Acting might seem like the most easy and awesome work on the planet, but when you go behind the scenes, you get a whole other picture of what it is truly like to be an actor. I must say, over the months I have come to know quite a few actors in Los Angeles, and all of them share common traits, which I would like to celebrate in this blog.

A burning desire to succeed. Have you ever sat in a crowded room filled with beautiful people who look almost exactly like you, who are all reading the same part as you are, and wearing similar clothes as you? The most confident person in the world can saunter into that audition room and still be faced with insecurities suddenly. It truly takes a burning desire to succeed in the acting world because actors need to reinforce over and over again that they are special and not just another number.

Ability to accept criticism. On a set, time is money. Things must move quickly and efficiently. Hence the importance of being open to criticism without flinching in front of dozens of people. Actors are continuously faced with criticism, and this is what makes them exceptional people:  their ability to keep their mood and vibration positive, and not let words destroy their self-image and self-love. If they do not have a strong back-bone, the slightest discouraging word can send their career down the drain.

Adaptability. Acting is all about going with the flow of the present moment. Whatever script actors have memorized or scenes they have revised, things in real life can go completely wrong sometimes. Thus they need to adapt quickly, and this means losing the desire to control events or situations. From what I have observed, great acting comes from great adaptability, that attitude that whatever happens on set, “It’s all good”.

Detachment. When going in to audition for roles, actors must remain detached from the outcome. If they hold unto that burning desire to get a role, they might live great disappointments. I have seen actors saunter in and out of audition rooms like they were going to order another cup of coffee, two sugars and cream. As they sit in that audition room, sipping their 876th cup of imaginary coffee, their faces reflect that timeless spiritual law of detachment.

Ability to sense others. To succeed in acting you need to be plugged into that invisible realm. Certain actors have told me that they immediately sense when the producers turn them down, even before they have spoken their first line. This sixth sense of what others are looking for creates in them an ability to not take things personal, to realize that they might not be the perfect person for that role. Most good actors navigate through auditions with an ability to sense and foresee ahead of time whether they will be cast or not. Such a sixth sense frees them of great expectations.

Staying humble. A great actor stays humble, because he or she never knows when the moment of glory shall pass. Maybe one year they get cast in the most popular television series, and the next they find themselves without work. Whatever happens, staying humble allows for actors to avoid crashes and burns.

My time amongst actors has taught me much. I continue to learn from their powerful spirits and quick minds. The world has much to learn from them. Let us remember that although Shakespeare is considered the greatest English writer of all times, he was also a superb actor. Rodney Dangerfield once said, “Acting deals with very delicate emotions. It is not putting up a mask. Each time an actor acts he does not hide; he exposes himself”.

Mother Ocean in California is widely known by surfers as the “Blue Lady”. The Blue Lady is a force to be reckoned with. My first time in California, I had no knowledge of duck diving. When the first six-foot wave stood up in front of me, I froze in fear and could not figure out for the life of me how I would survive. After getting “rinse-cycled” and after eating many “sea-salt potatoe chips”, I stumbled out of the Blue Lady and got a crash-course from my good friend who had been smirking discreetly from the shore.

“Kook!” he yelled at me, which is a Californian word for many states of being, but in this case it meant “beginner”.

Many people are afraid of the ocean’s great power. And we should be! She can toss you around like you are but a speck of sand to her. Every time I duck dive under a wave, and close my eyes, I feel like a little part of me is dying, that part that is used to the known, to the visible, to the physical. As you go under a wave, it’s all about trust. Trust that you will pop back up again on the other side, safe and sound, the seagulls screeching above you.

I have great admiration for surfers. To surf is to not fear the unknown, to really trust that the Blue Lady will protect your life no matter what happens. Talk to any surfer and you will know what I mean. They are the most laid-back, easy-going, relaxed people on earth! They are natural gurus, really, because they enter one of the most powerful forces on earth every day with great humility and reverence, and then go back to work as if they just had done the most natural thing on earth.

The Blue Lady opens her innermost secrets to those willing to close their eyes, take a deep breath, and surrender to the great unknown.

Every writer has an itch. It can be a small itch, or a big itch, but it has to be an itch. Orlando in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando has a very big itch, one that is related to the whole body; when the desire to write takes over her, her entire body shakes and trembles and tingles (if you haven’t already read Orlando it is an amazing book). My itch is quite annoying as it happens to me… in the middle of the night.

