The Syncreate Podcast: Empowering Creativity
Welcome to Syncreate, where we explore the intersections between creativity, psychology, and spirituality. Our goal is to demystify the creative process and expand the boundaries of what it means to be creative.
Creativity. It’s a word we throw around all the time, but what does it really mean? On the Syncreate Podcast, we share stories of the creative journey. We talk to changemakers, visionaries and everyday creatives working in a wide array of fields and disciplines. Our goal is to explore creativity in all its facets, and to gain a better understanding of the creative process – from imagination to innovation and everything in between.
The Syncreate Podcast is hosted by Melinda Rothouse, PhD. She helps individuals and organizations bring their creative dreams and visions to life through coaching, consulting, workshops, retreats, and now, this podcast. She's written two books on creativity, including Syncreate: A Guide to Navigating the Creative Process for Individuals, Teams, and Communities (winner of a Silver Nautilus Award for Creativity and Innovation), with Charlotte Gullick. She's also a musician (singer-songwriter and bass player) and photographer based in Austin, Texas.
The Syncreate Podcast: Empowering Creativity
Episode 71: Acting Out of Character with John Cane, PhD
How can acting and improvisation training improve your interpersonal and communication skills? We explore this question with John Cane, PhD, actor and integrative wellness psychologist. John is the Founder of Acting Out of Character, a training program offering workshops for turning acting skills into people skills. John received his PhD in psychology with a specialization in creativity studies, along with Melinda. We discuss how acting and improvisation relates to authenticity and emotional intelligence, including how John works with organizations to help with team building and collaboration. We also demonstrate the improv exercise of “Yes, And,” which can facilitate creativity, openness, and innovation.
For our Creativity Pro-Tip, we encourage you to adopt a “Yes, And” mindset in your work, relationships, and daily life. Let us know what you discover!
Credits: The Syncreate podcast is created and hosted by Melinda Rothouse, and produced at Record ATX studios with in collaboration Michael Osborne and 14th Street Studios in Austin, Texas. Syncreate logo design by Dreux Carpenter.
If you enjoy this episode and want to learn more about the creative process, you might also like our conversations in Episode 21: The Walk of Faith and Courage with Shakespearean Actor Warren "Ren" Jackson, Episode 56: Asking the Questions with Broadway Stereophonic Cast Member Chris Stack, and Episode 66: Finding Ease Through Body Awareness with Jennifer Roig-Francoli.
At Syncreate, we're here to support your creative endeavors. If you have an idea for a project or a new venture, find us at syncreate.org. Our book, also called Syncreate, walks you through the stages of the creative process so you can take action on your goals. We also offer resources, creative process tools, and coaching to help you bring your work to the world. You can find more information on our website, where you can also find all of our podcast episodes. Find and connect with us on social media and YouTube under Syncreate. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and leave us a review! We’d love to hear your feedback, so drop us a line at info@syncreate.org.
Episode-specific hyperlinks:
Acting Out of Character Website
Book - Stolen Focus by Johann Hari
Saybrook University Creativity, Innovation & Leadership Program
Show / permanent hyperlinks:
Melinda: Welcome to Syncreate, a show where we explore the intersections between creativity, psychology and spirituality. We believe everyone has the capacity to create. Our goal is to demystify the process and expand the boundaries of what it means to be creative. We talk with visionaries and changemakers and everyday creatives, working in a wide range of fields and mediums, from the arts to science, technology and business.
We aim to illuminate the creative process, from imagination to innovation and everything in between. I'm Melinda Rothouse and I help individuals and organizations bring their dreams and visions to life. At Syncreate, we're here to support your creative endeavors. If you have an idea for a creative project, maybe a book or a musical project or whatever medium you might be working in, or a new business or entrepreneurial venture and you're not quite sure how to get it off the ground, find us at syncreate.org.
Our book, also called Syncreate, walks you through the stages of the creative process so you can take action on your goals. We also offer resources, creative process tools and coaching to help you bring your work to the world, including a monthly coaching group that will be starting up in 2025. So check the website for more details. We'd love for you to join us.
So my guest today is John Cane. He's an actor as well as an integrative wellness psychologist and coach. He's the founder of Acting Out of Character, a training program and workshops for turning acting skills into people skills. He's also the founder of See Beyond the Obvious: Being Your Best Self. And he was a colleague of mine at Saybrook University, where we both did our PhDs in creativity studies.
