Speaker 1Shut up, and sit down. Welcome to Being On Stage, the only podcast that gives you motivation, inspiration, and confidence to be better on stage. No matter how you entertain, sing, dance, band, comedian, public speaking, MC, drag, burlesque, performance art, or street performer, this is the show for you. Hey, rock stars, welcome back. I am your host, Reggie Dawson, and again, this is the Being On Stage podcast. We are celebrating episode 20 today. I have to say, episode 20 felt like it would never get here. Started off a little bumpy, still working on the consistency of all the episodes, but it's something new to me. Just like for some of you, performing on stage may be new to you. So, a couple weeks ago, I published an episode that talked about lip sync. And within. 24 to 48 hours, I would say, I lost a good portion of my Instagram followers, lost a couple followers on Twitter, and I lost like five page likes on Facebook. Like, I just noticed that I kind of seemed to slow and lost some steam a little bit. And it got me down. Like, it really got me down. Like, I got to thinking to myself, you know, maybe I'm not the person to do this. Maybe this is, like, too much for me. Maybe I'm not qualified to. To be giving, you know, advice and tips and guidance on how to perform better on stage. And I talked about, you know, in that episode, and it's called What I Learned From a Drag Queen, in case you want to go back and check it out. But in that episode, you know, it talks about the art of lip sync and how it is an art and the proper way to do it. And I figured, you know what? I don't care about the people that I lost as my followers. I don't care about the fact that maybe I didn't get as many people to subscribe to my podcast or download my podcast. And I don't care about the people that stopped following me on Twitter and that unliked my page on Facebook. What I care about is the fact that the episode that I put out since then still got downloaded. Which means I still have you to thank for sticking with me and for believing in me and believing that I have the message that you need. And that, to me, means boatloads. And that brings me to our topic today. And that is. Feeling like maybe you're not the right person. Feeling unqualified. Feeling like this is going nowhere. Maybe you've lost a little bit of steam. But I'm here to tell you, it happens to everybody. Everybody loses steam. Everybody feels like they're overwhelmed. Everybody feels like they should not be the person doing what they're doing. Everyone goes through that. And when it translates to being on stage, pun very much intended, when it translates into being on stage, sometimes it can feel like. you're not ready to step on stage. Or sometimes it can feel like you're not ready to open up that night. You're not ready to play by yourself. You're not ready to have the spotlight on you. You're not ready for a Saturday night. You need a Wednesday night. And sometimes you're going to have shows where nobody shows up. Sometimes you're going to have shows where there's a handful of people in the audience. And sometimes you're going to have shows that are just nuts. The point is, no matter what happens, no matter how many fans or followers, you see how I connected that. No matter how many fans or followers or loss of fans or followers that you have, you have to keep your eye on the people that are still there. The ones that are still tuned in, the ones that are still, you know, waiting for you. And furthermore, if you haven't found that audience, maybe you've done some, maybe you've played at a couple of places. Maybe you've done some karaoke or stuff. Maybe you're playing on the streets. Maybe you're doing your art on the streets. Wherever you're performing right now, if you don't have an audience, please don't stop performing. There is an audience out there that is waiting for your gifts and your talents. There's an audience for everybody. Everybody has people that will be entertained and impressed and drawn to them as a performer, including you. You have people that are waiting for your gifts and talents. Maybe you haven't found them yet. Maybe I haven't found my people yet that are waiting for my gifts and talents that I'm sharing. But I found you. Well, you found me. I didn't really find you. But you found me and you're still with me and I'm going to continue doing this for you. I don't care if my podcast gets downloaded a hundred times an episode or one time an episode. It doesn't matter if there's a hundred people in the audience or one person in the audience. They are there for you. They are there for your art, your talent, your message. They are there to support what you are doing on stage. Whether it's your best friend, or even if it's your mother. If there is someone in that audience, you need to give everything you have up on that stage. You're going to have tough nights. You're going to have nights where you want to give up because it feels like nobody appreciated what you delivered on stage. It's going to happen. But you have to keep going. You have to keep pushing. You can't stop just because you face a little adversity. As entertainers, our entire career is going to be full of adversity and people trying to beat us. Beat us down and beat us out for more money or more fame or more fortune or more fans. It doesn't matter. There's always going to be adversity. There's always going to be tough shows. There's always going to be an empty crowd. There's always, always, always going to be loss of steam where you feel like you're just slowing to a halt. I haven't published an episode in, I think, over a week. I think about nine days, which I think is the longest I've gone without recording an episode. Because during this time, I mean, granted, I was on vacation. I had a lot of family stuff going on. Work's been crazy. Excuse, excuse, excuse, blah. But I'm still been doing stuff in preparation for where this podcast is going. I've still been reading books. I've still been reading articles. I've still been watching videos. I've still been applying myself to my craft, even though I haven't dedicated the hour it takes me to prepare, record, edit, upload, and write