Layering Emotional Preparation is an Acting Technique is key. Layering literally puts layers of emotions on top of emotions in your acting. After Activating one Emotion, you rest it, and go get another emotion activate it. This way you have more than one activated emotion current. Your real time experience will have two activated emotional ranges. This takes knowing Relaxation techniques.

Do you Blame the Playwright for writing more than one emotional current? How do you handle scenes with more than one emotion?Have you learned the acting technique of Layering Emotional Preparations?

Some Main Quotes from this Acting Article: “Layering Emotional Preparation takes patience and timing with Relaxation.” “Layering an emotional life of an experience is a key in acting”

“Emotions on top of each other will intensifying the desired Emotional Ball Park.”

Copyright 2022 Simon Blake

Why Do Actors Need to Layer Their Emotions

Acting is a complex art form and requires the actor to be able to layer their emotions. By layering their emotions, actors are able to be realistic. The more reality of emotions bring you to life in a way that more you connect with an audience. Layering also helps actors to show subtle changes in emotion. Emotions build as the story progresses. Actors must express a wide range of feelings without relying on being extreme. Facial expressions or large gestures should come out of your emotions.

Many Playwrights Have Interlaced Different Emotional Elements in the scripted Characters. The Actors job is to find within themselves the Emotional Life to live a real time experience. The Actor can’t go on stage prepared without having activated personal emotion.

Layering also allows for different interpretations. Each Actors adds their unique emotion to the same scene. Uniqueness Depends on the performer’s personal preferences or direction from the director. Layering emotions requires practice and skill. It is necessary for any actor who wants to be successful in their craft.

Technique 8: Layering Emotional Preparation

Quick Note: As the Arts and Acting grow these techniques become more relevant. IF there is no art in your acting then you do not need Emotional Preparation. There are many projects (most) that don’t have much emotionally artistic value.

Working Actors rely on their Directors and the Script Writers. Script Writers task themselves to add Emotional Layering in their scripts. Much of the industry type casts because Actors struggle to gain Acting Techniques. If you don’t exercise their own talents you won’t grow. With these helpful techniques you will only book emotional acting parts.

Learning to do this yourself builds your talent levels higher. If you handle emotional capabilities you are in a different league. Good script, writings and materials have undercurrent emotional elements.

Common Understanding:

Simon himself will spend a couple weeks on an Emotional Layering. Loving the ability to reengage in an Imaginary Emotional World builds talent.

Layered Emotional Preparations come in all shapes and sizes. They can do this as a short exercise before working. Layered Preparationscan be lengthy preparations towards an entire film script.

In some cases it will be at least a two-week process to achieve. It may take several weeks to months to gain the Emotional Concoction desired for a certain role. Layering the Emotional Preparation techniques will skillfully intwine the complex scenarios. Complex Scenarios are part of the emotional influences with audiences in acting.

Few Actors ever achieve complex Layered Emotional Preparations as a regular acting technique. It is the cream of the crop Actor that persists with Layering their emotions towards an acting role.

Layering Emotional Preparations Builds Depth

Layering your Emotional Preparations usually occur one layer at a time. In this section Simon aims to help you learn how to begin to layer your own Emotional Preparations. It is important to understand that layering emotional preparations. Layering is often a needed process. You do not need to Layer emotions to be successful with Emotional Preparations.

Far simpler single emotion techniques are just easier to utilize and function with. As practical as Multiple Preparation Techniques are, it is an advanced process. It is however important to know that Multiple Preparation Techniques exist. Knowing Multiple Layering Emotional Preparation Techniques exist is important. Often you could end up creating them by your own default you will know what to do if it happens by accident. Pay attention to the technique you are creating. Do not discard your growth because something feels stuck.

    ____________ 

Instructions: 4 Short STEPS to Emotional Preparation

Layering of Emotional Preparations is an advancement in the process of Emotional Preparation. The building up of the life inside of the Actors emotional world is a by adding personal emotion. It is easier adding the complexity of emotion before a scene commences. Gaining the necessity of the scene is not the purposes of making it more complex.

Let’s take a Look: If you are doing a role as an alcoholic. That is a complex topic and scenario. If you gain the emotions needed it simplifies the process for your acting. The goal of Emotional Preparations is to make your acting more simple. Emotion is not logical or more complex. Adding emotion takes hard work to add to your acting.

The purpose of the complexity is in the Playwrights hands. The Playwright has already thought out the outcomes. The overall method to communicate to the audience. Adding emotion remains for the reason of function. You want to function at a higher level in your acting.

