The Best Theatre Goals You Set for Yourself Are the Ones You'll Never Achieve

I want you to try something. If you're an aspiring actor or director or designer, I want you to set a series of goals for yourself. They can be as detailed or as simple as you want. But I want you to make sure they are clearly definable and easy to remember for the rest of your life. 

Now what should these goals be? Should it be something as easy as getting the next role you audition for? Having the chance to direct a dream show? Or even being able to work with certain theatre artists?

No. The goals you set for yourself should be ones that you will never achieve. 

While some might say that the goals you should set for yourself are ones that you can realistically obtain, I feel the best goals are the ones that keep your hungry, keep you climbing and fighting towards. 

For instance, as an actor, your goal should be to win every Tony or Oscar or Emmy, ever year for the rest of your life. Will it ever happen? Of course not. But in the pursuit of that impossible goal, I guarantee that you'll work harder than you ever have before and do some of the best work in the process.  

By setting reachable goals for ourselves, often the problem becomes, what to do once we achieve them? Not to mention the loss of humility and diligence in some cases. 

And as I mentioned before, by always working and fighting to an impossible goal, even if you fall just short of it, you're going to be accomplishing some incredible things. 

For instance, let's say your impossible goal was to be the best documented parent in the history of the world. Would that ever happen? Of course not. But by trying to be, you're going to be an amazing parent. 

The same goes for an actor. Will you ever be considered the greatest actors who ever lived? Not likely. But in the pursuit of that, you'll perform better and audition for better material along the way. 

For me, my impossible goal is the have the biggest and greatest theatre blog in the history of the world. Will that happen? Of course not. But in trying to do so, I'm constantly trying to come up with new ideas, reach out to new people and provide some of the best content we can. 

With this theory, you may never reach the top of the mountain, but it's going to be one hell of a climb.