The Alibi: Why Actors Self-Sabotage Before Big Auditions

I can tell you which one got booked first without even looking at the timestamps.Twenty years of representing actors, and I have read a lot of these emails. And after a while you stop reading the words and you start reading the calendar.So let's look at one. Two lines, same actor, four days apart. Now, I changed the details, not the order.Line one is a callback, Thursday at 2:00. Line two is an industrial out in Long Island City, Thursday at 1:00, booked on the 18th. The callback was on the 14th.Now, everything about the second line is real. There is a call sheet. Somebody is paying him. He auditioned for it, he took the rate, and he is getting on a train. And if he no-showed, it would have been a bridge that he could not afford to burn.So he emails me and he says, "Unfortunately, I have a conflict Thursday." Then he looks at the word "unfortunately" and decides it's a little much, deletes it, and sends a clean version.And then something happens that he doesn't tell anybody about. He barely tells himself. He feels better. Not relieved. Better. Lighter. Nice day out. And it lasts about nine minutes.Now, if you have ever sent a version of that email, and I think most of you have, I'm not here to make you feel bad about it. That conflict was real. Everything on the timeline would have survived an audit. I'm here to tell you what the reason actually was, because it's not what your brain told you it was. And then I'm going to give you a way to catch the next one before you hit send.

Welcome to Mental Rehearsal, the podcast for struggling actors and actors who struggle in this business. Talent gets you noticed. Mindset keeps you in the game. Meet Dr. Albert Bramante, talent agent, hypnotherapist, and NLP practitioner. Every episode we'll expose the mental traps that hold actors back and give you practical tools to build confidence, beat self-sabotage, and perform at your best. So stop rehearsing your fears and start mentally rehearsing your success.

Now, last episode I told you that everyone is running a script that they did not sit down and write. Tonight is what one of those scripts looks like once it has grown up and gotten a job. It is not a belief system anymore. It's in your calendar.So today, the alibi. The reason it shows up before the audition, and why the reason is always a good one. And why it gets even better the more you have on the line. And why arguing with it has never worked on anyone. And then I'm going to give you a 90 second check that you can run tonight with nothing but your calendar and your sent folder that tells you which one you are looking at.So let me tell you about an actor I worked with. We'll call him Nate. Now, he's a composite, of course, and I will say that up front, because this one is recognizable enough that a real name would be unkind.So Nate had been at it for 10 years. He wasn't struggling. He worked. He was the guy that other actors in his class texted when they had a self-tape they were not sure about. They would run it by Nate. And if you have been around a while, you know that is a real credential. Nobody sends their tape to anyone they think is beneath them.Then Nate got a chemistry read. It was a recurring network guest role. The kind of thing that may not fix your life, but it changes the next three years of it.He had three weeks between the initial audition and the chemistry read. Now, three weeks is forever. And he'd been running it that way the whole time. A choice he found in the first few days, and he kept getting more and more inside of that choice. He ran it for me. We even did it over video. And I remember thinking, this is it. He just has to do that. That's all he has to do, is what he has prepared.However, two days before the read, he decided to abandon it and go a different direction. And I'm not talking about an adjustment. I'm talking about throwing out three weeks of work and building something new from nothing.Now, I want you to hear how reasonable that sounded, because he told me the first choice was going stale and he did not want to walk in there with something that was over-rehearsed. Which is a real thing, and it's a valid choice. Choices do go stale. So I didn't say anything, because at that time I agreed.And I want to be fair to him. He was not being lazy about it. He worked harder in those two days to prepare the new approach than he had the whole three weeks before. Two nights before, he sent me an eleven minute voice memo at one in the morning, working something out. And you could hear that he was awake, searching, and completely engaged.And that's what stuck with me for a while. And at the time I really couldn't tell you why. I was thinking, okay, why did I receive this memo? And I'll come back to what happened in the room, and the one thing that he said afterwards that told me everything.Now, the second thing I want to mention. This is not a person, this is a claim. And it's going to sound like flattery for about 20 seconds. And that is: the better you get, the better your excuses get. Not more of them. Just better ones.The people with the thin reasons are usually the people who are not close to anything. It's the traffic. My headshots are old. The agent is not doing anything. These reasons are thin because they do not hold much weight, and most people in the industry