Doing Emotional Preparation is not for the purpose of exploring fanciful complications. Adding Emotions is the simple way of entering a complicated Imaginary Circumstance. The more straight forward the emotional diversity the easier it is. Expressed emotion is often more enabled in expression when the Actor relaxes.

The Richness of inner life that can be entail by structuring your layers. Preparation is more incredible than most of the work combined. A realness that translates in raw format on camera and is a shock to audiences. Audiences see the real life of a scene that can surpass expectation.

Layering Emotional life may take place over several days or weeks. On occasion Layering Emotional Preparation could take place over a month period. The longer Preparations take is pending upon the work that the Actor is involved in. The part most often dictates the complexity of preparation.

STEP 1: Determine Two Single Emotions to active

STEP 2: Self Activate the First Emotion

STEP 3: Wait until you have a solid affect from the first emotion

STEP 4: In a Relaxed State activate a Second Emotion

Benefits of Layering Emotional Preparation Technique

The Layering Emotional Preparation Technique (LEPT) is a powerful approach. Helping people ready their emotions for acting is very personal. It involves breaking down large emotional tasks into smaller, more manageable chunks. Normally you would identify the larger emotional range of the scene. The issue is, often there are more than one single emotional ranges. So this technique bridges the gap to include self activating more than a single emotion.

This technique can be used to help people overcome fears and anxieties. Emotional Preparation Technique is not therapy. The process of difficult memories and experiences, build resilience and emotional intelligence. Intelligence is needed to determine which emotional ranges work for you. How well do you do in self activating an certain emotion. Intelligence is not needed as Logic within your acting.

By breaking down the task of acting into into smaller emotional parts. You can start to identify your emotions in chunks. What emotions do to you keep you in a “range” during acting. This helps reduce the potential for overwhelm and increase the chances of success. This also achieve the Playwrights emotional intentions. The Actor can be authentic and natural with the active emotion working for them.

LEPT works by layering on new skills, techniques, and understandings that can help. A person’s perspective on a situation or experience is their value. Simon teaches to be open and vulnerable to an undetermined outcome. You want to be open to what is really happening not what is suppose to happen.

Increasing your capacity to cope with difficult emotions is healthier. The critical ways to having a longer career is to get to know yourself. Being able to have an experience without numbing out is important. Avoiding certain emotions altogether is often a result of a block. If you avoid certain emotions you may have emotional blocks you need to solve. You may need to release in order to be able to work freely with that specific emotion.

Ultimately, this Layering technique can help people gain better insight. Insight into why you feel the way they do is critical. You can also learn about what ranges you find easier to access. You want to manage your feelings in more helpful ways towards your expressing them. Expression is the ideal outcome, not controlling how you express your emotions.

Difficulties To Watch For When Layering Emotions

Layering emotions can be a difficult process to navigate, with many potential pitfalls. One of the biggest challenges is not over-loading the emotional weight of a scene. This is especially true for scenes that contain multiple emotions. It’s important to ensure that each emotion is given enough time and space first before layering them.

Realize Each Emotional Layer to your contentment then work on adding another. The key is to be expressive without overpowering any emotion onto the scene (unless scripted).

• It Takes Time to Learn
• It Doesn’t work with Emotions you Don’t know well
• It can quickly take you into unexpected emotions
• It is easy for your feelings to shut down and fear to take over

The key in acting is to go with the unexpected.

Additionally, it’s important to make sure all of the emotions are authentic. Being realistic and accurate is another key. Otherwise, emotions can come across as forced or unnatural. It’s also important to pay attention to how the different expressions interact with one your scene partner. The Difficulty is in getting your emotions to build off your partner.

How emotions build on each other throughout the scene will build a career in acting. When layering emotions, it’s essential to be mindful of pacing and timing. When you feel overwhelmed relax into that until it is more manageable. The Difficulty and goal is to make sure each emotion has enough time to develop before moving on to the next one.

How to Do Layering Emotional Preparation:

Learning how to do Layering Emotional Preparation takes more work. Working with only one emotion is still a lot of hard work. Working with more than one emotion takes even more work. Each emotional current is an additional activation of emotion.

You are the Actor. You don’t need ANY Guru’s technique! You need your own Technique!

We start by breaking down the scripted materials and answering the questions. What is the overall essence of the script> Do we support or contrast the stories Essence? Is the part we play in the script contrast or support the theme of the story?

After we know how we support the scripts storyline we add our own personal emotion. We add to ourselves the essence of the entire script. The Essence is the overall mood and emotion. Actors arrive in scenes not by changing the words, but by adding our personal emotion.

