I come from a family that does not condone self-pity or taking the easy way out, which is why, when at the age of 12, I quit volleyball, it was not an easy decision. But after years of not enjoying it, it seemed senseless to keep at it. The things I hadn’t liked about it to begin with, I didn’t miraculously start to enjoy. And the things that I had liked about it no longer appealed. Imagine, then, what I felt when the parent of a friend and teammate with whom I was doing my homework came up and said to me, “So I hear you’re giving up volleyball.”
Needless to say, I was shattered. All the worst things I’d thought about myself seemed to be confirmed by this adult. I was giving up on something instead of pushing through. I was frustrated by the difficulty of this sport and instead of trying to master it, I was opting to drop out. She was right: it was super lame of me to do the easy thing.
The parent of a friend and teammate with whom I was doing my homework came up and said to me, “So I hear you’re giving up volleyball.”
Needless to say, I was shattered.
This mindset has tormented me for years, especially as the returns from acting have not been what I, once upon a time, had expected. And now that I’ve set myself up to change my role within the industry or leave it completely, I’m finding that I’m still haunted by this memory. I worry that, once again, I’m about to stop trying because it’s hard (and yes, this is said in a self-pitying, whining voice).
But even as my mind taunts me with the decision to go to business school and potentially leave acting in favor of a more stable career (regardless of the industry), I can’t help but wonder whether it’s fair to douse my decision in shame the way I have been. Thinking of it in this way, as though after a few halfhearted attempts, I’m just my throwing my hands up in defeat — well, that’s not at all reflective of the reality. To behave as though it is is to do myself a disservice. And in 2025, I’m trying not to do that to myself. So here is my attempt to push back on the notion that I’m just quitting because I’m tired of doing hard things.
If you loved rock climbing and decided to take on a notoriously challenging route, people would have mixed reactions. They’d tell you that they were impressed but they’d also spend a lot of time cautioning you on your choice. Let’s say you accepted their concerns as legitimate but decided to go on with it anyway. At first, you’d start the hike feeling great about your progress. Until bad weather slowed you down and forced you to seek shelter in a mountain cave. And when a few days later the weather hadn’t improved, you might decide that perhaps you should go deeper into the cave because you could spy a very faint speck of light at the end of it.
This is where the acting world is right now, to a degree. Or perhaps I should say, that’s where my career has arrived. Global events have made this a more difficult career than ever, and I’m now quite deep in this cave.
My options are either to “quit” the hike and go back, which might mean facing some self-righteous (and secretly gleeful) faces telling me, “Well, as I said, it’s a hard hike and not everyone can handle it.” Or, spurred on by what I know of this hike — that it’s hard but technically doable — I can hunker down in the cave and keep waiting, which risks using up all my supplies. Or, I can keep going deeper into the cave, risking getting stuck.
My options are either to “quit” the hike and go back, which might mean facing some self-righteous (and secretly gleeful) faces telling me, “Well, as I said, it’s a hard hike and not everyone can handle it.”
If my life were on the line, wouldn’t most people tell me to just go back and try again at a later date? So then why is it that people (including myself) see quitting as such an evil practice? Why is it that deciding to not be stubborn and reckless, to not keep going along a dangerous path, is so wimpy?
I don’t know. And even as I know that in reality quitting is not the greatest evil on earth nor is it a sign of moral lassitude, I try to find ways of skirting the term “quitting.” I tell myself that maybe one day I’ll go back to acting, that this is a strategic retreat, that it’s not me, it’s the industry, that I can make a difference elsewhere. These things are all true to a degree, but they still don’t change the key issue. The issue being, if you truly tried your best, what is so wrong with conceding the battle?
I hope to arrive at an answer before I and others feel urged to make a dangerous choice simply because we fear being labeled “quitters.”
