How to avoid accent overwhelm
Mar 02, 2022
Episode 29: How to avoid accent overwhelm
Have you ever felt American accent overwhelm?
Listen as I teach you how to do your American Accent practice with ease.
Learn how to pronounce, prep and place the U.S. accent so you’re ready for that next audition.
By the time you finish listening, you’ll know:
- What is accent overwhelm
- How to practice without getting overwhelmed
- Effective strategies to practice your American Accent
If this episode inspires you then I'd love to hear from you! Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, post it to your Instagram stories and tag me@katherine_beck_ !
Then follow me on Instagram to go 'behind the scenes' with me and my own journey as an American accent coach and Voiceover Actor.
LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:Ready to master the ALL AMERICAN ACCENT? Grab my free guide to learn how to master the All American accent. Grab my free guide here.
LEARN MORE FROM KATHERINE BECK:
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SHOW TRANSCRIPT
You're listening to the All American actors podcast, episode 29. In today's episode, we're talking about how to avoid accent overwhelm. You know that feeling when you're learning another accent and it just gets to be too much and you're not even sure if you're doing the accent correctly. Well, fear not. We're gonna work through this together, I'm going to share with you my tips on how to learn the American accent with ease and not feel that accent overwhelm that's coming up next. Ready to go behind the scenes and learn what it really takes to build a sustainable career as a working actor in the US film and TV industry. Join me Katherine Beck. You're all American accent coach. As I give you the insight and inspiration to take action on your career, learn my best tips and tricks to performing with an American accent and hear from working actors and other industry professionals. To give you a comprehensive overview of this biz we call showbiz. This is the all American actors podcast. We're gonna jump into today's episode in just a moment. But first I want to give a big shout out to AK Maloney, who sent me this five star review and says highly recommended for all actors wanting to break into the American market. Catherine is not only incredibly talented at what she does, but is also delightful to work with. I'm excited to listen to the rest of the episodes. Wow, thank you so much for your kind words. And I truly appreciate it. I am so passionate about sharing my experiences and knowledge to help support you along your journey because we really all need that support along the way, don't we that guidance and sometimes just someone to bounce ideas off of and that's what I love to do. So I'm so glad that you're loving the podcast, and I'm excited to share more really cool podcasts coming your way. And I know I've said this before, I may sound like a broken record. But when we received these five star reviews like the one I got from AK Maloney, it helps us get ranked and recognized by Apple, which means we can get seen and heard by more actors all across the world. So if you're loving this podcast, do me a quick favor. It only takes about 30 seconds of your time, make sure to subscribe if you haven't yet subscribed, click the five stars write a quick review about the podcast would mean so much to me. And make sure you share this with all your actor friends as well. So if you're loving this episode, go ahead and leave us a review. Alright, let's talk about accent overwhelm. Now I am sure we've all felt overwhelmed at some point in our lives. Am I right? I know I have. I know. I felt it when I launched this podcast with 10 episodes all at once. What was I thinking that was a massive accomplishment. And I'm so proud of myself for doing it. And you know, really sticking to my goal. But was it overwhelming? Oh, you better believe it was did I feel like it was too much or that I couldn't accomplish it? Yep, too much definitely. And that I couldn't accomplish it. But because in my mind when I set myself up for a challenge I do not like to give in. I like to really strive and complete whatever it is I have set out for myself to accomplish. And I knew it would be long hours. But I accepted the challenge. And I wanted to complete my goal. And in the moments where I felt overwhelmed, I just had to remind myself to breathe to pause and focus just at one task at a time and really look at that bigger picture, visualize that beautiful outcome that was headed my way. And that's kind of what we need to do when accent overwhelm sets in so many times I see actors give up or stop practicing when the idea that it's too hard or that they're too busy to practice sets in. And maybe just maybe the underlying theme here is accent overwhelm. So let's think about this. If you're practicing your American accent on your own. Yeah, it can be overwhelming for a variety of different reasons. Number one, because in order to fully inhabit the American accent, there's a lot to learn, you know, from placing the sounds correctly to learning how to pronounce all the sounds to mastering American intonation and rhythm and stress. It's a lot of information. And number two, knowing if you're doing all of these things correctly. Oftentimes actors say, Well, I don't want to practice because I'm not sure if I'm doing it correctly. So I don't want to instill bad habits, which I totally get. I do I get that. But here's where I think we go wrong. First of all, if you're not sure if you're doing it correctly, do you have enough information and enough instruction on all the foundations of the accent to practice and learn it on your own? So think about If you've been up until now, you know learning the accent on your own referring to you know a couple of YouTube videos and things that you found online and you're practicing on your own, do you have enough information and instruction on all the foundations of the accent to really practice on your own? And secondly, and this is really important, so make sure you listen up if you don't allow yourself to fail. How are you ever going to learn how to succeed mastering an accent, whether it's American or any other accent involves discovery and exploration. If you're too worried about getting it wrong, you're holding yourself from getting it right, you're holding yourself from truthfully connecting to the accent, making it your own, letting it sink in to you. I make mistakes all the time. And you know what I welcome them. Because I always know that in every mistake I make, it is an opportunity to learn and we never stop learning, especially as actors, we can never stop learning about our craft. So take pride in making mistakes. All right now this thing called overwhelm What is it really what is overwhelm? anything, any skill you learn in life requires time requires training, it's not going to happen overnight. And yet, for some strange reason, so many actors think that they can just learn the accent overnight or take you know, a group class or a one day master class in the accent and think I have mastered the American accent. You know, it sounds funny when you think about it, I have taken one group class and I have mastered the American accent, okay, or mimicking your way through learning the accent, but I am sorry to share this with you. It requires a little bit more than mimicry to fully inhabit the accent and book the role. So yes, there is a lot to learn. And if we want to avoid this thing called accent, overwhelm, then set yourself out a plan. Give yourself a realistic timeline of how long it's going to take you to learn all the things, all the accent things, then working back from there thought out, well, how you going to practice when are you going to practice ideally every day is a good goal. And fear not, you don't have to practice all day, every day, an hour a day is great. But if you don't have that amount of time, that's okay. Even if you have at least five to 10 minutes in the day. And I guarantee you've got five to 10 minutes in the day to practice. That's what you're going to practice because again, if this is something you truly desire, and truly believe is an outcome you want to achieve, you will find the time within your day to practice. And lastly, when it gets to be all too much and you have a question or you need feedback on your accent. Well then by all means seek out assistance, hire an expert, a dialect coach to help get you unstuck and give you the feedback that you need to release some of that confusion that you may have. So there you have it. Those are my top tips on how to avoid accent overwhelm. So now go out there, get inspired, start practicing your American accent or any other accent that you've been avoiding. You know, you kind of put on the backburner. Now we're going to bring it forward and we're going to start taking action start working on that accent today. Let this be the inspiration for you to take action. And remember if you need a little bit more support or guidance on where to start, how to start you can download my free guide that's going to give you my step by step process on getting you to sound all American. It's yours. Just head over to Katherine beck.com/accent and let me know if you love this episode. Take a screenshot and share it with me on instagram tag me in it at Katherine_Beck_ you can find me there, make sure to send me a DM and let me know and also feel free to share any podcast topics you'd like to hear on the show. And coming up next week on the show. I am talking with one of my favorite Dynamic Duo couples working in LA theater director Mike Matthews and producer and writer Todd Milner. They're going to share with you their expertise and insights into the LA industry. Now make sure to share the show with all your actor friends, let them know what's coming up next week and invite them to tune in with you and learn how to become an all American Actor so you can be the working actor you dream to be until then go practice your American accent and I'll see you back here next time.
