Feb 24, 2014

If you're not one of my personal friends you may never seen me in person or, if you have, you may have seen me live doing a show at Comedy Works in Denver or maybe at a company or association event.  I am a non-famous entertainer.  A hypnotist and comedian.

You may have heard me say something during the show like, "Wow! This is fun. I can't believe I get paid for this!"  And... it was true.  During the show I usually am having a fun time.  There have even been a few times I was having such a good time that I almost forgot to pick up my check.  Almost.

So... what do I get paid for?  The other stuff that I do all day long and have done for years:  Like writing this blog post, which will hopefully not only educate my prospective clients but also drive traffic to my website;  Exploring the best system to use to cue my show music; Joke writing (I try to write a humorous line every day to post on Facebook);  Today, opening a twitter account and then trying to figure out how to use it to my best advantage;  Getting health insurance;  Signing, scanning and emailing contracts;  Hand writing, addressing, stamping and mailing out promotional postcards;  Following up those mailings with phone calls;  Working on self-hypnosis programs and souvenirs to sell at my shows and on my website (Rusty Z hypnotic pillowcases, anyone?);  Copyrighting pillowcase artwork;  Calling printers to print pillowcases;  And the usual dog walking and personal stuff.  If I'm not home doing this stuff, I'm on the road, doing this stuff.  (Except maybe the dog walking.)

Most of these activities boil down to doing the one thing most people hate to do:  Job hunting.  (Eighth on the Holmes and Rahe stress scale.)  Most non-famous entertainers' gigs last a day or maybe a few days.  Once in a while you can get booked on a tour or a cruise ship for a run of a few months, which is great if you don't like to see your family and friends.  But mostly, the life of a non-famous entertainer is a non-stop job hunt.  So, the postcards get mailed, the phone calls get made, the blog gets updated, the jokes get posted, the tweets get tweeted and the products get produced.  All in the hopes of getting the next job.  

So next time you see a non-famous entertainer at a club or maybe your company event, and if they look like they're having fun and enjoying what they do, remember; that's the reward for the hours, days and months spent doing something that ranks eighth on the stress scale:  Job hunting.  And then having to start over and do it again tomorrow.

Oh, yeah.  Famous entertainers?  They have people.

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