So it's great to just reconnect. And John, you've got a radio show now also about how music shapes our lives. So highly creative person wearing many hats. That sounds familiar. So there's so many things we could kind of talk about today. But first of all, just welcome to the show. It's great to have you.
John: Thank you, I really appreciate it. You did forget one thing, though.
Melinda: Oh, tell me, what is it?
John: I like to sing karaoke. [Laughter]
Melinda: Karaoke! Okay.
John: I was told a while back that I sound like Jim Morrison. And I didn't know that, and I didn't start singing till I was 50.
Melinda: Oh, wow.
John: Yeah. So I'm, like, ancient now. But, yeah, I was in a band, and we didn't have a singer. And the lead guitarist said, you know, it's really hard for me to sing, really hard for me to play this stuff. And I'm a drummer, and I said to him, well, I could sing it, but I don't think I can sing.
And so I swung a mic over and I started singing and I'm not tone deaf; I found that out. And what happened as a result was I started to strip--I understand that you sing and you play and so you understand--and I began to realize I started to strip out my voice pretty fast because I didn't have a technique.
Melinda: Oh, yeah.
John: But then I took voice lessons, and, anyway, I go to karaoke, kind of to stay in shape because I'm not in the band anymore. And it seems as though people give me good feedback. They like it. And that's to me, that's like the whole point behind entertaining people is that you entertain them and it's not about yourself.
Melinda: And it's fun. It's fun to do just to do it, right?
John: Yeah. Singing makes me happy, you know? But yeah, it's just a pastime. But I mention that in joking because that's kind of like a side note.
Melinda: Just another creative outlet. I love that.
John: Yeah. And I, like I said, I really appreciate the fact that, I know that you play bass, don't you?
Melinda: I'm a singer-songwriter and bass player. Yep.
John: Yeah. You don’t find too many bass players out there.
Melinda: Not too many.
John: Hard to find.
Melinda: Yeah. And singing bass player. Female singing bass player. So yes, I enjoy being that anomaly. Yeah.
John: So do you play in a band right now or no?
Melinda: Yeah I do. I have a group of musicians that I play with here in Austin.
We're currently trying to find a band name, which is like the hardest task in the world to get five people to agree on something. But our working name is The Company. So we'll see if that sticks, but yeah. Yeah, it's been really fun. I'm working on some new stuff, going into the studio, recording some demos.
So that's been really fun. Yeah.
John: Fantastic.
Melinda: Yeah. So thanks for asking. But I really want to dig into, so the workshops and the trainings that you do, utilizing your own acting training is helping other people, including people in companies and organizations, to kind of learn acting skills in order to parlay those into interpersonal and communication skills and so I would love for our audience to hear a little bit about how all of that works.
John: The foundation of how I found, from the research, turning acting skills into people skills really has to do with understanding that how we go through life is pretty much based on our experiences. And of course, that can be debated in a lot of different directions. You know, talking about epigenetics, you know, you start talking about DNA and you know, as far as what you pick up for your parents, what you don't pick up. But the areas that I focus on have a lot to do that are in parallel with how we learn through, and this might kind of be a leap for some people, how we learn through, for example, through hypnosis.
Melinda: Okay.
John: And I don’t know how familiar you are with hypnosis.
Melinda: A little bit.
John: Okay. Well, in the hypnosis that I'm talking about is a technique from Milton Erickson, which has a lot to do with using your imagination and it comes down to, you know, relaxing and then seeing yourself in a situation and then carrying out whatever it is through your imagination to have that experience.
And the key thing in hypnosis is that you're relaxed and you're really open to having a new experience because the mind doesn't know the difference between imagination and reality to some degree.
Melinda: Right.
John: And so in hypnosis you're taking on the experience through your imagination. And your mind thinks that, wow, you actually had that experience.
And the whole idea behind hypnosis is if you're focusing, you're really into it, is that after the experience you come out of it, you go, I feel better than I did before about this fear that I had up until this point. Now I use that as an example of what I do because in translating acting skills into people skills, it has to do with creating, a lot of which came out of the research, creating a safe environment, that's the first thing.
And, in hypnosis, your safe environment is your mind and when you're relaxed you open up, and as you I'm sure already know, when you're relaxed you become more creative, neurotransmitters start firing and, you know, your endorphins are going and all those neuropathways go whoa in every direction. And hopefully you get into a state of flow, maybe.
But anyway, in turning the acting skills into people skills, we do exercises, acting exercises to build up to a point, then we do role play. And kind of fast forward, I ask participants to select somebody that, it could be anybody in history, could be an actor, could be anybody, could be a parent, could be a friend, anybody.