If we contrast the script then we isolate our emotional feature. The script may be about how there is no corruption in the world and we are the only corrupt thing in it. Or The storyline is about how the news channels only broadcast the truth and we are the only lying part of it. Whatever our function we understand the emotion to fit it. Then we put our own personal emotion behind it.

Contrasting a storyline is a really fun thing to do as an Actor. Often times we start the work on our part and depend upon the Director. The Director will adjust or contrast our purpose within the material. BUT, We as Actors must find our own emotion to add to the Directors Direction. The Director does not give us our acting technique. The Director does not give us our Emotional Preparation. We find our own personal emotion by ourselves through journalling. Discovering what moves us. Exploring our life’s meanings. Then we have that underlying participation in the project.

When novice at Acting you start on where you understand the dynamics to be they try to play the dynamics. Playing the dynamics will pretend rather then authentically get the emotion. YOU and Your Emotional Activation go into the project. It’s important to participate without changing the lines of the script!

If anyone corrects your understanding of the script, work with it. The Director often makes changes, then you have to readjust. Each time the Director changes your understanding of the script, you adjust. It is normal that you need to adjust your Emotional Preparation. Make sure the emotion you will activate is your desired choice. Then adjust yourself to their reality with the new understanding of the script. Often times you will need to feel safe to go deeper.

What is an Emotional Layer

An emotional layer is the internal state of emotion and feeling that influences our behavior. It is the sum total of all our emotions, thoughts, attitudes, and beliefs. Our emotional layer can be a powerful motivator or inhibitor to our actions.

When we activate an Emotional Layer with acting technique we start to feel the influence of that activated emotion. It can shape how we view ourselves and the world around us, and provide us with guidance as we make decisions.

Some people may have a deeper emotional layer than others; this often affects how they interact with others, their ability to cope with difficult situations, and their resilience when faced with life’s challenges. Understanding your own emotional layer can help you identify patterns in your behavior that are impacting your life negatively and work towards making positive changes.

Learning to understand other people’s emotional layers can also help you build stronger relationships with ourselves. By listening to others providing insight into their feelings, motivations, and needs we can build our own empathy. Empathy is the key ingredient in audience connection.

Where to Find Layers of Emotional Elements

Short Answer: Within Yourself or Outside Inspiration?

When looking for layers of emotional elements to add to your story, there are a few different places you can find them. Firstly, literature and films are great sources of inspiration since they often contain complex and interesting emotions that have experienced various emotions throughout their lives.

Secondly, talking to friends and family can be a great way to gain insight into the feelings of others. Finally, personal experiences can also provide valuable insight into the range of emotions people experience in life.

By combining these sources of information, writers can create vivid characters that readers will easily identify with and be invested in. Additionally, reading and studying psychology is another great way to get ideas for adding layers of emotion to stories, as it provides a deeper understanding of how people think and feel about different situations.

By taking the time to explore these various sources and understand how people experience emotion in different contexts, writers will be able to create well-rounded and engaging stories that readers will enjoy.

In order to find layers of emotional elements within yourself, it is important to take the time to reflect on your own thoughts and feelings. Start by writing down your thoughts in a journal and noting the emotions associated with them. Then, delve deeper into these emotions and ask yourself questions such as “What do I feel?”, “What are my fears?” and “What do I need from others?”.

You can also practice mindfulness exercises like meditation or self-reflection in order to gain greater insight into your emotional layers. By taking the time to really explore your innermost feelings, you can gain a better understanding of who you are and what motivates you. With this knowledge, you can start to build stronger relationships with yourself and others around you.

Acting Technique and Playwright Scripts

Then we answer the overall essence of ourselves in the script. Are we activating the right parts of ourselves? Do we have that emotion available within ourselves to activate with self activation? Every great writer has a throughline for every different name (‘character’) within the script. Our essence may be ‘a great and loyal friend’ in a supporting role to a main character ‘despite their faults in character’ or our part maybe ‘a loyal friend that confronts the wrongdoings and impetus’s the realization of self to the main character’.

Whatever threads of existence of our demeanor within the script must be emotionally within us. The goal is to be familiar with those emotional dynamics in order to Emotionally Prepare ourselves for those dynamics. If our active nature of self is a great and loyal friend than we do not have to include a deep sense of that reality within our Emotional Preparation because we already possess it, as long it our sense of self is activated within ourselves.

If there is any nervousness that is changing or adjusting our true nature it should be coming our of our activated emotion. If not address nerves within ourselves so we can really be who we are within the scene.

