how to make £175 in 5mins flat

The promise of this letter is to find better ways for actors to make more money without selling their souls.

it’s main question is how can we do this sustainably in the long run?

but from time to time I might share a get-moderately-more-money-than-you-had-yesterday-in-an-unsustainable-but-relatively-legal-way-get-rich-quick scheme

as is my right.

And last week we explored how making your own work will change the world uniquely, but what if you’re currently stuck in low confidence hell? what if you just can’t take that first step?

We’ll see how these are connected. But first

let’s talk about paperclips

How much is a paperclip worth to you?

If i wanted to buy one off you, and said,

“Hey- i want to buy a paperclip off you”

how much would you charge me?

In July 2006 a chap in Canada, called Kyle Macdonald bought a house with one.

Not really.

He traded it.

→ First for a fish pen.

→ That for a doornob.

→ Next a camping stove.

→ 6 months in, he had a skidoo

→ A few months later, an afternoon with Alice Cooper.

→ One year from the start, he received the ownership papers to his very own house.

His paperclip became his house.

The Confidence Spiral

An actor’s greatest enemy is low confidence.

Low confidence is the near certainty that you can’t do something.

Can I pull off this accent?

No.

Will they believe me?

No.

Does everyone think I am terrible at this?

Almost certainly.

Will I book this job?

Obviously not.

What choices should I make for this audition?

It doesnt matter, I am a piece of shit.

The Ancient Critic

There are lots of names for that voice inside your head - your inner critic, Steven Pressfield named it the resistance, my old acting teacher called it “the little fucker”, and millions still call it the devil.

The theory goes that we have inherited this voice from our ancient ancestors who needed to detect physical threats in the wilds

“Don’t go into that jungle alone, you won’t survive, you’re just not smart enough”

Those who were most alert to danger and to things going wrong were most likely to survive and pass on their ability to be alert to danger and to things going wrong

But danger is different now.

For most, constant physical danger is a thing of the past

and so our critic’s energies are unstoppably repurposed to the other thing that could kill us

being kicked out of our tribe.

It’s an easy question to answer - if I am working on an acting job or have finished one recently.

But as the weeks of no acting work turn into months, the voice inside my head starts to get louder and louder

You haven’t had an acting job in months

what have you been up to?

You know what success looks like

and this is not it

You are not a successful member of your tribe

You are of no use to them

You are a burden on them

You are a piece shit

you piece of shit

Our critic’s definition of success is what it thinks the tribe values -

As a kid I watched as society treated the actors who were given fame like Gods.

This is what success looks like. 

In my 20s, I watched as the elders I entrusted to be my guides fawned over the alumni with big names, taught their example as the goal and went weak at the knees in their presence.

This is what success looks like.

And now, at least once a week, as I regurgitate my credits to a fellow tribesmen to the song of “Oh you’re an actor? Have I seen you in anything?”, I watch as they leave disappointed. They have not.

This is what failure looks like.

But it’s bollocks.

We’re not getting kicked out of the tribe

and that’s not our definition of success

But the ancient voice can’t be reasoned with.

It’s unreasonable.

Freedom through doing

The professional artist must make her work in spite of her inner critic

it’s one of the things that defines her as an artist

risking failure to bring something new to the world.

So we must go to war against our critic.

By addressing our rock bottom confidence.

When our confidence is low, the receptors in our brain that control our critic become over-active, sucking energy away from the parts of the brain that we are using.

This is why, when we are in low confidence:

• we can barely hear ourselves think

• we lose our train of thought

• we forget our lines

• we lose our instincts

Our brain is literally pushing everything through the filter of

“If you fail, you will die”

So if we listen to it we stop doing anything risky

We stop being an artist 

It is the opposite of the feeling of flying that we chase

that blissful clarity when we are in flow.

If we want flow back

we must build our confidence back up, intentionally

Which brings us back to the paperclip.

We must trade our way to freedom.

Action Stacking: The confidence trading game

Here's how to do it

1. Set Your Long-Term Vision: Before your begin the game, remind yourself of your ideal destination - Kyle’s was a house.