Quite often I am enjoying a dream when it takes over. At first it is like an annoying noise in the background of a dream, but it gets louder and louder and finally, it wakes me up: words flash, bells go off, you name it, I have it. Then the trick is that before falling back asleep, I have to recite the words several times  in order not to forget them. In truth, I am too lazy to write them down.

How does your writer’s itch manifest itself? Have you ever tried to control it or ignore it? What happens when you ignore the itch? Once I tried to sleep through the itch and it turned into a nightmare: someone over a loudspeaker was yelling my name, telling me to get up and write things down. I nearly fell out of bed when that happened. My advice: do not ignore the itch! Obey it! Amazing things have come from writers who follow their itch rather than fight it.

How can you encourage the itch? Give it permission to disturb you at any moment during your day (or night in my case). It’s unbelievable the words that will come at you! Truly. My friends used to tell me to take sleeping pills, but I always replied, “Why sleep when I could write the next best-seller? Let me sleep when I am dead”.

James Cameron has created the greatest spiritual movie ever made up until now. Those of us with old souls cannot fail to see the dozens of evolutionary messages that float throughout the movie like an ocean of little awakenings. Cameron has created a whole new universe, one that is filled with hope for our future on earth despite the recent gloomy end-of-the-earth movements.

Since there is so much to say about this movie, I would like to focus primarily on the different forms of symbiosis that are found in “Avatar”. Throughout the movie there are three different forms of symbiosis: the one between humans; the one with animals and humans; and the one with Mother Nature and humans.

The human symbiosis happens when Jake Sully, the marine who is under cover as a Na’vi warrior, falls in love with Neytiri, the beautiful woman warrior on Pandora. Their symbiosis begins when Neytiri saves Jake from the wild forces of nature, and takes him under her wing to teach him the Omaticaya ways. It is a love-bond that is physical, mental and spiritual, and carries Jake away from his mundane world into a world of magic and wonder.

In Cameron’s movie, we find humans respecting animals when they kill them for food, and giving thanks for the life the animal has surrendered. It takes Jake Sully a long while before he can create a bond with the animals around him, but once he is in symbiosis, he becomes greater than before. In the end, the animals come to save Pandora from human destruction. The message is clear: love the animals and they in turn will love you back, in ways you cannot even imagine.

Finally, there is the great symbiosis with Eywa, Mother Earth, and the Na’vi warriors of Pandora. Eywa is the one who guides this race and protects them, who contains all memories of the past and who will intervene to save them from destruction. Jake is frequently called a “moron” when he first enters into contact with Eywa because he does not understand her great role for the Na’vi. With time he learns to pray to Eywa, to bond with her, and to fight with her.

“Avatar” is filled with messages of hope for the future. It speaks of the importance of bonding with all life around us, with stepping out of our modes of destruction and war we have so long held unto, and teaches us to see beyond monetary gain to planetary gain. It wakens up our desire to save our planet rather than rage war on it. I invite you to bathe in the magic and beauty Cameron has created, over and over again.

Being real is all about learning to walk to your own beat in life. Every life has its own beat, and all beats are beautiful, but finding out what beat your life is might be a little tricky at times. When you turn to the outside world and compare yourself to others, there will always be people who are more intelligent, more beautiful, more popular, more rich than you, but this thinking produces nothing but a dead-end. You are looking at other songs and telling yourself yours isn’t as precious, and this is when you become less real: when you try to fit into another beat.

Socrates said the wisest words two thousand years ago: “Know thyself”. These words, as simple as they are, teach us that before achieving wisdom you must first know your essence, what makes you dance in this world, what makes you cry, what makes you laugh, what makes you afraid. When you can identify your weaknesses and strengths you become more real, and step past others around you swimming against their own life stream.

Feeling like you don’t know what you are doing here on earth some days? Remind yourself of your passions, the things that make you vibrate, make you happy. There is an old Chinese proverb that says, “If you love your work, you will never work a day in your life”. Repeat this to yourself. You are your work, and your work is you. When you love what you do, every moment of life is magical and infused with divinity.

Walking to your own beat involves taking risks, perhaps losing friends that you had for a long time, or feeling lonely for some time. It might involve you quitting a job you hate and spending some time in limbo, waiting for that job that will turn your life into magic again. It could mean that you feel sad for some time as you retrieve lost pieces of your soul.

Cinderella’s story is the tale of how one woman is badly treated by others, and always feels like she is an outsider until the day her real identity is revealed. As she steps into her real vibration, her real beat, the world outside can no longer harm her and she finally achieves completion and happiness. Walking to our own beat is a lot like Cinderella’s story, which involves risks and loneliness and venturing forth into the unknown, hoping the shoe will fit.