And write down the attributes that they have, break down qualities that they have. And they could be a number of different things, like, I don’t know, person has a strong sense of perseverance. They're strong willed, they have confidence. They see things in a very animated way. You know, their free spirit, whatever it is. And then possibly research on their own.
Or we can do it together. As far as somebody in history or who this applies to, if they can't find anybody, find somebody that has these qualities. And then create a role and then create role play where they step into that role and they try out those experiences within that person and within themselves. As I like to say, you're being somebody else while you're still being yourself.
You're pretending to be somebody else while you're still being yourself. The whole point is that you're having a new experience as this role. But the interesting part about human beings is that when we even simulate characters, it can change us in that process. Because we align it with, okay, I just had an experience. I like it or I don't like it.
Melinda: And it strikes me that in trying on these different roles or these different characters, we begin to embody those characteristics that you mentioned, whatever it is, perseverance or free spiritedness, or whatever trait or characteristic that we maybe want to bring more into our own being. And we get to sort of try that out and see what that feels like in the body, maybe like gestures and facial expressions and posture, so that maybe we feel more confidence in expressing that trait.
John: Exactly. You know, it's the old saying of fake it til you make it. And the interesting part to me is that, you know, way before we had internet and everything else, you know, when we learned in a different style of learning as an apprentice, you know, even, for example, as writers. Writers, you know, 100 years ago, were like looking at other writers.
And then trying to adopt a style and then, you know, working along as far as into their own style and suddenly being their own person, having their own style. So that is kind of like the principle that I'm talking about is that, as far as, you try on different things and you see if it matches up with whatever talent or skill that you have, you know, I've mentioned this in a past interview and I'm a big fan of Sylvester Stalone and his history, in the sense of, he's somebody that has persevered from the beginning.
And I've seen him in interviews. And there's other actors I love, Robert De Niro, Jack Nicholson, Meryl Streep, and they all have qualities that I have actually visualized in self-hypnosis that I know that would be good for me, for what I'm doing. But I mentioned Sylvester Stallone because he's been very athletic his entire life.
And I go running every day. And sometimes when I think about when I'm running, if I'm, you know, I feel tired, I think about, you know, him and Carl Weathers running down the beach, you know, in Rocky III. But I say that because everybody has this at their fingertips. And it's really a matter of if you're using it or not.
Melinda: Yeah. This is so interesting. It kind of, to me it makes me connect. I was actually just talking with our Saybrook colleague Dr. Robert Cleve yesterday, and we were talking about archetypes. And it strikes me there's a similarity, this idea of Jungian archetypes that embody certain characteristics that we might want to emulate. And, you know, same thing with actors or notable figures in history.
It's like, you know, we find this person who has those qualities that we might want to bring out more in ourselves. Right. And then in this sort of archetypal way, we can begin to embrace those more and more. So I can see this being really useful and beneficial in leadership contexts, for example. You know, I work with a lot of leaders and executives as well.
And so much of it is around interpersonal communication skills, relationships, emotional intelligence, empathy and all of those same traits, I think, you know, come into play in acting. Like, you're studying a character, you're trying to put yourself in their shoes and see what is it like to, what does this person feel like? What are their emotions and how do they communicate?
How do they express them? So a lot of the same qualities show up in leadership contexts, I would imagine, as in acting.
John: Yeah, absolutely. And I think that you know, I'm trying not to step on your toes, you know, you know, in saying what I'm about to say because I get so passionate about what I say.
Then I go, well, you know, not everybody thinks that way. I think that sometimes we can be short-sighted in understanding how we're communicating with people.
Melinda: How so?
John: Are we really connected you know, to the other person? Are we managing our emotions?
Are we controlling? And that's a big thing in acting is controlling your emotions. Just going through exercises suddenly, which is one of the reasons why I did the research is because I realized I was managing my emotions better when I was put in a situation where they said, well, you’re gonna have to feel this way.
I'm going to have to feel that way? You know, whereas sometimes people feel as though their emotions are managing them.
Melinda: Or driving them. Yeah.
John: Yeah. And I think that we can be short-sighted with that. Also one of the biggest things about acting is empathy. You know, it's funny, I was watching an interview a while back with Jennifer Lawrence. And she's like one of my, I should say, defenses, when people say I can't do that. I can't act.