Emotional Layers work by identifying the needed layers that will support the scripted materials efforts and concepts. All the dynamics that the writer has written need to be included in our consideration for preparing ourselves and any layers of Emotional Preparation that we need in order to take on the role.

If the script has your part as a loyal friend the dynamic will influence how you communicate. You can activate the emotions of being a good friend. The scene storyline is you are aware of your friends’ faults and have the courage to tell him. If you do not Emotionally Prepare on the emotions of being a good friend you will not have the reality needed. You should feel nerves from your Emotional Preparation when you have the courage to tell him his faults.

Your job is not to rewrite the script. Your job is to experience the script. In order to deliver the news to your good friend you will need Emotional Preparation. You will need to layer an additional emotional preparations into a single Emotional Preparation effort for that particular scene.

Doing so will enhance your gumption to tell the truth to your friend in the scene. That is an example of a double layering Emotional Preparation. Your regular preparation for the part as a whole, if needed and the added particular element that the scene that dynamically changes the scenes outcome.

Understand that finding dynamics within a scene is usually finding the element that changes (or has flux) the outcome of the scene. Including the dynamic identified will intensify the emotional preparation in the required way to affect the scene naturally without preplanning the effect or when the effect will occur exactly within the other actor.

At some point the reality of the Emotional Preparation will work its way into the reality of affecting the other Actors. You do not need to force your emotion out until you have the interaction do it for you. There will be at least slightly its own timing of realization each time you do the same scene.

The specific quality may even be able to be timed within a few lines of dialogue but the more freedom it has to find itself within a wider selection of the scene the more realistically it will happen. This takes the willing capabilities of the Director sometimes to appreciate the artform of realization instead of the forced doing of scripted performance.

In film the specific timing of the Emotional layer can be achieved in natural occurrence. Sometimes, It may take several takes of the same scene until the natural occurrence does occur. The timing desired by the production is always realism and authenticity.

We do not want to pride ourselves and overdue our technicalities in emotions. Make our emotional calculations as simple as possible. Let our timing depend upon interaction with the other actor. Determine our outcome with interaction as it pertains to what happens in the scene. Allow our emotional dynamic within a scene to be specific to that real time experience.

We want to learn to match our Emotional Preparations to the parts that we do in the scenes. This involves studying and choosing which emotions we will activate. The ability to layer any prior experiences with the script emotional states is your craft in acting.

Bringing over into the scene’s dynamics the emotion of initial experience is that key. Most often you activate an emotion that of the past moment just prior to that scenes happening. Preparing the multiple emotions of an experience to what just occurred prior to the scene is the norm. The beginning of a scene starts with your activated Layering Emotion Preparations for the first moment. Where the scene goes from there is word for word from the playwright. Where the scene goes emotionally depends upon how your Emotional Preparation interacts.

Learning to do layering Emotional Preparation turns the simple instruction into an artistic effort. Your Direction into the artistic form of Acting is regardless of scenes difficulty. This is why you want to keep it as simple as possible. You can trust that your acting partner is going to make it more complicated moment after moment in your scene.

Great Directors are capable of layering their casts emotional abilities and conditions. Conditions for the Emotional Preparations of the scene require full knowledge. The casts Layering Emotional Preparations will strongly enhance the capabilities of the Acting. The layering of Emotional Preparation makes the mundane request of a timed event a skilled artistic endeavor of the trained Actor.

If the Directors requests get too annoying remember to simplify it for yourself. This is why emotion is so key in acting. Emotions simplify the complicated acting instructions by Directors. The accuracy requested by Directors can get too specific. When creative differences will erupt between Actors and Director your job is to make the adjustment. It is not your job to fight so another makes the adjustment. An adjustment is simple if you are working with your emotions. Use Layering Emotional Preparation on Film Sets or during Theater rehearsals.

Sensitive Directors will go back and forth layering the dynamics of the scenes details. When the details overwhelm you, you are going to need the Layering acting techniques. Translate into emotions everything that is happening as the scene undercurrent. The Actors will achieve the fullest realization of the scenes happenings when they are free emotionally.

You will remember more of the required details when you are not logical. In this way working with your emotion can help you improve attention to detail. Do not infiltrate the Actors into heady instructions of movement without emotional intercourse without purpose. Every purpose has an emotional component.

The natural workings of the main dynamics of a scene will produce its own flow, Rythm and movement within the Actors. Cinematographers need to limit their instructions and request as much as possible. Too many requests to instruct motions towards the camera will lesson results. Instead work around where the Actors move rather than insisting on the Actors to move around the camera.

The more freedom the Actors have to work within the emotional life of real time scene happenings the more dynamics will flow from their internal sense of being and the more stimulated the scene will become.