I have recently run into an exceptional water device called the SD 501 Leveluk created by the Japanese thirty years ago. I have always been a really healthy person, eating organic food, drinking green tea, working out a lot, and of course drinking a lot of water. Recent studies are showing that dehydration is the cause of most diseases, even down to cancer. Shocking as it is, it makes sense: we are born 90% water, one year later we are 70% water, and by the time we are older, our bodies contain 50% water.

I started drinking Kangen water simply because I found it tasted good, much better than bottled water or tap water, and because I wanted to see if it was really magical as some claimed.  Miracle after miracle happened to me once I started drinking it. Curious, I started to read about Kangen water and found that this water had three distinct properties that other waters did not have: it was antioxidant; it was hexagonal; and it was alcaline. After some research, I discovered that drinking Kangen water was three-eight times more antioxidant than green tea and that was why my immune system had become so much more resistant to sickness and allergies.

Then I found out what hexagonal meant. Kangen water has a water molecule that is much smaller than normal water. This means that it can enter the cell better, eliminating toxins quicker and hydrating our bodies faster. When a molecule is smaller, it is better absorbed by our bodies. MJ Pangman’s book called “Hexagonal Water: The Ultimate Solution” speaks about how drinking hexagonal water can help so many health problems, such as diabetes, asthma, allergies, colon dysfunction, and the list goes on.

The last property of Kangen water is its alcalinity. When the body is acidic, all sorts of diseases (including cancer) can form, but when it is properly balanced and slightly alcaline, health is obtained. By drinking alcaline water, I found that I slept better and was a lot less stressed-out by the daily humdrum around me. What was shocking to discover was that most water on the market is acidic, and that tap water is PH neutral only due to the chemicals water plants put in it.

Why do I call Kangen water “magic water”? Simply because it did what no medicine or drug or herb has been able to do for me. It put a stop to many food allergies I had since I was young, allowed me to sleep better, and brought my energy level way up. Furthermore, Kangen water does something no other water does: it opens your heart chakra! As crazy as this sounds, once you begin drinking Kangen water, do not be surprised if love comes knocking on your door. I invite you to try this magic water for yourself instead of taking my word for it.

For more information concerning the SD 501 Leveluk,  you can write to me at this address: oceandoll@hotmail.com.

Have you ever wandered into the darkened area of a New Age store, hunting for that secret place where a woman is waiting for you, a crystal ball in hand, promising to tell you of your future? At some point or other, all of us have reached out to others for guidance and there is nothing wrong with seeking help. What is wrong in my mind is when the guidance from others becomes a program, albeit one that is hard to understand and decipher. Whereas in the past it was fashionable to consult a fortune teller and gaze into her crystal ball, I would like to write about the reasons why not consulting a fortune teller will serve your future better.

Please remember that what many fortune tellers see or feel is filtered by their own perceptions, fears, and feelings. In my eyes, a pure channel (someone who is connected directly to the Source) is not authorized to tell your future; rather, they help you make better decisions based on your present moment. Be wary of those who tell you God is speaking through them, for often it could be something less pretty!

Another reason why consulting fortune tellers might not truly serve you is that whatever they tell you might stay in your mind a very long time, and could actually hinder rather than help you. Once I consulted a woman who told me my brother was going to have an accident at a certain age, and my whole family became terrified, even my skeptical brother. As time went on, we realized that our fears might actually be creating this event instead of avoiding it. You might recall that energy flows in the direction that our thoughts do, so focusing on a dark future will certainly create that future. In the end, we learned to erase from our minds the words of this woman, and my brother still stands today, thank God.

Lastly, fortune tellers, for the most part, do not really see the future. Sorry to bust your bubbles folks! What they do see is what you already know, what you already carry within you as a future plan or goal. If you have consulted a fortune teller, oftentimes you find yourself saying, “Amazing! She saw all my talents and dreams!” and this is true. What they do is take what is inside of you and shape it into what they believe might be the future for you. So in reality, you could consult your best friend and get a better reading of your future, in my opinion.

I recommend, if you want to look at your future, take that crystal ball into your own hands.  Say out loud what you would like your future to look like, instead of trying to “see” into your future. Create your future, words have a lot of power! You might be surprised how much your future will be prosperous, beautiful, and filled with love. Instead of letting others guide you to certain goals or dreams,  guide yourself and with enough self-confidence and self-love, you can manifest anything your heart desires!