Casting call

For some years now, I’ve worked as a full-time actor in Hollywood, appearing primarily in TV, film, and commercials. In the acting business, as well as in many other human endeavors, there’s a widely held sense of competition—which says many individuals are vying and even struggling for any particular job. In fact, this kind of competition seems to be generally viewed as normal! I’m grateful to be always learning in Christian Science the truth that man, as the idea of God, is never in competition with any other idea of God. Each individual is a complete idea, just as every number is a complete idea. The number five is not in competition with the number eight. Each individual, like each number, is one of a kind, and can in no way take the place of or be replaced by any other individual.

Does this mean that when I show up for an audition, I’m the only actor sitting in the waiting room? Certainly not! Depending on the type of project, it’s not unusual to walk into a room filled and overflowing with lots of guys—and they often look just like me! What I’m talking about is bringing into that room a still, confident spiritual awareness of not only my own God-given individuality, but also of the spiritual nature and individuality of every other actor there. It has to apply to everyone, or it doesn’t apply to anyone. An experience I had some years ago has stayed with me as a vivid example of “no competition.”

I was walking along the beach on a sunny Southern California day praying to gain a clearer understanding about the sense of competition in my own field of acting. I looked out at the ocean, which was especially calm that day, and saw the sun reflected as a single round light, flickering in the gentle waves. I stopped to really take this in. All around me on the beach were small puddles of water in the sand. Each one also contained the reflection of a single round sun. Some puddles were larger and some very small, but each puddle, according to its particular size, still reflected that one round sun. Then I noticed that the large rock I was standing next to was literally covered with thousands of little drops of water, again each of varying size. Each and every drop of water on this rock had within it a full reflection of the same round sun. Every “body” of water, from the huge ocean to the tiny droplet, was reflecting the same sun, and yet each was doing so in a completely individual way. One didn’t have two suns, and another only a partial sun. 

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December 5, 2011
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