Adria Dawn

I think I'm successful because I try to maintain outside perspective - who am I outside of the business? That fulfills me in deeper ways. I tell my students, you're more than any role that you book. Who are you when you leave this university? What hobbies do you like to do that have nothing to do with acting and directing? Because I have good friends and good family, and I try to keep a balance of making sure that I continue to connect with those people, I can find a deeper meaning to my life with that. It's about not defining myself solely by the business, but maintaining connections and interests outside of it that give me a fuller sense of purpose.

A fellow colleague once told me to be transparent with people, and he said to me one time, let my hindsight be their foresight. I always let people around me - let my hindsight be their foresight. So when I'm teaching or coaching or talking, I say to my students, let my hindsight be your foresight. In other words, it's humbling to learn from the mistakes of others. For me, I kind of live by that in ways too, to always stay humble. That's good advice - stay humble, be open, and think about how you can serve people and lift them up in the best ways that you can. I think that's through humility and kindness.

I would say to train. Find a teacher, find a mentor that you feel safe and comfortable with, and learn from them. Learn from others, go see plays. When you watch movies on TV, look at what you gravitate towards. What roles speak to you? Why? So much of this industry is about the doing. I would tell that young person to not be afraid of making mistakes, because that's what makes you better. I think there's such a fear of being wrong or doing something wrong these days. With technology, you can get canceled. I think you have to just own the failure, because that's going to produce the biggest growth. So I would tell her to be okay and embrace failure. And with that, hold on to joy. Things are joyous and fun, and I think we've gotta remember our joy and our spark in anything that we try out that's new for us. It can be exciting, and that's okay, to be happy and excited and fulfilled about trying something new.

I'll be 54 next month, so the idea that we embrace change and how the industry changes is sometimes hard for folks like me. There are challenges of learning technology, learning how to move into self-taping and Zoom callbacks and things like that, and learning different technologies around the camera and how to use them. I also think there's challenges in just the sheer number of tries you go up to bat for a role. I always think about being in this business as learning how to get your calluses - you gotta get those calluses nice and good and tough to handle all the rejection and all of the work you put in to keep moving forward.

In the entertainment industry, the values that I hold tight are discipline and endurance. I think longevity is important. And staying humble and letting go of ego in the industry, because there's so much of it - because we are our products as performers. How do we separate the self from the product? I think that's important. So humility, kindness, openness, and discipline are key for me. It takes an incredible amount of work - work in your body, in your mindset, in your craft, in all of it together to really succeed. You can't really give up, so it's not for the faint of heart.