can see that.By the way, when someone is actually in the room for things that they want, the reasons are excellent. Sometimes specific and verifiable. They involve other people's schedules, real money, and a professional obligation. And if I pushed on one, I would look like a jerk, because on the surface I would be wrong. Especially if it comes to, they can't do an audition because of family, because of a health concern. That would be inappropriate for me to push back on, and rightfully so.And this is the part that gets me, in the chair. When a client tells me that their headshots are old, I can work with that. When a client tells me they're on a paid job that conflicts, what am I supposed to say? Flake on a producer? Of course not. So I nod, and they go. And for years I had a feeling that I could not put words on.And I'll come back to what the size of a reason is actually telling you. It takes about 90 seconds to learn, and it's the most useful thing in this episode.Now, the third thing I want to talk to you about is from the other half of my life. I've been teaching college psychology for over 20 years. And every semester, before every examination, somebody announces it first, out loud in the hallway, 10 minutes before I hand out the test. "I didn't study at all." Sometimes it's "I was up all night." Sometimes it's "I didn't even open the book."And I want you to notice the volume, because that is a tell. They're not confiding in a friend. They're making sure everybody heard it. And I used to think that was bravado. It is not.Now, this is what took me years to notice. Very often the kid did study. And sometimes for hours. And then they got up in front of the room and said the opposite.Now sit with that for a second. That is a person doing the work and then telling everyone they did not do the work. Now, you may be thinking, why? And I'll come back to that.Now, there's a name for what I've been circling, and I'm going to say it and then mostly stop. And that is self-handicapping. And I want to tell you why I have a personal stake in it. I wrote my doctoral dissertation on this. Self-handicapping and fear of success in actors. That was the research. So this is not a concept I read about last week and brought to you. I've been looking at it in actors for a very long time, from a chair on the other side of the desk and from a chair on the other side of the phone.The idea of self-handicapping came from two researchers, Berglas and Jones. In 1978 they ran a study which I still think about. They gave people a test. For half the room it was solvable. For the other half it was rigged, basically impossible for them to solve. Then they told everyone that they had aced it. Then they offered everyone a choice of two pills before the second test. One was supposed to help your performance, and the other was supposed to hurt it.Now, the people who earned that win took the one that helped. The people who could not explain the win took the one that hurt.Now, this is not a study about lazy people. These are people who had just been told they were excellent. That is exactly why they reached for the handicap. They got handed a good result that they could not account for, and they had no intention of finding out whether it would happen again under clean conditions.Now think about how much of your career arrives that way. You booked the last job and you're not sure why. The room felt weird and you got it. The room felt perfect and sometimes you never heard back. And you live in this world.So here is how it actually works in your life, in plain terms. You want the part. And you have already pictured it. The phone call you would make when you get the part. The email you would send. The social media announcement.Now picture a genuinely clean audition. You walk in fully prepared. You're rested, you're off book, nothing gets in the way. Everything you know how to deliver. And then they tell you no, or you're not hearing anything.What does that no measure? It measures the best you have under the best conditions you can build. And sometimes it sends you the message: not enough.Now, that is a sentence you cannot afford. Not that you cannot handle. You cannot afford. It's like a bill that would empty the account.Something in you does the math on that bill and decides it's never going to let it come down to that. So it arranges for the conditions to be imperfect, in advance, on your behalf. And the key words are "not on purpose."And this is why the phrase self-sabotage makes actors defensive, because it sounds like an accusation. Nobody sits down on a Tuesday and decides, hey, I want to damage my own chances today. And it does not feel like that on the inside. It feels like scheduling. It feels like a conflict. It feels like judgment.And now watch what the obstacle does to the result, because that is why it is so hard to get rid of.If you do not book it, the reason is already sitting there. There's no thinking required. It was a conflict. It was the schedule. It was the four hours of sleep you had the night before. It was a choice you changed. So the no attaches to the obstacle instead of you.But look what happens when you do book it. You booked it with one hand tied behind your back. Which does not protect you. It promotes you. Now you are not just good. You are good under conditions that would have sunk someone else.And it pays