Evan Carmichael and Alex discuss finding your authentic voice instead of copying mentors. Harrison Ford says imitation limits your unique opportunity. They use their salsa school as an example: the curriculum stays the same, but each instructor teaches in their own style, whether that's through humor or passion.
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You don't have to clear your voice before you clap.
I was like, oh no, he's just—
Good morning, Believe Nation.
Today's message is find your own voice. Too much of a pause. I'm trying to go deeper. I'm trying to work on a diaphragm, uh, having a deeper voice.
Over to you, Harrison Ford. You got it. Over—
oh, I say that.
Good morning, Believe Nation.
Today's message is find your own voice. Over to you, Harrison Ford.
The only advice I've ever offered young actors is to try and figure out how to do it for yourself. Never be caught with the idea that you can imitate someone else's success. As much as you might admire what someone else does, don't try and imitate that. Find your own way. Find what— find your own voice. Find your own feelings. And that will make— will give you a unique opportunity.
So what do you think?
I think I'm actually facing that challenge right now, of being mentored by you, And just in my life when I was younger, I would look to people with a little bit more experience, a little bit more wisdom to get advice from them. But every time I would try to just completely imitate them and pass on their message, which might not be something I believe always in my core, something I could learn from them but not in my core, it never came out right. I didn't feel authentic about it. As you're trying to grow, as you're trying to, you know, you look at Steve Jobs or you look at anyone in your life and you're like, I wanna be like them. You don't want to be them, you want to take things that really make them amazing and apply it to your life to make the inner you look more beautiful on the outside versus just faking it. This is really too hard to what I'm thinking about right now, what I'm struggling with. I still haven't fully solved, you know, where I find the balance of, you know, having my own word or thinking for myself even, I would say, go so far. But it's a learning process and I think just thinking about putting it on your radar is important.
So for those who don't remember, Alex is a friend of the, friend of the channel and helps me run Toronto Dance Salsa, this business that we're filming out of. Every time that I've gotten advice from others or tried to model others, and it's the name of this channel, modeling, modeling the masters, I've always had to tweak it. You know, I would get frustrated with my media coach because she'd ask me to do something that wouldn't work, like her way wouldn't work, but she would guide me down the path a little bit further and I would have to tweak it for my own purposes. I look at this business, this salsa dancing school. When we're teaching salsa, as an example, there are moves that we have to teach. Like, a level 1 class is a level 1 class, and what you do in the first class is the same across every class, no matter who's teaching it. But the delivery and the execution of each instructor has to be different. We're all welcoming, we're all friendly, we're all about family, you know, it's on Alex's shirt. But the way that I teach is slightly different than Alex's style, slightly different than Lisa's style, than Lily's style. Alex is really funny. You know, he makes a lot of bloopers, he makes a lot of people laugh, he's jokey, he's entertaining, he's a character. You know, I'm not. I'm more passion, you know? I'm more believe. So if I tried to copy Alex or if Alex tried to copy me, we wouldn't succeed. Like, I can't be better at being Alex than Alex. And so it's a challenge also for us in mentoring our other instructors that, like, just because it works for Alex doesn't mean it will work for Lily. And Lily needs to find her own voice too. In teaching, yes, still the same moves, but teaching it in her way that feels authentic to her instead of putting on somebody else's mask. You know, for you guys watching, whoever you look up to, if it's my channel or Jobs or whoever it is, you can learn a lot from their success. It can, it can inspire you just to see where they came from, what they built. It can also give you practical how-tos, like what is the next step that I need to follow, not just the inspirational side but tactics. But recognize that you will not be the next Steve Jobs by doing everything like Steve Jobs. You have to tweak the things he did to make it work for you. And instead of even thinking about being the next Steve Jobs, worry about being the first you out there. And I think it's an important process to find your own voice.
So the question of the day today is: Where do you find the breaking point between being true to yourself but still stepping out of your comfort zone?
Leave it in the comments below. We will join in the discussion. We also want to give a quick shout out to Marco Polo for buying a copy of the book. Thank you so much. Really means a lot. So for your chance at a shout out in a future video, make sure to pick up a copy of the book and email in your receipt so we can keep track. Thank you guys so much for watching. Have an amazing day. Continue to believe, and we'll see you again tomorrow morning for another shot of espresso. Okay, I'll throw it to you. You ready?
No. Okay, so the question today is: I know what I want to say, it's just not coming out.
Leave in the comments below, we'll join in the discussion.