And I bring her up because she has never had any formal acting. And she, you know, pretty much she's pretty proud of that. And she says that, you know, some of the acting for me is really about the empathy. She said that's the high. If you can understand where the other person is coming from and be that person or find it in yourself to be that person. And to me, that's the thing that really connects human beings. If I have a conversation with you and I'm getting your feeling, then it gives me, you know, there's a big thing in acting about listening is the most important thing.
Melinda: Absolutely.
John: And Meryl Streep says, you know, acting isn't about fooling around. It's about sincerity. It's about truth. And that, I think, is one of the biggest things to consider, I think in any conversation, when it comes down, being connected with somebody. And in acting, it's all about the moment, you know? Are you in the moment? Because that's the only way that the audience is going to believe you. If they can see that, and feel that sincerity, they might have something wash over them that they need in their life. You know?
Melinda: Do you have any real-life examples that you might share of, like these trainings or workshops that you've done with groups or organizations and maybe, you know, how they translated into a particular, you know, context that was useful for the participants or?
John: Yeah. Well, I work with teens, adults and veterans. And with teens, I usually use a lot of, their level has to do with, I focus on social-emotional learning, social skills. And so I do exercises, improvisation exercises where they actually have to be really connected to each other. And I say that literally, physically connected to each other.
One example is that they have to stand up, everybody in the room has to stand up, and they have to what, I have coined, well I can't steal that, a friend of mine coined it, a Viking handshake. Which is basically they have to take hand to forearm on each other and crisscross on both sides like this.
They have to face each other. And then I give them a number of different things to talk about with each other or learn from the other person. Like, say, I want you to teach this other person something, and I want the other person to respond. The whole time they’re so close it might be uncomfortable. But the whole point behind the exercise for them is understanding the feeling of what it really is like to be connected to someone.
And hopefully that translates, that you know, as an experiential exercise, it translates into how they feel next time they have a conversation with somebody. That suddenly they're, wow,l I'm really connected to this person. And that's just one example for teens. I mean I do other exercises with them. But the most recent one is with this corporation that I did and they're worldwide and they have communication issues within their company and the morale is down.
And one of the biggest things was when I went over to visit, and many times I go to companies just to get a preview of what's going on. I realized that the environment was so quiet. It's a manufacturing company. But when I talked to the rep over there, she was telling me, it's always like this.
People don't talk to each other. And they say they have communication issues, and yet they appear on the outside to be a company that dots all their I’s, crosses all their t's, but they're very sterile and it seems as though they're trying to do the right thing, but it's almost as if they're missing the human factor in it. You know, like, we, you know, we want to get this many widgets out. That's the point. You know, and at some level, at some service level we want you to be happy. But make sure you get the widgets out.
Melinda: Right. Bottom line.
John: Yeah. I mean I'll give you an example. Every desk over there is clean. Nothing on anybody's desk. And they have drawers that have to have specific things in them. And they're allowed one drawer that has personal stuff that nobody will look in, but they will come through and they'll check everything else out. Now I mention these things, just to give you a picture of maybe why people don't connect.
It's the influence of the environment on them. Yeah, it's very structured, which I have no problem with structure, but it's very strict. And they brought me in because they said, we want our people to connect more. So I went in and I did some exercises with them. I had some in this conference room, and then I had some, which were worldwide, on zoom.
And we did these exercises where they would have to connect, improvisation exercises, you know, gibberish exercises where they have to pay attention to emotion and the other person. Or I like the three-sentence exercise where they get up and you tell them, okay. Have three sentences to start a story. It has to make sense. At the end of those three sentences, somebody else is going to step up and continue what you said.
The whole story has to have an ending, though. You have to stay consistent with what is being said. So the exercise is really about listening to what somebody else is saying and then adding on to it. In improvisation, it's called Yes, And. But this is just another example of that. Now, I say all this because I call these acting exercises.
But to me, you don't have acting exercises without life teaching those exercises. It's almost as if, I look at it as, you know, I’m reading this book right now, not to plug a book, but I'm reading this book right now called Stolen Focus.
Melinda: Okay.
John: It's a great book about how we are losing focus. Based on a number different things, from the internet to environment to whatever.
But one of the biggest things that is mentioned in the book is this understanding that we have created a problem and now we have to create a solution. And he talks about a lot of different things. And that to me is kind of like, we used to be more connected. And as a society we'll just say America, let's say 60 years ago, 70 years ago.
And then we moved away from that. You know, we begin to look at, okay, why do we move away from that. Well, we're not really learning anything new. We're just relearning what we already knew .
