Transcript:
Ever tried, ever failed?
No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.
The world is yours. Treat everyone kindly and light up the night.
Please don’t ever stop.
I had so many dreams of where I wanted to go, who I wanted to be, and what I wanted to do. What I didn’t have was cash, a bank account, a credit card, or an apartment. I just had debt — a big, hungry, growing, larger every moment debt.
I packed the life that I knew with socks and a toothbrush into my backpack and I slept on couch after couch after couch at friends’ apartments in New York. I dusted pianos at a piano store on Ludlow Street.
When I was 29, I told myself, “The next acting job I get, no matter what it pays, I will, from now on, for better or worse, be a working actor.”
But something good happened. I got a low-paying theater job in a play called Imperfect Love, which led to a film called 13 Moons with the same writer, which led to other roles, which led to other roles. And I’ve worked as an actor ever since.
Raise the rest of your life to meet you.
Don’t search for defining moments because they will never come.
The moments that define you have already happened, and they will already happen again. It passes so quickly. So please, bring each other along with you.
You just get a bit derailed, but soon something starts to happen. Trust me—a rhythm sets in. Just try not to wait until, like me, you’re 29 before you find it. And if you are, that’s fine too. Some of us never find it, but you will. I promise you.
You are already here. You’ll find your rhythm or continue the one you have already found. Don’t wait until they tell you you are ready. Get in there. Sing.
The world might say you are not allowed to yet. I waited a long time out in the world before I gave myself permission to fail.
Please, don’t even bother asking. Don’t bother telling the world you are ready. Show it. Do it.
Ever tried, ever failed?
No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.
The world is yours. Treat everyone kindly and light up the night.
Thank you so much for having me here.
