We recently connected with Jo Kelly and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Jo, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?
I graduated in human resource psychology and systemics in my university years in belgium. Then when I started acting, I realized that no matter how hard I studied acting it wasn’t making me a better actress. Quite the contrary, the more I studied and trained, the more disconnected I felt. I was a good actress but I wasn’t becoming great. I was also realizing that my actor colleagues were having similar experiences as me. They studied and trained a lot, they worked hard before their auditions but they usually were not very free at all. In fact it was very rare to see a truly free and alive actor.
So with my educational background I started to be really curious and interested in researching why so many actors felt so passionate, trained so much, worked so hard and then felt terrible when they auditioned and were therefore not booking the kind of roles they wanted.
I started to research the topic and soon discovered that the missing piece was the instinct.
You see, when we are raised by authority figures, i.e: parents and schools that tell us how to feel ( don’t get scared, don’t be angry, don’t cry etc), how to think, how to behave, how to learn, what to want, what to like, we become conditioned and programmed by these authorities. And this programming replaces our natural one which is our very own and unique instinct. And an artist without an instinct is not an artist. An artist showing up with conditioning and programming cannot create from his own unique self.
So I became VERY passionate about making sure I would help as many artists ( we work mainly with artists but also with singers, dancers, athletes, writers, directors, therapists, any high level performers) as possible to wake up from their conditioning in order to live their truth and freedom. So that they in turn can wake up audiences by showing up in their free and full humanity
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
For more than 20 years, I have guided actors to undo all social and emotional conditioning so that they can be reminded how to BE (and not act) in full authenticity and freedom, in order to deliver incredibly alive, raw, and truthful performances.
After having worked with some of the hottest actors, directors and other artists all around the world, I have guided and coached thousands of pro actors, just like you, to land roles with the biggest studios like Netflix, HBO, Disney, Showtime, ABC studios, and more.
I have always been committed about being an acting coach and not an acting teacher. I do not believe that one can be taught how to act but certainly can be reminded how to BE and can muscle that—like any pro.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
1/No masterpiece will ever come from a formula, a recipe, a method or a technique 2/We are born perfectly human. We do not need to get better or to improve. We are beautifully fucked up as we should be.
3/ No one can teach you how to be more you. No one can teach art. Art is what inevitably happens when you stop trying so hard.
What’s been one of your main areas of growth this year?
Releasing one dream and stepping into another as my family structure changed
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.tobeornottoact.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tobeornottoact_jokelly/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/jo.kelly.77
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/to-be-or-not-to-act-jo-kelly-0b707023/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/TOBEORNOTTOACT
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC0iHxQ3hjK2O6UAYU0P2zCA
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.es/user_details?userid=_VPHgstIWPquitMEO8Wdlg