Learning the Layering of Emotional Preparations down the very detailed requests will allow you to stay spontaneously alive instead of having to follow implicit instruction as an Actor on an overly professional environment where production egos may be present. The lifeline of the Actor who is training in the reality of really being in a scene when the scene begins is the Layering of Emotional Preparation taught in this chapter and throughout this book.

 An average scene with circumstancial reality which is more difficult to achieve will still only have active dynamics that could total less than a half dozen at a time.  But the adjustments that may need to be achieved on an set where production egos may be present could triple that amount in a single scene.  The ability that the Actor has to turn the instruction into an emotional dynamic is the lifeline they can grasp onto with Emotional Preparation and layering their emotional life.  Finding emotional reasons to justify the instructions that may be for the purposes of production only but realizing even the production elements with emotional justification is the artwork of an accomplished Actor.  
 Keeping it simple for the following examples of learning will allow a very clear understanding to even the egostical production heads and personalle that may be reading as well to help them realize the collective efforts of all involved, including themselves.  
The more instruction that an Actor receives on a set environment at the time of the scene the more you threaten to extract the dynamics and life rehearsed with the spontaneity that you desire to achieve.  But it is also the balance of the Actor keeping their own ego in check and doing as much as they can to help realize the artistic dreams of the production crew and producers that is also important. 
Let's also remember that an involved Director that works with Emotional Preparation with the Actors have dozens and dozens of dynamics that are active within them at the time of filming a scene.  Directors prioritize the abilities of their cast and crew on set and compensate for dynamics that are missing in order to save a filming of a take of a scene or to fill a need within a dynamic of an Actor interchangeably.  This doesn't even include the personal dynamics of the cast or the crew.  This is why the most organized crews often work instinctually together and are impressive teams that can adjust rapidly to different environments.  Often the advice given on organized sets is to ignore everything else and just do your part but be willing to do anything that is asked of you.  But the reality is that the spontaneity of the scene and the dynamic of presence that is included within the textures that build the workings of why a scene occurs and the direction which the scene goes once it has started is the most precious of all aspects on a film set or in a theatrical production.  

 Now that we have talked about the headaches, lets discuss the parts of the work that are easy for everyone to accomplish together which involve up to a dozen layers of Emotional Preparation that will keep the spontaneity of the part alive within the Actor and a common understanding within the production. 

The more you are capable of having the crew comprehend the overall dynamics and overall process the more they can be supportive of the production and start with the knowledge of knowing when to assist and when to wait.

~ _ put this bellow Layering Emotional Preparation
Building Depth – Layering Emotional Preparation with Same Emotional Current
Layering Emotional Preparation with the Same Emotional Ballpark with One Emotional Current.
Many actors struggle with themselves with knowing if they have given their full selves into their work. This process is a process of Emotionally Preparation which layers your preparation until you know you have maxed out your emotional life.
The first thing to review before learning this is the thing that makes it not work which is ‘Emotion does not like to be watched’. As soon as we focus on Emotion and not meaning we will feel a difference in our Emotional Preparation. Emotional life that is watched will vapor into areas that will take quite some time to retrieve later.
Layering a similar emotional life and experience on top of each other will intensifying the desired Emotional Ball Park.
do not exhale the emotional life, allow it to sit within you as you resolve to a meditative state of adjustment.
In life we do this without knowing we are doing it, until an event in life reminds us of how much of an emotional state that we have, which then at that point in our life we have to address the issue. Alcoholics go through this all the time by one glass at a time they suppress the emotional layers.
In this process of Emotional Preparation, we do not suppress emotional because we remain aware to it and allow it to build up inside of us until we choose to let it go. The mere working with this many layers of this similar emotional life awakens more of that emotional life not giving it a chance to suppress. We are awakening the emotional life by activating it to recognition and building up the processes to continue to recognize the layers one by one, then at the chosen time we release into the scene.
This particular Emotional Exercise is a way both a way to uncover bent up emotional life that is in hiding in a specific area and a way to layer the emotional life talent by attaching the meaning of your emotional life to an imaginary stimulus of the scene.