out both ways. That's why arguing with it does nothing. That's why every friend who ever told you to stop self-sabotaging got nowhere. Because you do not talk someone out of a strategy that wins whether they succeed or fail.Now, let me say the thing you may be thinking, because I would rather say it than have you sit on it. You might be thinking, well, this is another version of "you're getting in your own way," which people have been telling you since you started. Usually right before they tell you that you have to want it more. Then they finish their coffee and go home to their salaried job.Well, I'm not going to do that. I do not think you're getting in your own way because you're weak. And I do not think you're getting in your own way because you do not want it. I think something in you built a very good piece of protection machinery. It built it because at some point you needed to, and it works. And I have a fair amount of respect for it.It's not that it is stupid. The problem is that it's expensive. In order to keep working, it has to keep you a step outside the room. And that's the actual cost.And I want to say it slowly. It cannot protect you from a clean read and also let you be all the way in there. Those are the same thing. The distance is the protection.So every time it does the job well, you were a little bit absent for something you waited a year for. And you didn't experience it as an absence. You experienced it as a room that went fine and that you cannot really remember afterwards.If you have ever walked out of an audition and not been able to say what actually happened in there, that is not nerves. That is not bad memory. Something moved you back a step so it could take care of you.Now, this shows up in about four shapes, and once you see them you cannot stop seeing them.The schedule. The conflicting booking. The trip you commit to. The class you cannot miss. That's the one that was at the top of the episode.It could also be the prep. Going back to Nate, changing something so late that it was never really the thing you built. Or the flip side, staying on book, so nobody, including you, ever finds out what it would have been.It could also be the body. Four hours of sleep before the biggest day of your year. Drinking the night before something that matters. That one is the closest thing to reaching for the pill that hurts. And it's the one that people defend the hardest, because it does not feel psychological at all. It just feels like being tired.And this is the one that I think most people have been doing the longest. The pass. You just do not go on the audition. And the reason is good. You tell your agent, and it's over in eleven seconds. And nobody will ever know it happened, including you.This last one is the most dangerous by a mile, because the other three leave a mark. You remember the audition you did on four hours of sleep. You remember the choice you changed. The pass leaves nothing. There's no room. There's no tape. There's no performance to be unsure about. Just a Tuesday you spent doing something else.Do that 11 times a year and you have not had a bad year. You had a year that did not happen.And the industrial at the top of the episode, somebody auditioned for it, negotiated the rate, and is getting on the train to film it. The actor who committed to the family trip that lands in the middle of pilot season is paying for that flight themselves.See, none of this is laziness. It's more work than going to the audition would have been. Nothing lazy builds any of these.And that is why the standard advice is making things worse instead of helping. If somebody tells you, oh, you just need to want it more, and the truth is you were pouring energy into an elaborate protection structure, then you just got a diagnosis that does not match your symptoms. You know you want it. You can feel how much. And there are plenty of actors who have come up with alibis who were really hungry for the work.So the advice does not fit. And when good advice from someone you respect does not fit, most people do not decide that the advice is wrong. They decide that something is wrong with them that the advice cannot reach. And I have met a lot of actors who carry that around. It's heavy, it's inaccurate, and it took 10 seconds to hand to them.So this is not about avoiding work. What is it avoiding? It's avoiding a clean read on you. And as long as you have never been measured with nothing in the way, you never have to find out. You get to keep believing you might be great, because nothing has proved otherwise. And you also get to keep the other one alive, quietly, without it ever having been confirmed.Because not knowing holds both. Finding out picks one.So it is not protecting you from failing. You have failed plenty of times and you are still here. It is protecting you from finding out. And once you see it that way, it stops being shameful, because that is a reasonable thing for a system to do. The only trouble is that it never checks back to see whether you are ready now.And I want to say something very important. And if you take one thing out of today, take this. Sometimes the reason is just a reason.A veteran casting director by the name of Bonnie Gillespie wrote a piece about nudity clauses that is really about knowing what you will and will not do. Her point was this. You can submit, get