Real-life resilience - Vince Vaughn

His audition failure rate was once over 99%

Vince Vaughn in Swingers (1999), courtesy Miramax

Every successful actor in Hollywood has been rejected at some point. Every. Single. One. It’s part of the journey. There is no world in which Ryan Gosling or Julia Roberts hasn’t missed an opportunity they wanted.

Vince Vaughn was that guy too.

In his early days, the actor estimates that he would land a job for every thousand auditions that he did. He got rejected from films like “There’s Something About Mary” and roles in TV shows like “Friends”.

And when he missed out, he would get pretty low. He would take some time and not work on anything productive. He explains it here:

“I would get down. I would take a week and then I would just not do anything. But then I started to realize that the week I took off was really two weeks. It was a week of not doing anything, and it was also a week of not getting better.”

One week off was actually costing two weeks!

With that realization in mind, he understood that rejection is just part of the process…. a rite of passage for any actor to go through this sort of challenge. So, after each rejection, he would get back on track quickly and re-focus on what he could do to improve for the next one.

All of the greats, whether it’s acting, sport, business executives, even successful companies…. all of them have been through some level of failure or rejection.

The dividing line between success and failure is our ability to bounce back quickly (I like to say bounce forward) and accept that failure is part of this process. This is what resilience is - our ability to advance despite adversity.

Applying Vince Vaughn's mindset to our day to day work

 

The next time we have to deliver a presentation, launch a product, or introduce a new reporting structure, we can accept that it’s unrealistic to think that everyone will love it. We obviously have to always put our best effort forward, but we also have to accept that our best may not necessarily be perfect for the client or audience. The important thing is to know that nothing good comes from wallowing in any sort of pity party. Instead, when we accept that feedback and criticism is just part of the process, we can immediately shift to solution mode. We take the feedback, adjust accordingly and try again.

Just to reiterate, there are two key ingredients we need.

The first is that we accept that failure is just part of the process. When we do that, it’s actually extremely liberating. We start to actually invite it as a way to learn more. The best way to do this is to remember the guys like Vince or Quentin Tarantino, who were rejected (badly) and used that rejection as propulsion fuel forward.

The second is to use each failure to improve. Without any attempt at actually improving, we are going to be living in a world of repetitive mistakes that no one wants. One way I like to do this is to just ask a basic question: "what's the lesson here?" and that opens up a mindset of adaptability and growth.

These are simple and effective tools to implement. And now that we know that some form of failure inevitably lies ahead, will we be prepared?

I teach workplaces and individuals the strategies we all need to improve our mindset and mental health. I've worked with the Canadian Red Cross, JAN-PRO, Scott Dunn Luxury Travel and a variety of marketing agencies. I focus on preventative ideas and practical tools to help teams and individuals thrive when obstacles come along.

WORKSHOP INFO