How do actors get into the emotional roles? We can learn a lot by following their techniques. Why? Because minding your thoughts is essentially playing a role of who you want to be if you want to discontinue your bad habits or addictions. If you are determined and disciplined enough to follow through, then knowing the psychological tools will be useful for us. Besides, the cognitive science behind the tools is very revealing and presents a comprehensive view of our pursuit of mind your thoughts for better health and better life. So let me dive into that.
Acting used to be melodramatic and exaggerated physical and facial expressions and emotional display. But innovations in the psychology of acting have been enthralling us lately and many of us are mesmerized by the realistic acting on the TV. This is happening because actors have realized that rather than portraying exaggerated gestures which can be conceived as overacting, they are remembering when they felt that emotion, recreating that past emotion and bringing it out through emotional memory. Rather than acting, they are immersing themselves in their past emotions by remembering the incidents. For example you can get angry remembering an incident that happened to you. In the same way, in a positive effort, you can remember a situation where you forgave someone and that incident set you free forever. By invoking that incident you can forgive again. This is called method acting or inside - out acting and is pioneered by Stanislavski. Later taught by Lee Strasberg, Michael Checkov and Uta Hagen, and practiced by notable Hollywood actors. It is like a James Bond role actor imagining an unfair situation in his life and showing that anger or vigor to go after a bad situation or a bad guy. You can do this too, by invoking past positive emotions and applying them to the current negative situation. Yes it takes discipline, but the will meeting the methods, is an effective way to mind your thoughts.
The second tool from the psychology research used by actors is Theory of Mind, a fancy word for understanding others state of mind or empathy. This research shows that exploring the new character, what that new character should be feeling, acting, expressing, belief system, with such planning, the character can be enacted more realistically. In this process, one has to become more empathetic, ie, understanding of the others feelings and emotional states. In our case, if we are wanting to be less attracted by our weakness of let’s say shopping. Then portray or act a role of a character who does not like shopping, the discomfort they face for not finding what they like, having to search a lot to find, and worrying about choosing between different products, colors, and online shopping has too many confusing labels. By listing these scenarios of the new character you will start feeling the new character and don’t want to shop or buy instinctively. This can be applied to other negative emotions and cravings by acting out a new character who does not like those same things as you do. You can do this as a fun game, slowly flexing your acting muscles.
Suppression of self-identity is another approach actors use to immerse themselves into the new role. The now and present is the new role, and past and before is your self identity. By forgetting that self identity temporarily and immersing in the now, one can forget self. Mindfulness practice is one of the ways one can enhance the present experience and be aware of the new role of being connected to the current environment, in this case the new role being enacted. You need to be aware of the difference between internal state awareness vs self-reflection. The practice is about increasing the former and decreasing the latter. Why are we even suggesting acting to control your bad habits? All of these techniques are essentially how you mind your thoughts and self. We are suggesting these techniques, only because you are interested in understanding yourself, and managing your addictions no matter big or small. All of us can improve ourselves, and that requires discipline to control our thoughts. I am not suggesting that medical intervention is not necessary, but in addition to it, having your own understanding to manage your habits is important. Besides, research shows that, flexing your muscles of acting, makes you more empathetic, and have less psychological issues as overly focusing on self, and inability to flex the psychological grips leads to psychological distress.
# Sources:
* “Enhancing Empathy and Theory of Mind”, by Thalia Goldstein and Ellen Winner, J. of Cog & Dev., 13, 19-37, 2012
* “The Benefits of Being Present: Mindfulness and Its Role in Psychological Well-Being” Kirk Warren Brown and Richard M. Ryan, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 2003, Vol. 84, No. 4, pp 822–848.
* “Private Self-Consciousness and the Five-Factor Model of Personality: Distinguishing Rumination From Reflection”, Paul D. Trapnell and Jennifer D. Campbell, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 1999, Vol. 76. No. 2., pp284-304.
No comments:
Post a Comment