Reality of Doing

I am truly blessed to have such wonderful friends and family. During the past 24 hours, I can’t even count the number of emails, texts, tweets, phone calls, voicemails and Facebook messages that I have received expressing congratulations. Let me start by saying thank you to each of you for your love and support.

If there was ever any doubt about whether or not I liked TV as a kid, just ask my mom. She would literally have to lock me outside in the backyard to pull me away from the tube. So it was no surprise that whenever someone asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up, I would say – I want to be on TV.

Most kids would have said doctor, policeman, fire fighter – but not me. I wanted to be an actor. But life happens, right? We grow up. We’re trained to be responsible and do the things that everyone wants us to do. But deep in my heart I still always wanted to be on TV.

And then one day a student asked me, what’s the one thing you regret not doing after college? Without hesitation I said, moving to LA to see if I could make it on TV as an actor. That split-second response came from such a place of truth – that I was forced to take a look at it.

So four years ago (last week) Erica and I packed up most of what we owned and drove across country to answer that question. The journey so far has been full of many highs, a lot more lows and a helluva lot of traffic.

I know I’ve told this story many times before, but I find it particularly relevant today.

So, thank you for watching The Event last night. Thank you for showering Erica and I with your support. But if you did watch, I hope you’ll take away more than hey, I know that guy. What I hope you’ll say is hey, there’s a guy who ‘always wanted to be on TV’ and tonight he was.

I may or may not ever be a series regular on a sci-fi hour-long drama, win an Academy Award or live in a mansion in Beverly Hills. And that’s OK. It’s also OK, that I can now go back to that student and say that I no longer have that regret. There are things we do in life that are worth far more personal value than money could ever supply. Being in that pilot last night was one of those things for me.

So now I have a question for you. What’s the one thing you regret not doing (after college, after having kids, before getting married, ever)? What’s something you’ve “always wanted to do?”

Now go do it. I did. And if I can, so can you.

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