Actors like to work on what they call "something solid": something they can "get their teeth into."

Student actors, in particular, are primarily concerned with things they can immediately experience physically. Most of their early questions begin with the word "what" rather than "why." They're looking for action.

Now that you know something of the function of the conscious and subconscious in learning how to act, the exercises have more significance, more meaning. You understand their psychological as well as their physical purpose. By synchronizing the "why" with the "what"—getting them together—you achieve the all-important "how."

Through study and practice you have acquired good posture, which is a poised, well-balanced, graceful manner and method of standing. It puts into operation the principles of relaxed constriction.

Bad posture is a bad habit. Good posture is a good habit. By using the law of substitution, you exchanged a bad habit for a good one. Your bad posture habit was in the dark subconscious-ocean— you were not aware of it.

First you focused your aware-beam on the bad posture. Then you consciously constructed a good posture habit pattern in your conscious mind. Next, by conscious—and conscientious—practice of the new pattern, the law of substitution automatically operated. The new habit "pattern" became a habit in the subconscious.

Through this process, you made good posture your own. But remember, as long as something you have learned remains restricted to your conscious mind, it's still on "temporary loan." When your subconscious absorbs it, it's really yours.

The CONSCIOUS-subconscious process is neither too difficult nor too complicated for a sincerely ambitious actor. Understanding and putting it into practice simply takes will power and common sense.

If you haven't completely absorbed the previous lesson, read it over—again and again if necessary—until you have thoroughly grasped the theory of habit transference through the law of substitution.

Take all the time you need to go back over the exercises. Synchronize them in practice with the CONSCIOUS-subconscious theory.

If you have thoroughly absorbed these lessons, you're going to find that the processes of learning have become much easier. Your entire outlook has broadened. You have learned that the subconscious is a vast natural reservoir of creativeness, inspiration and emotional power.

This reservoir is an inexhaustible treasure chest of your imagination. When you see your ideal self—your perfect self—in a daydream, you are tapping the reservoir of your subconscious.

A great actor, either through knowledge or intuition, taps his subconscious to construct consciously the whole personality and image of a character. Then, using the law of substitution, he substitutes that character’s personality for his own.

Among the great men and women of the theater none are more universally honored than Alfred Lunt and Lynn Fontanne, stars both individually and as a husband-and-wife team.

During one of his rare guest appearances on television, Alfred Lunt, referring to himself as a portrayer of characters conceived in a playwright's mind and born in an actor's performance, said, "You don't react as yourself, but as the character you are playing."

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