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Who Were Your Greatest Teachers?

Who Were Your Greatest Teachers?

Good morning,

Happy Sunday! I’m just about to finish off my summer break and reopen our school and so blessed to be “back home” in Sun Valley, Idaho. And even more grateful to be here with my daughter. What are you grateful for today?
Recently one of my great teachers and heroes, Wayne Dyer, passed away at the age of seventy-five. Much too young yet a beautiful life well lived.
He was diagnosed with Leukemia in 2009 and chose an extremely unconventional treatment. Skeptics would say his approach didn’t work and in the end, cost him years off his life. He would say (and did) it gave him many years of quality of life and he had no regrets.
I don’t want to debate the merits of traditional vs. non-traditional approaches to fighting Leukemia and Cancer. In fact, I wouldn’t ever want to debate it as I believe it’s an extremely personal choice and there’s no right answer. In fact, one of the great principles of Sanford Meisner and the Meisner Technique is, “Trust your gut and follow your heart” and never, in my opinion, has this wonderful advice been more true to follow then when dealing with something like this.
A
ll I want to do today is honor this brilliant teacher for all he gave me and my career as an actor. 

About twelve years ago I went through a very difficult time in my life both personally and professionally. I was dowwwwwwwwn and struggling to get up. My mom (my other hero!) gave me a book by Wayne Dyer called, “The Power Of Intention”. It was lot of information I’d been exposed to and believed in yet somehow his writings resonated in a much deeper way and had a profound impact on me. And the more I read the more I wanted to read.  
I finally bought the CD’s of the book and listened to them constantly. And because of all the stress and chaos inside of me I had trouble sleeping so listening to him in the middle of night became a beautiful gift and routine. 

Soon the depression and fear that “this would never end” began to lift. There were many contributing factors besides his books and CD’s (I bought them all) to my “comeback” but he was the cornerstone for sure. And I will be forever grateful.

I’m thankful to say that these days my life and career are extremely blessed – certainly not without problems and setbacks but my resiliency is solid as is my artistic health (something I’m going to talk a lot about in these newsletters). And one of the main reasons is because of this beautiful teacher of mine. Thank you, Wayne Dyer for everything.

Who and where do you go when you need talented balance and perspective? Maybe today is a good day for a check in because being an actor, artist, dreamer can be very “scary” and THE key is balance. Perspective.

And the other key is not waiting till we’re already drowning to ask for help.

I’d love to hear your feedback so let me know what you think by joining our Artistic Family Facebook page. This is a private group and a wonderful opportunity to get and give help to others and for all of you to share your thoughts, ideas and comments with each other and with me. Sign up here:
Artistic Family Facebook Page

And remember now that you’re a part of our Artistic Family join us for our next Webinar (free to you!) on Saturday, October 3rd, 10:00am PST.

I look forward to spending time with you next week.

Until then, my very best,

Jim

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