called in, and then say, hey, you should know I'm not comfortable with nudity, once you are already that far into the process. Or you can put that energy somewhere else, into what she calls the many, many roles out there that meet your personal criteria.That is not an alibi. That is a professional with criteria, using them early, before anyone's time gets wasted.Not every pass is an alibi. Some passes are judgment. And judgment is a thing you spend 10 years building. You're allowed to use that. You're allowed to pass on jobs. You're allowed to say no.If you walk out of this episode suspicious of every professional decision you made, I made you worse, not better. That is not discernment. That's just a new way to be hard on yourself. And you already have plenty of ways to do that.So what you need is something that tells them apart. One question.The one question is: did the reason exist before you knew what was at stake?That's it. That's the whole test.A real conflict has its own history. It was on the calendar before the callback was. It came out of your actual life, and it would have been there whether this opportunity showed up or not. An alibi arrives after. It arrives once the stakes are known. And it always shows up dressed as good professional judgment, because that is the only outfit you would have let it in the door wearing.Which is why I opened tonight with the two dates and nothing else. You do not have to interpret anything. You just need the order.Now, if we're going to look at this, let's look at the Two-Date Check. You need your calendar and you need your sent folder. That's the whole toolkit.Do not do this from memory. Your memory is on the alibi's side, and it will help it out.So step one. Pick the thing from the last 12 months that you passed on, that you moved, or maybe that you half showed up for. What is the one thing that comes to mind when you think about this now?Step two. Find the date that the opportunity landed. The email. The breakdown. The email from your agent. Write down the date.Now step three. Find the date the reason landed. When did the job get booked? When did you buy that ticket to go out of town? When did you sign up for the class? Write down the date.Step four. Look at these two dates. That's it. That's the tool. You'll know within 90 seconds whether this was a valid reason to say no, or an alibi.And step five, which is what a lot of people will skip and I want to press on it. Whatever the answer is, write one line about what it cost. Not "I held myself back." That one sentence costs nothing to write. Name the room. Name the show. Name the person you would have worked with. Because the defense will happily let you feel a vague, comfortable regret forever. What it cannot survive is an itemized bill.And if the dates come back clean, and sometimes they will, that's real information too. That was judgment. Go be glad about that. You had a legitimate conflict.Now, the dates work on the one you already built. The next part works on the next one.So put the calendar down and stay with me for about two minutes. You can keep your eyes open if you are driving. This is all going to be done in your head.So take one breath and let your shoulders come down.Now go forward. A few weeks from now, something has landed. Something real. You know what it is. It's an audition for your dream show. Your dream project.Now something else has come up, and it conflicts. And there will be a perfectly good, valid excuse attached to it. Do not argue with the reason. Just let it be a good one. It will be.Now put yourself in the moment right before you send that message. Phone in your hand. Sentence written. Thumb over the button.Now stay right there. That is the only place that is winnable.Now notice something. Notice a small lift that's already starting underneath. The lightness that shows up before you even hit send. The nine minutes.You're not going to stop it. You're just going to catch it. And as you catch it, press your thumb and finger together firmly and hold them, and ask yourself one question. Which came first? The opportunity or the conflict?That is the whole rehearsal. Thumb and finger. Which one came first?Run that in your head four or five times this week, and what happens is your fingers get to the question before your thumb gets to the button. That is not courage, and it is not willpower. This is rehearsal, which is the one thing you're already better at than almost anybody else.Now let me answer the objection, because I know you have one. You're thinking, well, so I catch it, and then what? I still have the conflict.Sometimes you do. And sometimes you catch it and you do the industrial anyway, because it's Tuesday and you need the money. This is real life.But you will know. And knowing is the whole thing, because the version of this that eats a career is the one where you never see it happen.Now, if you were sitting across from me, I would stop talking about this and start asking. So let me do that. You answer these in your head, or out loud by yourself. And I'll stay out of the way.First one. And this is the question I ask more than any other question I have. What is this behavior protecting you from?The second one. What are you pretending not to know?And the last one. What are you postponing?Now, you do not have to answer any of those. You just have to hear yourself say it. That