Breathe as you breathe.

You have practiced and heard so much about breathing.

We breathe all day long so why the focus on something normal.

My experience is that it takes a long time – a lifetime – to assimilate the best breathing practice into your acting. To make it yours.

Your goal should be to breathe as you when you’re acting. Not imitating the breathing you learned in voice class or yoga.

Eventually it has to be connected to your playing.

The journey of practicing better breathing to make it your own is a key part of your journey of being a professional actor.

To be in a scene and to be breathing as taught in class is to have a disconnect. You’re both in and out. Your mind doesn’t like that.

But, you – if you’re like me and most other actors – will have to act in movies for many years with this disconnect. It isn’t a crime; it’s part of your development.

The point is to know that with conscious practice your breathing will change qualitatively. 

In acting it goes: impulse, breath, speech. That’s the linked journey you want to assimilate.