Will Centurion: Counselling life teaching
Psychological well being, efficiency methods and self-regulation are key components for private {and professional} success. Will Centurion, Counselling and Life Teaching for Actors, Singers and Dancers, has helped quite a few artists obtain simply this.
In a world the place calls for and expectations are excessive, it’s essential to deal with your self with kindness, and evolve by the method and harness the superpower of creativity to let your mild shine.
As an business skilled with over 20 years of expertise, Centurion has offered teaching to purchasers with a view to assist them enhance their wellbeing and resilience to allow them to benefit from the highlight. With business related and evidence-based methods catered for every consumer, he affords Counselling, Mindset Teaching, Scholar Teaching, Trainer’s Psychological Well being Toolkits, workshops to Rewire, Reboot and Restore, and The Resilience Coaching Program to develop mindsets to recuperate from challenges and adversity.
Dance athletes and artists have to coach vigorously, overcome accidents, set-backs and juggle research together with different commitments – to not point out life’s highs and lows. Providing instruments to beat troublesome conditions, handle stress and wellbeing, Centurion has labored with purchasers and organisations reminiscent of Brent Road, Jason Coleman’s Ministry of Dance, Transit Dance, Victorian Faculty of the Arts, Monash College, The McDonald Faculty, The Nationwide Theatre Melbourne, The Australian Ballet College, Royal Academy of Dance, TAFTA (The Australian Movie and Tv Academy), Moulin Rouge the Musical, Magic Mike Dwell and Hairspray the Musical. Centurion has additionally been a beloved speaker at Victorian Dance Festival‘s renowned Vitality dance teacher conference a number of instances.
Be part of us as we converse with Centurion about his work and the way he permits his purchasers throughout Australia, America and the UK to realize their private finest.
Will, inform us about your expertise as a dancer and three key highlights.
“I began dancing at age 18. I used to be a late bloomer to the world of the humanities. However what I lacked in information, I made up for in ardour. All the time behind the category and by no means featured in any college showcases, I knew that one of the best ways to get forward was to remain in my very own lane. Relatively than making an attempt to be another person or wishing that my journey had been completely different, I learnt to understand my very own timeline, course of and strategy. Finally, even with solely three years of dance coaching beneath my belt, I managed to interrupt into the business and have a rewarding 20-year profession as a musical theatre performer in exhibits like A Refrain Line, West Facet Story, We Will Rock You, Saturday Night time Fever, Aladdin, King Kong Dwell on Stage and The King and I.
My three highlights are: 1.) debuting in AIDA in Germany in 2003 as an Assistant Dance Captain, 2.) taking part in BANZAI in The Lion King for the Melbourne and Perth season of the tour, and three.) ending my 20-year profession with Within the Heights on the Sydney Opera Home.”
Profession transitions are such a crucial shift for dancers and a difficult one to navigate. How did you personally work by this course of?
“Taking my final bow on stage was an emotional expertise. I knew that it will be the final time I carried out in a present. What helped was already having one thing else in sight that I used to be keen about. The psychological well being sector has been an enormous supply of fulfilment and extremely rewarding. It has allowed me to proceed to lean into my creativity. You see, our abilities are transferable, it doesn’t matter what business we select to enter subsequent, and that makes the grief extra tolerable and a useful member of any crew we determine to hitch. I took a day to mourn after which introduced myself a counsellor and mindset coach who particularly works with performing artists. It felt extremely highly effective to pivot my profession alone phrases and to look again at my time within the performing arts with appreciation and gratitude.”
For many who are curious, what does a ‘wellness coach’ do, and the way can dancers and artists profit from having one?
“A wellness coach is somebody who helps their purchasers by the psychological, emotional and bodily challenges of their chosen profession. It’s somebody who you may co-regulate with when going through setbacks, uncertainty, change and confusion, or in case you are merely needing to be reminded of your strengths. It’s so essential for dancers to have somebody working alongside them on this manner, simply as another elite athlete would. Consider all of the profitable swimmers, tennis gamers and observe runners, and I may assure that a part of their help system would come with somebody who works on the psychological points of efficiency.”