Melinda: Sure, sure.
John: If that makes sense. But you know, I'm a firm believer that we have this imagination that we can use in any way that we want and that can be a good thing and a bad thing.
But at the same time we can solve the problems that we have. And I think that the experience of connecting to each other, through this process that I created can kind of bring us back to where we were, if that makes sense.
Melinda: And it also strikes me that, you know, I've taken some improv classes and some acting classes and, and you know, there's a playfulness.
Right. So you were speaking of this very kind of sterile sounding, very strict sort of factory manufacturing environment. And, you know, you're coming in and you're doing these exercises and it's, you know, there's a chance to be sort of playful and light-hearted, potentially. And what did you notice when the folks from this organization were going through these exercises, did you see a change? I guess so.
John: You know, first of all, for one, I would like to say that I'm glad you brought up the playfulness. Because I don't know if you know this, but while you probably already do, you’re very well read. I know you are. But this whole idea of play is that, matter of fact it's mentioned in that book Stolen Focus.
And when he brought it up, I was thinking, oh, thank you for saying that. Because when we know when we play, we start learning so much better. You know. So when I was doing this workshop, it was interesting because I had people in the room and then, you know, I couldn't really see. I had somebody monitoring the chat, you know, that was coming up.
But the people in the room, they were like, they were so focused on everything that I was saying. And it was interesting because they were really at first, you could tell that, you know, when you hang around actors or musicians, I should say to anybody that's really artistic. And correct me if I'm wrong, but we're kind of willing, really willing to try things.
Melinda: Yeah, yeah. And not afraid to maybe make a fool of ourselves or just be silly or whatever.
John: Right. Yeah, so at first, the people were holding back.
Melinda: I can imagine.
John: Yeah. So they were afraid of this, this whole idea of being embarrassed. So I explained to them that I've never seen anybody die of embarrassment. Then they began to, you know, having volunteers get up it. I got two, then four, then six. And then it started getting better because everybody started seeing that, okay, this isn't that bad. It looks like they're having fun.
And, you know, I should say this at, we were talking about Saybrook, and I've done improvisation conferences or workshops at the conferences. And I used to have people that would get back to me after these improvisation workshops and say, you know something, John? I was really scared to do this workshop, but as soon as I saw everybody else like goofing around and jumping around and not being afraid to be embarrassed, I suddenly realized that I could do it.
And then, and I felt so much better about doing it. So to me, there's some kind of a need in human beings to be creative, you know, in whatever way that there is.
Melinda: For sure. I love that. So, I'm curious, you know, how might like certain exercises that you do translate into specific skills?
So maybe using the same example, like the kind of improvisational exercises that you were doing with them to hopefully get them to interact more, like how might the exercises then in turn translate into specific skills that they might use at work?
John: Well, the, I mentioned briefly the gibberish exercise. Well, gibberish is basically, it's not a language. So it's more like sounds. And like so, the whole point behind the exercise is to get two people together, and you pair them up, and have them try to get a point across to the other person. It’s like a really obtuse form of charades. And the thing that I like about it is that it's not only fun, but it's funny.
And it gets two people laughing during the whole process. It's almost like learning a new language, you know? But since the person is, each person has to try really hard to get their point across without a language. Like if I'm trying to get something across to you, you can see, oh my God, he looks like he's angry or, you know
It hopefully causes each person, because each one takes a turn trying to get a point across. Hopefully it causes the person to focus more on the person's feelings rather than on what they're trying to say. And the point behind the exercise is that the person walks away from it and suddenly they're paying attention to what somebody is feeling instead of what somebody is saying.
And this completely corresponds with this whole area in, as far as some of my research, which is called theory of mind, which has to do with connecting not only to understanding the other person has different thoughts than you. But also understanding how to empathize with them at the same time. And in a lot of the research goes back to, matter of fact, working with school-aged children, and helping them through drama classes.
And they found it was very effective that they raised their ability to understand that people are different than them, and understanding that other kids have different feelings than them. And I think about this sometimes as far as it's starting out, like that, if they're teaching it at that level, how important it is for adults, that maybe if you didn't have that, that you'd be able… Did I get off on a tangent there?
Melinda: No, no, I was just going to I was just going to jump in because I actually have a client right now who's someone I've worked with, you know, several times in the past as well. But he was telling me that he started taking acting class, you know, which he'd never done anything like that before.