Re-Activating recent Layering Emotional Preparation

There is a point in the work that you will have to learn to re-activate already lived within Emotional Preparations. This step is often a step that goes without contour. It is important to remember to re-activate your Emotional Preparation and all the steps that you need to in order to achieve the freshness that is desired within the work of realism.
Creating realism is a responsibility which also comes with the actions of intension before the artwork commences. It is in a beginning sense starting within you but the responsibility of consistent work on camera and for a scene requires an ability to step back take a breath and re-activate your intended Emotional Preparation program that you have designed for yourself for the scene.
Re-Activation is a when necessary or when a needed procedure that you will have to learn when you are needing it and when you are already present within a framework of that specific emotional element.
If you are just learning Emotional Preparation you need to understand that the advanced person may prepare and layer many different emotional colors into an intertwined emotional life and then let themselves go into an exercise or a scene. That more advanced person may even write down the segments that are of importance to them to have a checklist of sorts but the less advanced Actor may only need the ingredient of relaxation in order for the life that they already have to just come to the surface so they can let go of it and allow the connection to the others in the scene or exercise to be as authentic as possible.
Either way the re-activation of Emotional Preparation is a valuable lesson if you allow yourself to adjust to your present needs. Each time you work with Emotional Preparation re-activation you will discover that it is a different assembly every time it is achieved. This customization is actually a benefit to the work of the Actor and a reason why experience can accumulate so rapidly learning Acting.
However genuinely complicated or simple the Re-Activation needs to be is how complicated the Actor should make it. The re-activation should mirror the inner preparation for the scripted material or the desired Emotional Preparation that the Actor is attaining. The journaling of the experience could be an added benefit for referencing later on and also for keeping track of the experience as long as it does not intellectualize the approach. Self-Stimulation is an approach in acting that is a crafting mechanism for the emotional life that will be carried over into the filmed scene work so it must be a sought-after approach to allow the Actor to create their own process of achievement.
The personal process of achieving the Re-Activation of Emotional life is the responsibility of the Actor and not that of any other position within the industry. Occasionally an Acting coach may give examples to the due process of achievement, but the personalization process needs to remain the Actors achievement of parenting their own emotional self. If the Actor is anywhere near the ability level of Re-Activation of Emotional Preparation, then they have their own abilities to journal, track and in a non-intellectual way restimulate themselves in the desired ball parks that accumulate to make the make-up of their emotional life of the Re-Activation.
Reducing Emotional Intensity from Emotional Preparation

Reducing the Emotional Intensity from Emotional Preparation is a cooling down time of the Preparation. You may want or need to from the Direction of the Director to reduce or loose part of your Emotional Preparation between takes or between rehearsals. Releasing techniques are more than timing out techniques or suppression of what you have gone through. Do not tell yourself that you are releasing the emotional element unless you are releasing the emotional element.
Releasing emotional circumstances surrounding your set up will release emotional components that are attached to those elements.
It is important to slow the believe to change regarding the meaning of the Emotional Preparation. Each Emotional Preparation layer has a meaning attached to it. It is designed that way so that when you are exiting the Emotional Preparation than you can exhale the emotion and the attached meaning that will take the remaining of the meaning with it.
We never just add emotional to Emotional Preparation because we want to be able to work with the structure of the Emotional Preparation and we are knowledgeable enough to know that Emotion is too fickle of a substance to work with alone.
Emotion tends to stick to whatever it is closest to. So, we orchestrate a meaning and attach the meaning to the emotional layer that we are subtracting.
We can thus then subtract entire portions of our Emotional Preparation and lessen the load of emotional weight by lessoning the weight of the meaning we built up during our Emotional Preparation Processes.
IF you take away the meaning of what someone is intending then you take away the emotion that is attached with it. This deflation event can occur with a child whose mother takes away the meaning of what the child intends to do during a process or discovery of the child. The mother could take away the meaning by changing or even just undermining the intent of the child and the emotional life inside of the child will change. Their attitude towards scoring that next goal in soccer all of a sudden becomes them not wanting to go to soccer because it is not a cool enough sport. The same is true with Actors and with your Emotional Preparation. What you deflate about your meaning takes emotion that is attached out with it. So, a change of attitude about what something means to you can be the ticket to releasing that aspect of emotional life.
The construction and destruction of Emotional Preparation is about what is valued and not valued by you. If you take the value out of your incentive or energy and focus to achieve something than the emotional life that was attached to it will also leave you.
Learning to orchestrate your own personal value system and be sensitive to yourself in a way that will continue to motivate the meaning or deflate the motivation of the meaning is a piece of the skill of being able to control your emotional life without having to control your emotion.
Example: One example which is pertinent to this particular discussion is changing the motivation of another in your Emotional Preparation to the person that you were working with and was highly motivated to achieve something with you. Then you could change the situation to they are no longer motivated to work with you. Changing this detail in your imaginary daydream could expel all types of emotional life that is connected to that part of the construction of your Emotional Preparation. Thus, releasing some of your preparation and not releasing your overall preparation. These types of emotional readjustments are key in being able to readjust your emotional life without touching your own emotions.
This process of attaching and Un attaching meaning will increase your empathy to the things that you do have the ability to change and adjust your attitudes to things that you do not have the ability to change.