The place are your purchasers based mostly, and do you’re employed with a broad age group?
“My purchasers are based mostly in Australia, the UK and the USA. I’ve labored with a spread of each skilled and rising artists, from cheerleaders, to circus artists, to actors and ballet firm members. The ages have all diversified from 14 to late 60s. My ardour is to work with full-time college students and rising artists, providing the type of help and steering that I want had been obtainable to me in my time as a theatre college pupil working and early profession artist.”
There are such a lot of calls for for dancers and performers. What areas and subjects do you assist folks with, and how much instruments do you present them?
“Emotional well being is one thing that always will get missed in actors, singers and dancers. There’s a whole lot of concentrate on the thoughts (a high down strategy) with out bearing in mind the function the nervous system performs in the way in which we relate to challenges (a backside up strategy). The extra somebody sees a track, scene or scenario as a menace, the extra doubtless the physique will do what it must do to maintain that individual secure. Some coping types typically find yourself being nervousness, despair, avoidance, ambivalence, self sabotage, fawning and overwhelm. My goal is to assist performers be taught sensible abilities to re-regulate the nervous system after a problem, setback or disappointment and to coach them in methods to keep up an athlete’s mindset even when it feels uncomfortable.”
Offering options and accountability is a key factor of your job. What’s your strategy to navigating every particular person’s circumstance?
“The important thing factor throughout everybody’s circumstances is to be taught self-compassion and resilience. We frequently have such excessive expectations of ourselves as artists and though that’s a terrific customary to try for, our pondering and response can in a short time develop into inflexible quite than versatile. We’re completely different, however the identical. Ours is a shared expertise of attaching our self-worth to our artwork, of burning out from the hustle or forgetting that we’re human and all the time anticipating the right audition efficiency or final result.”
Are you able to give us an instance of how somebody can cut back efficiency nervousness?
“The way in which to scale back efficiency nervousness is to alter your relationship to it. Usually we see it as our enemy, or part of ourselves that’s getting in the way in which. Nevertheless, nervousness has a a lot kinder and optimistic intention – and that’s to maintain us secure. Secure from disappointment, secure from menace, secure from ache. The difficulty isn’t what it’s making an attempt to do, the problem is the way in which it’s making an attempt to do it. If we will be taught to take heed to what it’s making an attempt to inform us, if we will be taught to assist it to really feel understood, secure, protected and guided, then nervousness might begin to allow us to do what we must so we will transfer to the subsequent degree in our lives. I discover that mindfulness methods along with some somatic practices will help nervousness to really feel the protection it must, with a view to let go.”
What are your high three ideas for aim setting?
“Purpose setting can in a short time develop into overwhelming and take us away from our finish vacation spot quite than towards.
Listed here are my high three ideas for aim setting:
#1. All the time begin with the smallest factor you are able to do. That’s the very best method to get the motivation taking place.
#2. Goal to enhance by 1% daily and make the aim concerning the course of, not the end result.
#3. Don’t set targets that are too massive. Preserve them sensible: there’s no level in setting targets that go away us dissatisfied!”
Are you able to present any phrases of recommendation for these contemplating a profession change?
“The golden ticket is on the phrase contemplating. There’s nothing you need to do, simply what you select to do. A profession change must be about reclaiming your energy, not a couple of give up. Discover one thing that sparks your curiosity, contemplate how one can add worth to it and use your present to be of service to others. We’re very lucky in having the ability to reinvent ourselves. That’s a privilege, not a curse. If it feels overwhelming, ask for the proper of help.”
Inform us a bit of about your Book?
“5 Self-Care Steps for Rising Dancers, Singers, and Actors is a concise manner to assist performers increase on their self consciousness. The goal is to supply tips that anybody can use on a day-to-day foundation. The essential factor with self-care is that it’s a every day apply and an ongoing growth. The extra we keep it up, the extra rewards we have now. It’s like having a shower; it doesn’t simply occur as soon as. Self-care is a dedication as a result of with out your wellbeing, there is no such thing as a creativity.”
For extra info on Will Centurion and his companies, go to www.mrwillcenturion.com.
By Renata Ogayar of Dance Informa.
