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When I auditioned for Cirque du Soleil on April 16 2010 I had one thought in my head:  I am prepared to fail.  I wasn’t going to accept failure but if I didn’t make the cut it wouldn’t be because I didn’t give it all I had.

When I arrived at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for the first time in 2005 and began competing for audiences with the thousands of other unknown shows I was prepared to fail.  The first night I did my show at the Gilded Balloon in Edinburgh there was no one in the audience.  Zero.  For the first two nights I performed my 60 minute show to an empty theater.  The average audience at the Edinburgh Fringe is 5 people.  By the end of the second week the show was selling out.  I had won the Fringe First award and we were turning people away.  Why? Because I stayed up until 2am handing out flyers.  On the fifth night there were 8 people in the audience.  One of them was from The Guardian.

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Since I began performing on stage in 1988 I have learned a few things about perseverance and expectations:

1. It is impossible to succeed without failure.

2. It is impossible to fail without trying.

3.  If I don’t at least try, everything is impossible.

Which told me that as long as I don’t give up, I’m a success.  Right?

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I wish I could say that people expected me to get this far in my career.  A severely abused lower class black kid with a high school education and a two year degree from the Community College of the Air Force?

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The high school psychiatrist (with a Doctorate) gave me my projected career choices when I was 15: Addict, jail or dead.  Michael Jordan inspired me to try and my wife gives me strength.

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Who inspires you?

Kahlil (at) gigsmacked (dot) com