is what the room is for. And tonight I am the room.So, going back to the classroom. Why does the kid stand up in front of the room and say he did not study, when he did?It's because he bought himself an insurance policy, and it pays out either way. If he bombs, well, he really did not bomb. He didn't study. Nobody learned anything about him. And if he does well, he did well without studying. So now he's not just smart, he's gifted.He gets to walk out of that room with his idea of himself completely intact, no matter what score he receives on paper. And it cost him one sentence in a hallway.See, that is your conflict. It's the same policy. You just have a call sheet attached, and it costs a great deal more.And I do want to say the part that matters, because I've watched this from the front of the room for 20 years. The kid is not a bad kid. He's a good student. He's not lazy. He's usually one of the ones who cares the most. See, that is why he needs this insurance policy in the first place. Nobody insures something they do not value.Now, the claim from the top. The one that seemed like flattery. Of course the best actors build the best alibis. It has to scale with what is at risk. A thin excuse means there was not much to protect. A beautiful, airtight, professional, impeccable reason means you're about to be measured on something you actually care about. And the machinery went and got you something the right size.Which flips the whole thing over. A really good reason is not evidence that something is wrong with you. It's a reading. The size of the reason tells you the size of the stakes. So if what you produced last month was airtight, something in you knows exactly what that room was worth.This is not a consolation prize. This is usable this week. Next time you hear yourself build a really good reason, unusually detailed, unusually hard to argue with, that is a signal. Not that you were weak. That you were standing next to something that matters.I listen for it this way. When a client's reason is just okay, I mostly let it go. When a client's reason is almost spectacular, I sit up. Because a beautiful reason means we are right next to the thing they actually want, and they have walked me to the edge of it and handed me a very good argument for why we should look elsewhere.Now, let's get back to Nate.Nate went in with the new choice he built in 48 hours, and it was fine. It wasn't a bad audition. I want to be clear that it was not a disaster, and nobody in the room thought less of him. It was competent. Professional. However, it was forgettable, and he didn't end up booking the job.Now, we talked for 20 minutes after, and he spent most of it justifying the change. Why it felt right, and what he found in it.So I asked him to run the original for me. The one that lived inside him for three weeks. Let's do that read again.And he could not remember it.Now, you would think three weeks of work. And two days had gone right over the top of it. He got about four lines into the read and stopped. And there was a long silence for a while. And he just went, huh.That is a sound I have learned to listen for. No tears. Not a breakthrough. Just huh.So we ran the dates. And then we went back further, and took him to when he was 14. To one specific adult. The one specific afternoon where he got measured with no reason ready, and learned, correctly, that it was not safe to be measured that way again.Now, yes, he booked something later that year. That's not the point, and I'm not going to use it as one. The thing that changed is smaller than that, and it happened first. He stopped needing the result to mean nothing. He can walk into a room now and let it count.He still does not book a lot of them, because, well, nobody books most of the things they audition for. But he goes home and has dinner.From the outside, that does not look like much. From the inside, it is the difference between a career you're having and a career you're hiding from.The reason was real. It was also built. Both of those things are true at once. And holding both is what makes this workable instead of shameful. You didn't lie to your agent. You didn't lie to the producer. You just were not the one who wrote the reason.And I do not think the goal is to never do it again. I've been doing this work a long time and I still catch myself doing it. The people I know who are further along still catch themselves. The machine does not get uninstalled.What changes is the lag. It used to take someone a year to notice. Then a month. Then they would notice on the drive home. And eventually, and this is the whole thing, they notice with the phone in their hand and a thumb over the button.That is what we rehearsed. Not never building one. Just seeing it a little sooner each time, until you are seeing it early enough to choose.So here's what I want you to sit with this week. And I do not want you to answer it to me. Just hold it.What is on your calendar right now that showed up after you knew what was at stake?Now go look. Not from memory. Open the calendar, open your sent folder, and find out which got there first. And you will know in about 90 seconds. And whichever answer you get, you're better off having that answer.And if tonight landed, I'm going to send you some hypnosis recordings, which are free.

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