Oh wait, I'm middle aged!

After rejecting her age for years, Erica finally is accepting that she's in her 40s.  Find out what is finally make her accept this.

Plus, updates on her goals, acting, and improv.

Transcript

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Welcome everybody. I'm your host, Erica Hernandez, and this is midlife crisis. No, just following my Dululu dreams. Episode 9.

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Da da da da da da da da da da. What if I talked like that all the time? What if I talked like that all the time? My dog is farting. Oh fine. I don't know. I came in here trying to be all excited and instead I was Zen and I was honed in. And this very zenny, um, what is that spiritually character came in and she's like, I gotta be live. I go to be live. So she was. She was. Today we have a great show for you. And by we, I mean me and all my personalities and my dogs that are sleeping and may fart and snore from time to time. Uh today we're gonna talk about some real midlife crisis stuff. Like some real, real midlife crisis stuff that is happening to me. And it's been happening for the past like few months, like recent months, end of 2025 into 2026. And then I'm gonna give you a little bit of a life update on the acting world, what's happening there, the improv world, and maybe a little bit of an update on my love of life, maybe not. 67. I know, I know that that thing six seven died a long time ago, but my niece loves it, and I thought it was hilarious when she did it the whole time I was there. I thought it was the cutest thing. She wrote 6-7 everywhere. She even wrote I Love 6 7 on some papers that I left laying around the house. And uh, I love her and I love everything she does, and she's perfect, okay? She's perfect, and if she loves 6-7, I'm gonna love 6-7. Anyways, let's get to the show. Um, I wish I had music, but I don't. There's like music playing in my head, like cutting these segments, but I don't know, but it's not happening. Um, fun fact if you guys could see, if you guys are watching on the YouTube, you shall see that um I have a mic stand. I have a mic stand because last two podcasts I was holding the mic when I when I was sitting in my couch and it kept I kept hitting it and I kept doing the like when I was editing and editing the podcast, I kept hearing the boom boom sound, the the podcast, the m the mic, the podcast. I kept hitting myself, I kept hearing when I would hit the mic. I could possibly edit it out, but that would take too much l time, and I just don't want to spend time fixing an audio issue that should be fixed upon recording. Okay, like ain't nobody got time for that. I don't get paid for this. This is a free podcast, guys. It's free for you. I don't make any money off of it, I just want to share my story. Um, and so I'm not gonna spend time on things that don't bring me joy or bring me money, okay? Like those are the two things. Like it has to bring me joy and it has to bring me money, and that's where I'm going to go. That's where I'm gonna be, right? Joy and money, joy and money. That is the theme for 2026. Joy and money! On to Saturn news. I want to talk about something that's been uh been heavy in my heart. Friends, family, audience members. I want to talk about some real stuff, some real midlife crisis stuff. As many of you know, as you get older, certain things happen. And officially we have to lay to rest. We have to say goodbye to my fertility. R.I.P. fertility? R.I.P. My fertility. Because I think I think I've officially entered perimetopause. Um, I haven't gone to the doctor yet because I need to find a doctor out here because I have a doctor, but they're in Northern California. I never go to visit just a few times a year. So uh I need to find one soon because I'm getting some symptoms that are not that are not fun, guys. Being a woman is so fun. Actually, I do I do love being a woman. I do, I do, but um like lately, lately, my periods have been beyond be like light, like super light. Sometimes I I'll have periods where it's just spotting. Um, and then my I'm not as regular as I used to be. So I never I was always kind of late. Like I was never ever on time, so I was kind of off. I was always slightly irregular with my timing. Is that the wording? I think that's the wording. Let me see what I wrote my friend. But um my with my periods, I was never like like to a schedule, right? Like some women are like, hey, um, it's it, you know, I get it every third Thursday of every third third, every every third Thursday of the month. Um I was kind of I kind of had something similar where I was like, I would always get it like on a Wednesday, or if something happened, I knew I was gonna get it like two days after that, like, you know, like certain I would get certain cramps and then I'm like, oh, I'm gonna start my period in like two days, or I would be bloated, and I'd be like, okay, next week I'm getting my period. Um and I was