Examples: of Layering Emotional Preparation in same teaching field.

-Clarify: Layering Emotional Preparation Techniques will by default often cross layer emotional Preparation but it is not the same as intentionally doubling into an emotional element. This is where Utilizing technique can make it look like you have more experience than you do.
Using multiple techniques will usually layer your emotions adding texture and contour to you emotionally.
Advice is: Do not try to both use multiple Emotional Preparation Techniques and also do specific techniques on your emotion at the same time. Atleast allow the technique of layering emotional effort to take affect first. Likely the simplier you keep it the fuller the emotional life will become.

-Confusion can often times come into making too many efforts at the same thing too soon.

Combined Emotional Preparation

Combine techniques in clear ways that layer upon each other in supportive ways to grander the solid circumstance. This is the reason why combining emotional preparation successfully usually occurs later on in an Actor Emotional Preparationary experiences because it takes time to learn to interweave dynamics keeping alive the previous work done.
How to choose the best choice with the deepest or most believable results – –

Example:
Jordan shows up to a new environment and new film set nervous about being in an unfamiliar environment having never met the cast on a regular series. Off camera Jordan decides to allow his nerves to be there but on camera he decides to be fully engaged and relaxed as possible. It is evident to everyone that first few days of his guest role that he is nervous, but they notice how he relaxes into his acting which creates a coherency with the other cast members on screen.
In the end a few weeks later Jordan gets called back for additional work and even though the director remembers that he was nervous on set, the director knows that the Actor will deliver in the film footage.
If Jordan had have tried to hide that he was nervous or be overt about how nervous he was to distract himself from the goal of staying relaxed and going with the real time acting experience in his acting it would have turned out different. Even though Jordan is not a professional Actor his actions behave like a professional by his demeanor and intentions towards acting.

You cant make yourself a professional you can behave professionally and later on likely be called one.

Finding the switch inside yourself of your willingness to release your own emotional freedom is an achievable endeavor. Being settled in the unpredictability of the outcome and the variances participation you are active with pending upon how much there is to receive is a healthy position. Letting go of your predetermined timing within a scene and going with the real-time impulses as they happen will leave you very present in your acting work with an incredible awareness as to what is actually occurring in the scene and scenario.
Allowing the internal unexpressed emotion to come out of you through interaction and from the others interest in you rather than your own pontification and overt expression will more thoroughly engage your senses and captivations. You will notice more about the other person or people you work with and more about the environment you are in when you are becoming interactively expressive based on others interests in you rather than your presented persona to them.
There are ways to self-prepare or Emotionally Prepare that will make your own work more engaging and interesting but when you are capable of receiving the other persons interests you will catapult audience’s interests in you because your entire senses are actively involved.

Question: Is Normal to feel at the end of a scene that you have not entirely expressed all of your Feelings into the scene?
Answer: Yes, and sometimes No. Often times you do not need to entirely spend thrift your emotional life in a scene. Seldom in life are you that encapsulated that you are empty emotionally after a discussion.
Rather than focusing on emptying yourself emotionally onto the other person allow the residual emotional effects to occur in your scenes. This means that you may have more awareness of a problem or situation at the end of the scene than at the beginning. The Inner life and dynamic of inner turmoil may build for several scenes or even the majority of the picture you are filming. If it, does you are doing something right, not wrong because there is a flux in your inner stimulations that is happening due to your involvement in the scenes in front of the camera. The inner stimulations in front of the camera can then be fully supported and reactivated by using Emotional Preparation Techniques.
To complete the answer, realize that you do not have any obligation to entirely express all your feeling in the scene overtly but that much of the scenario will be present in you without your outward expression of it. It will be obvious to the audience that you are stimulated by the occurrences or interactions if you are relaxed enough to trust the process does not have to be completed by you in any more than a natural way of an open response. A regimented response is not needed, and a punctuation may have already occurred in the scene which is the scenes own natural transitions or endings.

Internalizing UnExpressions (Wrap Up)
Internalizing Unexpressed Expressions means that you are making an effort to hold back your own responses, or you are unable to respond with how you actually are with honesty. You may be confronted, and the honesty of your expressions are getting you stuck in your head or internalizing what might happen with you without the interaction with others that are present around you.
When you internalize an expression, you fail to release its truth which conflicts with your job as an Actor. Your need to reveal your true self in acting is your bread and butter as an Actor. As you work through your inhibitions of revealing to others your own truthful responses you will discover that you are likely somewhat different than who you thought you were. Instead, you will find that you will surprise yourself with who you are becoming which even happens over the course of one film or a 3-month period of acting classes.