   • What's your ultimate goal? A lead role in a film? Your own production company?

   • Remember Deep Time Thinking - what change do you want your art to make?

2. Start Small: Choose one tiny action towards your goal you cannot fail at

   • Learn one line for an audition you’ve felt blocked for

   • Send 1 email reaching out to a casting director

   • Put on your running clothes

3. Do it. Then celebrate Immediately:

   • Physically celebrate (fist pump)

   • Say "This is progress"

   • Write it down in a journal specifically for your micro wins

4. Trade Up:

   • If you learned one line, use the confidence from nailing that to trade up to learning two lines, then three.

   • If you put on your running clothes, well done, now go for a 5 minute walk

   • If you sent one CD email, that’s incredible, now you want to send three, and then follow-ups

5. Track Your Trading:

   • Log your micro wins

   • The goal is "I made good actions," not "I am good"

   • This pulls you out of shame spirals by focusing on what you've done rather than who you are.

   • As you hit speed bumps go back to your micro wins journal and remind yourself of all the incredible things you have done.

An incredible thing happens, confidence begets confidence. The spiral get’s broken.

How I traded my way out of my audition fear

Last week i was feeling pretty unconfident about an in person audition I had that afternoon. But I knew i needed to get myself out of my shitty self talk. So I made a bold outfit choice. High risk? Yes. Appropriate for the part? Maybe. Strong but potentially very very wrong? Absolutely. But it was just what I needed:

1. Long term vision: Agency in my work

2. Start small: Made a bold choice that was my own

3. Celebrate immediately: I fist pumped (felt weird, but cool)

4. Trade up: With the confidence I got from the bold outfit choice, I started making other bold choices (“this guy is probably a scout leader”).

5. Track your trading: It was the best audition i have had in a long time - i enjoyed it immensely. I attribute this entirely to feeling confident and emboldened (even though my day started in low confidence). It was one of those regardless of the outcome auditions. Logged for when i need to pick myself up again.

Paperclips for you: They could be:

• Write something

• Create something

• register a domain for your website

• Make a meal for your loved one

• Do something small for someone else

• Clean the house

• Finish a chore you’ve needed to do for along time

• write a one sentence blog post

• write a line of poetry

• sign up to a course to learn a new skill

• write one line for the tv show you’ve been meaning to write

• make something

• publish it online

• put it on your social

• just put it out there

• ask a director what they are up to atm.

Then keep going.

Your paperclip will become your house.

Your first paperclip: money for almost nothing

If you are still stuck for a tiny action, let me help you out:

here is the get-money-for-doing-nothing-really-except-clicking-a-few-buttons-rich-quick-scheme i was talking about earlier.

Change your bank account.

That’s it.

That’s the trick.

Look how much banks are willing to pay you to switch your current account to theirs - Martin Lewis’ website shows you. *

Enter your details, then press switch (or whatever the button is on the website).

They will then give you £175 (supposing you meet the minimal requirements)

And what does it really cost you?

• 5 mins of your time

• The inconvenience of updating the people who need your bank details.

• Uninstalling an old app, and reinstalling a new one.

• A delay of a few weeks before the money comes through.

But £175 is a little more than a paperclip.

Imagine what can you trade £175 for?

I plan to trade it for some software i need for the audiobook narration course I am building.

I wonder where it will lead.

Small wins, big differences.

Trade and prosper.

See you next week.

Alex xx

P.s. let me know if you enjoyed this week’s edition - just reply with a thumbs up or thumbs down. or words - bonus points for words.

I love hearing from you - it’s one of the best parts of my week.

*The single biggest money making short term hack you can do if you are living in the UK is to sign up to Martin Lewis’ newsletter Money Saving Expert. I’ve made at least £475 so far from switching banks + saved hundreds if not thousands from his advice on switching utilities, playing big internet companies off against each other along with cheap mobile deals.

(My apologies to my American readers if the above seems hyperlocal to the UK. I have found that banks in the US are similarly desperate for your business check them out here. Unlike the above, I haven’t been able to test it on myself so please read all the fine print, and make sure you know what you are getting yourself into.)