo reel. This is a ball that didn’t take very much in the way of time or effort to get rolling, and while I’m proud of what I’ve got cooking thus far, I am rather pissed at moi for having delayed for so long. But I need to get over that and keep focused.

I’m not sure where I fell off the track of following through on personal goals and ambitions, but that’s going to end. I wish it were as easy as an off switch, but due to the lame ass cocktail of fear and insecurities I’ve picked up along the way, I’m finding it to be much more challenging. That being said, I refuse to again be self-defeated.  And am using that fear gauge as an indicator that I’m likely on the right path.

Inspirato

Here are some sites I’ve been frequenting to aid the process of reworking my mind grapes back into a more confident and danger’esque form.

Illuminated Mind – Site author Jonathan Mead states his objective simply as “Creating a social movement of people liberating themselves through living on their own terms.” There are lots of really good articles and case studies in support of thinking outside the box and steering clear from the traps of social convention.  It rather speaks to me.

The Quarterlife Quest – A recent, and very pleasant discovery from Eran Norton that topically is wicked in sync with my current state of mind.  She’s more than a few steps ahead of me in the action taking department and is doing rather well, which inspires and fills me with even more hope.

Seeing Good – Written by Lori Deschene, I visit this site and her contributed articles to tinybuddha.com when I’m in need of a positivity boost, or know I need to take time for a moment of meditation and mindfulness.

Four Hour Blog – As the blog component to his book The 4 Hour Work Week,  author, entrepreneur, kick boxer, tango world record holder, and lots of other stuff  Tim Ferriss provides even more resources, insight, and case studies in regards to living life more effectively and filtering out the unnecessary crap we’re all so good at burdening ourselves with. I love checking in and not only seeing what he’s up to, but reading/watching the stories of those who successfully applied the basic principles he preaches. [Scope the book on Amazon here.]

Wrapping this Mofo Up

So here I am… focused on getting back to my goals and passions and seeing them through.  And making  moves towards dressing as the me I want to be.

Mike Wong: Tech savvy entertainer and all around do-gooder.

Photo Credit: SolheimPhotography_Linda

Team Teamwork, the folks behind last year’s “The Ocarina of Rhyme“, have just dropped another sublime working of hip-hop and video game scores on the masses. As the title cleverly implies this round the focus is on the much loved (and über hyped) Final Fantasy 7, and features pairings of classic game tunes mixed with the likes of Kool Keith, Tom Waits, MF DOOM, Clipse, and Ghostface Killah.

While projects of this sort are definitely not made for mass appeal, whether or not you find yourself in the target niche it’s worth checking out if you’re one who enjoys beats or have ever felt the impulse to strike a sword twirling victory pose.

I am certainly of the sort that is currently self consciously grooving and bopping while my lady walks by and shakes her head with a smile in a way that only someone who loves me could. Because…  yeah.

Vinyl Fantasy 7 is available for on-line streaming as well as donation based download. Check it, yo!

[Thanks to @bburbank for the heads up!]