And he can be, kind of a, somewhat of a sort of serious, intense kind of guy. And he was telling me that from taking his acting class, he absolutely loves it. And it's allowing him to kind of explore, experience and then express like feelings and emotions that he maybe didn't know how to identify before, let alone express, well, this is what I'm feeling.
And through the acting exercises and the training, he's tapping into this whole like, emotional vocabulary or palette that he didn't have access to before.
John: Did he say how he felt about that?
Melinda: I think he's feeling very excited, like energized, you know?
John: Good.
Melinda: Yeah.
John: Yeah, I think, you know, sometimes people ask me, so what's the difference between why don't I just take an acting class or why do I take one of your classes?
And I tell them, well, you know, you can do that, but, and not, I think that acting classes are great for people. I mean that's how I learn. But when I'm doing my workshops, I first of all give a little bit of foundational knowledge of how it pertains to life. And to me, it’s a matter of fact, I just, had a coffee with my first acting teacher the other day.She’s this woman. She's just wonderful. She's in her 70s. And I love her to death.
And she was talking about how you have to have, she was talking about computers. She was having a problem with the computer, and she had to have her a friend come over and fix it. She said, John, I know how to use computers, but I don't have the foundational knowledge to fix them. And when she said that, she goes, you know, you have to have that foundational knowledge to really understand why something went wrong. And that's pretty much, when I'm doing my workshops, I say, you know, I give them, I don't make it, you know, too much up here as far as being too, you know, research based because I think I can lose people that way.
But I find that if you can give a certain why and then you can talk about the implications, then people go, oh, okay. It's like describing food to somebody. Well, this is how it tastes, this is what goes in. Okay. I'll try it. Now that you told that. Right? So I say that it, you were mentioning as far as this person doing the acting classes.
I think that in part when you, and the reason why I asked you how they felt about it, because I immediately went to how I felt when I first started taking an acting class. And I remember that it was my second acting teacher saying to me, because I couldn't do this one part. It was too emotionally challenging. And he said to me, what are you afraid of, John?
Melinda: Good question.
John: And he didn't want to know, because he’s not that kind of an acting teacher. But when he said that to me, I thought, oh, my gosh, he's right. Why am I afraid? And that was the key moment of, that's what's holding you back.
Melinda: The fear.
John: Yeah. You have some kind of deep-rooted insecurity about doing this. You know and to me that’s a significant part of when you take on a role or I like to say that, you know, when we go to movies, it's the best therapy. We show up, we're just going to go, oh yeah, I'm going to go see this movie.
And then something in the movie touches you deeply, and it's the best therapy because you don't have to tell anybody. You know, a party might go, I need to do that in my own life. Oh, geez. Great. Now I know I can't turn my back on it, right?
Melinda: Yeah.
John: But we try to turn our back on it, you know? No, push it down. Push it down. But I say this because it's intriguing when you're talking about this person that they found it exciting. And think that, to me that exciting part is that growth part that lends itself to, oh, I think I need to keep on going in this direction.
Melinda: Yeah. And I think also it maybe allows us to tap into or access parts of ourselves that again, maybe we didn't know how to access or connect with, or maybe we didn't even know were there. And to me, that's just about like unleashing life force energy. You know, we hold back in so many ways or we're, you know, we have certain fears or we don't want to look silly or we're not sure how to express ourselves in a given situation with another person.
And so we kind of hold back. And I think that these kinds of trainings and these kind of skills, give us access to those kind of things. And like you were saying in the beginning, almost rehearse role-playing a scene so that then we can actually go into the real-life situation and we're kind of more prepared for it.
John: Yes. Yeah. You know, before I started acting, this is one of the reasons why I teach the self-esteem workshops, is, you know, many teenagers, I had self-esteem issues. And, very inhibited. And it's interesting how our sense of self esteem affects our insecurities and our fears to do things. And matter of fact, I played in the high school band and I was an awful drummer.
And I say that because subconsciously, I was afraid of making mistakes. And if you start thinking about your mistakes, guess what? You're not thinking about what you're doing. But I look back on my life and I think it's interesting how we will create circumstances that suit our insecurities.
Melinda: Interesting.
John: Yeah. And as long as we stay in that bubble…
Melinda: then we're safe?
John: We’re safe. Yeah. And then we have like people in that bubble, that like reinforce our insecurities unknowingly. They're not like, you know, trying to be mean or anything, but it's kind of like, it's kind of. I'm from Buffalo, New York, originally. And when I go back to Buffalo, I see is what we call Buffalonians. it's, I know when I'm talking to somebody from Buffalo.