notes for a podcast episode. It takes me about an hour. Maybe a little bit longer. But I still keep going. I still keep doing something. So even if you're feeling like you've lost steam, even if you feel like maybe you should give up, maybe you feel like you're not talented, maybe you feel like you're not talented enough, I'm here to tell you you're wrong. If you don't feel like you're ready, keep working. Keep getting ready. Keep focusing on the future. Focus on where you want to be, and eventually you're going to get there. I can tell you where I want to be. I know exactly where I want to be. I have so many visions and plans and dreams for myself, for this podcast, for this business that I'm creating. It is insane. It will blow your mind. I want to have a Facebook group where I can go in after a podcast episode and just kind of let loose, and that will probably contain profanity. I clean it up for the podcast, but my vocabulary tends to be more of that of a sailor. But I clean it up for the podcast. But I want to have a group on Facebook where I have a whole bunch of talented performers. And artists all kind of masterminding together and encouraging each other and posting videos and kind of providing constructive criticism and positive feedback to each other. I want to have that. And I want to have private coaching clients that I help and I mentor, whether it be depending on levels and everything, whether it be in person, over the phone, through Skype. I want to have coaching clients that I mentor and that I help grow and develop. And eventually, I want to have my own group. I want to have my own show and put it together and travel with my coaching clients and go to certain theaters all around the country. And that is like the pipe dream. Like that's the dream. I want to have a training program that I can provide to entertainers no matter what they do on stage to help them be more engaging with their audience and help them be more confident on stage. These are the things that I envision. What do you envision for yourself? Where do you see your art and your talents taking you? I've shared mine with you. I want to hear what you want to do. Where do you want to be? I don't care if you sing. I don't care if you dance. I don't care if you swallow swords. I don't care if you belly dance. I don't care what it is you do on stage. Drag, mime, clown, comedian, musician, band, street performer, break dancer, belly dancer, burlesque dancer, stripper. I don't care what you do on stage. I want to know where you envision yourself as an artist. Tomorrow, there's a knock on your door. There's a knock on your door. to give you a dose of reality because it ain't going to happen slick. i'm sorry um told you a few podcast episodes and would be honest it's not gonna happen you know yeah sure okay reggie it might happen what if i make a viral video yeah fine your video goes viral at most you're gonna get money off ads that play on that video at most people are gonna know your name and follow you on social media but even those people that you see on youtube that you know youtube celebrities and all even those people they still gotta work at what they do they still gotta put stuff together and move things forward and you know craft their art so you're gonna do the same thing you have to keep working i've lost steam i know that i had something that hit me and knocked me down you're gonna have the same thing happen to you in your career something's gonna hit you it's gonna knock you down either you're not gonna get a gig that you're going for maybe you're gonna get stiffed unpaid because no one showed up for your gig maybe you're gonna get canceled as soon as you show up to the bar that's three hours away all of those things check check and check what it happened to me i've literally performed for four people but you know what i went out there and i did my absolute best i gave them every single bit of me that i had i left it on that stage i gave it to them because they were there to support me just like you're here to support me so i'm gonna give you every little bit of myself that i have into this microphone for you because you're still with me those 10 20 people that stopped following me stop liking me and stop listening to me i don't care about them they're the past you're still with me and you're the one that i'm focusing on you have questions comments concerns you want to know something you want to chat you know you want to talk about your dreams hit me up reggie at being on stage.com i'm here for you because i want you to be successful i want you to connect with your audience and i want you to gain fans thank you so much once again to listening to the being on stage podcast thank you for 20 episodes we're going for another 10 we're going to have another celebration when we hit a thousand downloads overall i'm thinking it's going to be in another two episodes or so maybe sooner who knows if you'd like to help we're going to celebrate when we reach a thousand downloads if you want to help me celebrate my thousand downloads here's how you can help one you can go to itunes you can either you can subscribe and drop me a review second thing you can do you can share me if you have a friend or you're you know a co-worker or a cousin or an aunt that you think should be performing share me with them if you like what you hear share me hit up my website www.beingonstage.com for your free book it is still available for free i've left that offer on the table i thought about taking it down and up in the price because i am going to eventually charge for it but for now i'm leaving the book is free so beingonstage.com pick up your free book even if you don't so even if you get there and you don't think you need it download it it's free it's called confidence on stage navigating the three levels of stage fright you do not have to have stage fright to read this book i guarantee you will find value no matter what i put a lot of good stuff in there head over to beingonstage.com drop a review on itunes and please please keep working don't let the haters slow you down keep on moving and keep on shining y'all
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