Preparation

Once I was doing a thing at a place for some people and we were asked to look over a script before we arrived. We weren’t supposed to memorize or rehearse it, just glance over it to see if there were any questions or changes to it.

So naturally, I gave it a once over the morning of my commitment to make sure I was familiar with everything. I read through it once to myself and once out loud to have a better idea of what we would be working on. It was literally the least I could do.

Upon arrival my contact began to review the script, noting the main points for me to be aware of. I nodded and said “Yes, I noticed that when I looked through it. Everything looks great.”

She looked up, aghast. “You know,” she continued, “I send scripts to people all the time and no one ever looks over these things. Thank you for being prepared.”

I always try to be prepared, no matter the purpose. I’ll take extra supplies, research the area, memorize the schedule, or study the materials beforehand. Whatever the project, I want to go above and beyond so people know they can rely on me and will trust me for future projects, too.

The thing is, most of the time my preparation doesn’t matter. A lot of time when I over-prepare no one even cares. They don’t notice that I spent extra hours doing my homework to make sure I was ready for them.

The more often that happens the more I want to stop preparing at all. Just when you think you should stop, someone finally notices that you took the time to do something that few people ever do. And when that lady thanked me for being ready, I learned at least two valuables lessons:

First, you should always over-prepare. If someone asks you to look over a script - print it out, highlight it, and read through it a few times. Bring the supplies they asked for, arrive early and stay late. Do the little things that matter, not because you need recognition, but because it feels good to be thorough and to exceed someone’s expectations - whether they notice or not.

Second, the people who do notice your attention to detail are the people you really want to be working for. All of those times preparing for people who took it for granted are practice for the people who will recognize your hard work. When they realize you sweat the details they’ll be grateful because they likely sweat the details, too.

The Roman philosopher Seneca is credited with saying “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” I think of that quote often, especially when my preparation goes unnoticed. It always reminds me to keep going above and beyond, whether it matters or not. Eventually your hard work is going to pay off and you’ll wind up creating your own luck.

Just a quick reminder this week to always over-prepare and over-deliver, regardless of the project. You may end up getting that big promotion, a raise, a repeat booking, or your dream role - you never know. But mainly, I want you to do the work like I do so I won’t have to wait for everyone to catch up at the start of every meeting I go to.

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Other Thoughts:

• I’m not really familiar with his work, but Bert Kreischer has found an awesome new way to go on tour this summer. Talk about embracing the moment.
• A few days ago, hundreds of people peacefully marched past my apartment in protest. Here was the view from above:

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The One Thing They Remember

After I graduated from college I moved to Los Angeles as soon I could. I knew if I put it off then I would never go.

I had $500 and two bags of props. My computer stopped working soon after, so I’d sneak into a college library to check my e-mail.

I read everything I could and worked tirelessly to get my name in front of people. I’d take gigs off Craigslist and donate my services to charity functions. But nothing seemed to stick.

Then, another performer gave me some advice:

“You need to find the thing that defines you - your one trick that people will remember you for.”

So I set out on a quest to find my trademark performance piece, the one thing that would become synonymous with the name “Mark Toland”.

I tried it all.

I worked on hypnosis but (and this is absolutely true) I kept falling asleep during the course.

I worked on advanced material from classic performers. I studied circus arts and sideshow stunts, hoping I would discover the one thing that would set me apart.

Then, I stumbled across something incredible. I found a video of someone walking barefoot on broken glass. At the time, it was a demonstration that few people were performing. It was so rare, in fact, that I couldn’t find any instructions for it.

So I taught myself.

Some friends had just moved out of their apartment and I claimed a long carpet that they had left behind. I went to the Dollar Store up the street and found two heavy-duty plastic buckets and a hammer.

At the time I was living in a tiny, smelly apartment with six roommates. I was sleeping in a literal closet, with a tiny mattress shoved up against the wall. There was no A/C and no space. I called it “the crack den.” But, my roommates were big drinkers and gladly let me “recycle” their bottles.

Soon I had collected over a hundred bottles and had filled both of my buckets with broken glass. Once a day, I’d lay out the blue and white striped runner in the parking lot behind the crack den. And for a couple hours I’d work up the nerve to step across the glass without wearing any shoes.

I cut myself too many times to remember but I kept at it. Eventually, I performed it for a show in Long Beach, then a show in Hollywood, and another in Santa Monica.

It was a staple of the act.

I didn’t have a car so I’d take my trusty buckets with me on the city bus. I’d ride two hours to a gig, then two hours back home. I walked on broken glass in a barbershop downtown, at rooftop parties, and even poolside at a movie producer’s home in the Hollywood Hills.

Often, I’d get off the bus several blocks away from my show so the client wouldn’t know I didn’t have a vehicle. Then I’d haul the glass and my other props the rest of the way to the show.

Once I was trudging along a dark street late at night, trying to find the correct address for my gig, when I ran into a hard-to-see fire hydrant. I yelped in pain and grabbed my shin, releasing the buckets at the same time. Glass spilled onto the sidewalk.

Little did my client know, but I spent the last few minutes before I rang their doorbell picking up a hundred broken bottles worth of glass with my bare hands and putting the pieces back into my buckets. If they had opened their doors they would have seen the “world class entertainer” they had hired crawling around the sidewalk on his hands and knees in a three piece suit.

But I stuck with it, convinced it was my claim to fame. I did it on TV and in at least 20 states. At one point I had backup stashes of broken glass in three states (Illinois, Texas, and Florida) and joked I was going to “have a set in all 50”. I was half-kidding.

Then, it got popular. I saw other people doing it more and stopped doing it as much. I got tired of driving to gigs and started flying. The glass stayed home.

Eventually, I only brought it out for special occasions in Chicago. Then, I stopped bringing it out altogether. It went in a closet, locked away and forgotten.

Until last month. After an apartment renovation and a quick break between the tour and the fall schedule, I was reassessing my closet of show props and production equipment. And that’s when I found the broken glass.

I took a long look at it and realized what I had to do. I boxed it up and put it in the recycling.

At one point I was certain that I would be walking barefoot on broken glass for years to come. I was sure that it was the spectacle that would put me on the map. But it wasn’t. And it didn’t.

It took hundreds of bottles, cuts, bloody towels, broken buckets, busted shins, and long drives to have a simple realization. It took those three years of storing the glass in the back of my closet to fully get it. I finally understood that the advice that other performer gave me back in L.A. was wrong.

I had spent all of that time working to find my calling card but the most progress I made was when I had spent time working on myself. People weren’t wanting to see the mind reading or the broken glass. They were wanting to see me.

The truth is, it’s not a skill or a trademark product, it’s not a signature piece or a notable work that’s going to make your name. It’s not the art - it’s the artist.

The one thing they remember is you.