• Journal Example of student in caligraphy type font –

Layering Emotional Preparation Acting Classroom Segment

Teacher – It is the stillness between the notes, that is what is a Moment! Remember this. A Moment is the stillness between the notes. The words are what interrupt the silence so they must have meant and Rythm. So, if you are acting and contriving you will never feel that stillness, thus you will never have reality in your work. When you do not have stillness in your work you will not be real.
Unanticipated reality is realness. You also have no realness unless you have relaxedness. Being still with unanticipated reality is discipline that the artist learns while learning acting. Just as a sculpture learns that their own patience is part of their craft. Learning to be comfortable with that and trust that it is the test of an Actors Faith.
Acting is nothing less than faith tested.

Layering Emotional Preparation is a personal self-doing of an Actor to achieve multiple emotional states.

Example – doing fairly well so far in the work.
Student conjures emotion.
Literally rushes out of the studio at the teachers critique. A student friend of hers goes out after her. The student’s friend comes in and gets her bag and book for her friend. Says to the teacher. ‘She says she’s not coming back’. Teacher says, “well tell her she is welcome to. Sleep on it and make her own decision” ‘ok, I will’. The student’s friend says.
Teacher – She is in love with her emotion. I’m not being mean, just honest. If you love your emotion that much you will miss having the experience. Audiences want to see real time experiences not just emotional outpours. Her own talent to emote is hindering the rest of her talents in being active. She has much more talent than she is allowing herself to use. I hope she realizes that one day.
The teacher mutters to themself. ‘Sometimes teaching isn’t easy. Telling people things that they really don’t want to hear gets upsetting some days.’ The student Eric – speaks up ‘we appreciate your honesty sir’ the teacher looks back realizing he said that outload makes eye contact with the student and nodds. ‘Hope so’ .

Scene
Student – emotional Preparation [ ]
Student – Emotional Preparation [ ]
Actual scene –

• The experience of the other person without emotional preparation – example.
  Scene where the one student doesn’t really catch an emotional preparation and is flat and lifeless underneath the words.

— Emotions don’t layer unless you let go of the first layer. Dividing the emotional pie instead of collecting emotional experience to add to one another.

Teacher – Learning to play by ear in music is an important study for an Actor to achieve. Just like in music the notes being played are not done by wrote but instead by how the artist hears the notes and adjusts the tune.
All acting should be improvisational enough to adjust yourself to the notes that you hear as you are inside of the experience of your acting scenes. It may take time to achieve this, but it is the goal of all decent acting is this principle.
In addition, you are actually all learning to allow the other to play your emotional instruments. Giving over to your partner to have them play your emotional chords as you also interject how you feel about them. The reality is that the more you can give over to your partner, the more of yourself will be revealed.

• Make another point somewhere else too. The key is getting your instrument to open and accessible to your acting partner and then relying on them to play your reality and emotional expressions. This way you are working off of them and you are also alive and spontaneous in the presence of the scene. The script has already determined your outcome, just as destiny some say has determined your life path. The more you give over yourself your open instrument and emotionality to the other the more you will accurately live out what the writer has written.

Layering Emotional Preparation Techniques

Layering Emotional Preparation takes the skills of being able to achieve single emotions in Actor Preparation and add another emotion to that Layer.

The skills of Layering Emotional Preparation involve relaxation.

Learning how to relax and gesture yourself to be able to keep one emotional thing still while you get another emotional thing also activated is a step-by-step tricky personal process.

About Simon Blake

Simon Blake has studied between 30,000 – 40,000 acting exercises and studied over 8-10++ thousand acting students and professionals. Studying over 1000+ famous names in the industry learning techniques that are keys to unlocking their talents.

“Meisner In and Out Exercise, which was later known as Doors and Activities give a basic building block to modern day acting” Simon Blake’s training includes every aspect of Meisner Training.

After being assaulted by an industry student associated with the school Simon moved on to finish his acting books and start teaching acting online. Studying every area of Meisner Training with well over 30 Teachers including himself.

Simon Blake runs and operates the website EmotionalPreparation.com which teaches Actors how to add Emotion to their acting using improved acting techniques.

Don’t Miss the Acting Lists !
Over 900 Meisner Independent Activities
900 + Emotions for Acting List

Copyright 2019, 2022 Simon Blake