It's just like, if I could be, I'm in North Carolina and if I run into somebody from Buffalo, I go, oh, now I know how to talk to you. You know, it's this whole other frame that comes into existence. I kind of look at that as far as people go, and we start surrounding ourselves with people sometimes that are of, like minds that limit that perspective.
I love hanging around with actors. Because they can be so brutally honest. And I love that. I love that they're not going to pull any punches. And then I get around my family and I pull back.
Melinda: It’s another story.
John: You know. Yeah. So I play this, you know, getting back to, as far as growing up, and in my mind, I wanted to progress, as far as there's an artistic side of me which I've been told since I was a teenager, but I felt as though I was in a place where I wasn't progressing.
And I think that many people might feel that, they might feel, you know, something? I really want to do this, but the support isn't there. Or I don't have the environment that I really need to kind of create the reality that I want. And I've mentioned this in the past and that's, you know, there's, according this one theory, there's three things that contribute to our sense of reality and creating our reality.
And that's, you know, what has meaning and purpose in our life, you know, focusing on that. And of course, this is easier said than done. Because most, many people would say, you know, I don't have time to look at what's purposeful or meaning, maybe, but what's purposeful meaning, you know, where is my focus going?
Is it in social media? And what's my environment like? Do I have a creative environment? You know, all of those things. I can tell by behind you, you have a super creative environment.
Melinda: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I'm in a studio, but it is a pretty awesome space. Yeah.
John: Yeah, it's got great color. Yeah.
Melinda: Yeah. And the wood paneling, I love it. So. Yeah. No, I think you're right. That's so true. And I'm mindful of time, we're almost to the end. So I wanted to see if we could do like a really quick sample exercise to give people a just a little taste of what you do. Is there something we could do together now?
John: Well, I, you know, we could do a “Yes, And.”
Melinda: Okay.
John: “Yes, And” has a lot to do, are you familiar with it at all?
Melinda: I am, yeah.
John: You did improvisation.
Melinda: Yep.
John: Okay. So, the purpose of the “Yes, And,” for the sake of turning acting skills into people skills, it's a very optimistic, positive exercise. There's no denial. You know, I'm explaining this to you and you already know this. So this is for maybe for listeners.
Melinda: Yeah.
John: So there's no denial. It's all positive, forward moving. And it has to do with how you can add to what the person just said.
Melinda: Yeah.
John: And not shoot down anything that they say. It's, the idea is don't try to be funny. Just, but it can be funny. But even more so than anything, the point is to hopefully help people in the process of the exercise to stay connected to the other person, in that moment and that sense of flow…
Melinda: And opening up possibilities rather than closing them down.
John: Yeah, yeah, it's almost like, I guess it could be a form of brainstorming if you want to put it in an environment like a corporate environment.
Melinda: Sure, sure.
John: Because in improvisation too, there is no wrong. It's so open, matter of fact, I did my master's project years ago on the mental health benefits of improvisation.
Melinda: Oh, cool.
John: Yeah. And they use it with the Alzheimer's and dementia patients. And that gives you an idea of, there's no rules.
Melinda: Right.
John: The idea is based on the experience.
Melinda: Great. Let's try it!
John: Okay. You can start if you like.
Melinda: Okay. Well, John, I was walking down the street the other day, and to my surprise, I came across a pink elephant dancing on the sidewalk.
John: You know, and I've heard that pink elephants are good luck, especially when they dance on the sidewalk and they avoid the cracks.
Melinda: Oh, yeah. You know, that makes a lot of sense. I didn't pick up on it at the time, but the way it was dancing, I think you're probably right about that.
John: And sometimes when they dance down the sidewalk, I've seen them wearing these pink tutus and maybe even other outfits. Was it wearing anything else?
Melinda: Yeah. You know, now that I think about it, it not only had the pink tutu, but also a top hat, and it was smoking a cigar.
John: And that is sometimes very common here in North Carolina.
Melinda: Really?
John: On the east side at midnight on Thursdays.
Melinda: Oh, really? Now, are you suggesting there's a community of dancing elephants there in North Carolina?
John: As a matter of fact, I've seen them so often that I think there's going to be different neighborhoods. And the really nice part is that they are beginning to be welcomed by Blue Elephants.
Melinda: Oh, that's nice to hear because I've heard there's a little bit of a rift between the pink and the blue elephants. So.
John: And they're getting along nicely as far as I know.
