2
Pen and Paper
I need this wherever I go. I journal for my own sanity and use a similar practice of the “Morning Pages” from “The Artist’s Way.” I write ideas, thoughts, images, things I want to develop. For every character I play, I create a notebook with back stories, inner monologues, abstract ideas, and add to it over time.
3
Poetry From Memory
If I’m not on a job, I like to keep my brain sharp by memorizing a speech, a poem or a passage that I connect with. The last one was Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If.” Before that it was a passage from a Taoist book about how insignificant we are in the vastness of the cosmos, yet how we should still strive to be a better part of it.
4
Exercise
Training has become a big part of my life again after almost 10 years of more unhealthy and self-destructive habits during my early struggling acting years. It helps me avoid or work through negative states. Anything that can take me out of my head and into the body — training with weights, the punching bag, Brazilian jiu-jitsu or yoga.
5
Teachers
If we don’t keep learning throughout our lives, I think we stagnate. I’ll always look to study as much as I can between work, studying with a Japanese language tutor, meditation teachers, martial-art teachers or any subject that helps inspire me creatively and think differently about something. I studied film and theater in college, and I remember my drama teacher at the time saying, “You should never become an actor.” Then I found a class at the Actors’ Temple, and a great teacher called Tom Radcliffe opened my eyes to maybe I could be doing this, that I had the potential to be a good actor.
6
Nonfiction
“Man’s Search for Meaning,” Bruce Lee’s “Striking Thoughts,” “Hardcore Zen,” “The Road Less Traveled.” “Easy Riders, Raging Bulls” is what I’m reading now. Older books that remind me why we do what we do on a deeper level I find helpful in this increasingly superficial modern western world.
7
Traveling in Japan
Kyoto is one of my favorite places — exploring temples, disconnecting from technology, going off the beaten path. One of my favorite trails so far was the Kumano Kodo, an ancient pilgrimage route.