Melinda: Beautiful. Okay, well that was fun. It, again, it's just fun to get into that very playful space, so thank you.
John: You know, and I know we're short on time, but I wanted to say something and that's that the more you carry the story on, the more there becomes a theme that you go back and look at how it's pertinent to your life.
And I think that that's the part that I enjoy the most is that the creative aspect of it is common in being human. And if you can lift something out of that, you know, I took in my undergrad many, many, many, many, many years ago, in a creativity class, my first brainstorming exercise. And I remember, like, you know, 30 students sitting in a circle, and there's a problem and they said, okay, you have pad of paper in front of you. Write down the solution. I don't care how crazy it is.
And all these students throwing these pieces of paper in the center and the teacher saying, I want you to go in the middle and now take a piece of paper out, make sure it's not yours. And I want you to add to that idea. And I say this because I think that there's possibilities everywhere.
Melinda: For sure. And we know from the, you know, creativity research in organizations that often, you know, there's a problem and people are trying to find solutions to it, but they try to move too quickly to one solution rather than exploring all the possibilities. And so they might overlook something that's truly innovative because they're just trying to get to the solution.
John: One of the biggest things that helps me, well, actually two things. But one of the things that really helps me is what is the stupidest thing I could do? And I say that not in a negative way, but in a way that I think it's stupid.
I have a friend of, this was the other day. I have a friend of mine that says something and I'll be like, that sounds absurd, but then it causes me, and I think it has a lot to do with our specialization. It causes me to say, you know something, John? You don't know it all. That may sound absurd to you, but maybe it's the thing that you need to look into further and may be totally absurd to you right now, but it maybe sounds silly, but let's pick that apart a little bit.
Melinda: Yeah, I love that.
John: I couldn't agree with you. It has, that, as far as you know, thinking to yourself, well, I don't have the answer just yet, because my gut says I don't have the answer.
Melinda: Right, right. I love that. So I like to end each episode with what I call a Creativity Pro Tip that people can kind of run with and try out on their own.
So I think we've got a lot of possibilities. But I love this idea of taking the “Yes, And,” exercise and just whatever you encounter in life, whatever situation or person or conversation, you know, rather than just saying, well, that's ridiculous or that's impossible, there's no way we can do that. Or, you know, we sometimes have this like instant reaction of like, no, right.
But instead try working with that “Yes, And.” You know, in your next conversation, in your next work interaction, whatever it might be. You know, just trying to go with the situation rather than sort of resisting it. Yeah.
John: Yeah. You know, if I could say something about that, I think that well, I've come across research that says, you know, as human beings we have a tendency to--and a lot of it has to do with the protective response--we have a tendency to judge because it's a, you know, evolutionary, okay, I'm protecting myself. So I'm going to question this thing. So it might feel uncomfortable in taking it forward instead of saying to ourselves, yeah, I don't believe that or reacting to what somebody says instead of responding to what somebody says, I love that. I love the “Yes, And.”
Melinda: Yeah, I think it's applicable to so many situations. So well, thank you so much John. It's just flown by. Loved our conversation. And so if people want to find out more about your work and all that things got that you're up to…
John: Thank you, by the way.
Melinda: Of course, it's my pleasure. I'm so glad this worked out. How can people find you?
John: Well, you can find me at hello@actingoutofcharacter.com. That's one area. And there's also my coaching website, which is mycoachnow.com.
Melinda: Okay, great. And you have a website for Acting Out of Character as well?
John: Yeah, I should have said that first. Right. actingoutofcharacter.com.
Melinda: Okay.
John: And that's where you’ll find the workshops and background information, also the previous radio shows that I did, and other interviews, and I'm hoping maybe this interview might be on there too.
Melinda: Yeah. Definitely. Hope so. We'll definitely link to your sites and you can link back to us.
John: I wish I was in Austin. I’d come jam with you.
Melinda: I know! One of these days we'll do it. All right. Thanks so much, John.
John: You're very welcome. Thank you for having me. I'm honored.
Melinda: Of course.
Find and connect with us on YouTube and social media under Syncreate. We're now on Patreon as well. If you enjoy the show, please subscribe and leave us a review and we'd love to hear your feedback on the show, so please reach out to us any time at info@syncreate.org. We'd love to hear your feedback. We're recording today at Record ATX Studios in Austin with John joining us from North Carolina. The podcast is produced in collaboration with Mike Osborne at 14th Street Studios. Thanks so much for being with us, and see you next time.