always slightly off. Like I would be pretty like I would be kind of on time, let's put that in quotes, um, for a few months, and then something will happen, and then it would kind of shift a little bit, and then I would have that shift, and then I would have that like similar similar regularity for a little bit and then like shift. So there was like seasons where my how often I got it kind of changed, how my cycle was kind of changed. Um, but now I'm even more irregular. So now it seems like almost every month it's like alternating, like I'm a little bit late one month and a little too early the next month. And also with that, like one month feels very, very light, and another month feels like almost normal, um, but still light. And then on top of that, I'm I spot now before my period, like sometimes I'll spot like a week before I get it. So I'm like, I don't know if I'm on my period or not. One time I like spotted between my periods, which doesn't happen. And this time around, the past two cycles that I've had, um, I just had like really, really bad cramps, and I'm I actually like things are starting to irritate me a lot more. Like sometimes it's my dog's breathing irritates me. I'm like, get away from me, like go away, like don't talk to me. Um and it it's kind of like like I don't know, um, it's interesting to see those hormones changing and be like, okay, this is happening. And the reason why I want to see see a doctor, because my like the reason why I want to see a doctor is like my symptoms aren't that bad right now. I've had some friends have experienced some not like had had some not so good experiences. Um, I had one friend that had very bad um like mental health issues, like they were crying a lot, and they were um like they were depressed for no reason, they had really high anxiety and they weren't an anxious person. They would they didn't like know what was happening and they tried to do it as natural as possible, but they recently got on not recently, I think it's been over a year since they got on hormone uh replacements or hormone therapy. I don't really know what it's called. So I'm like, well, I don't want to get bad. Like I don't want it, I don't want my symptoms to get worse. I just want to be on the hormone hormone therapy or replacements. I just want to get on some hormones to help this all out, right? Like, let's stop it before it goes haywire. Um, because one of the things too is my cramps are a lot worse. Like, I don't I never got per like bad cramps. Like I would get cramps, and every once in a while I would get pretty painful cramps, but it was just like half a day and then it's done. Now I'm dealing with like two, three weeks of cons con constipation and bloating, and then like cramps like the whole time before I get my period and during my period. Like yesterday I woke up with like really bad cramps, and I basically was living off of like ibuprofen for like three days. I'm like, this isn't what I want. I don't want to be in this pain, I want to just go with the flow. Like, I am so like out here living my living my best life and my perimetopause like my like my fertility ending is not gonna stop me from living my best life, right? Like I don't care that my fertility is ending, okay? Like I just don't want to deal with all the pain and the mood swings and all the hormone j shormone stuff that make me go crazy, okay? I just don't want to go crazy. I'm already crazy enough as it is. I don't need something else making me crazy. Okay, okay, so yes, I am uh in the market for a new doctor, and that's just like that's just a thing we go through as women, I guess. And I always consider myself like just more free-spirited, like young spirited, and it's like you know, the ages, the body is growing up, the body is changing, I can't fight uh the hands of time, right? I am where I am. Um, and about the fertility um ending, coming to the end of my fertile lifespan. Um, there was some sadness that came with it. Oh my god, I didn't realize how sad I was gonna get. So, for those of you that don't know, I don't have children. I am a super aunt and I love being a super aunt. I love kids, I do love children. But a long time ago, I was very much okay with not having children. Um, I was just always like, if I have kids, great. If I don't have kids, great. Like it just I was very indifferent about it. Like if I became a mother, of course I would be happy. And if I didn't become a mother, I still would be happy. Like my life fulfillment and my happiness wasn't based on whether I was a mother or not. Um, and so I do think that I probably am not able to have kids because I wasn't in my last relationship, I wasn't on birth control for many years, and I never had an accidental like or like I never had a pregnancy scare. Um, never I didn't get pregnant or anything like that. So it was just kind of like, huh. And yes, yes, for some of you thinking like, well, you need to have, you know, XEX Erica to get pregnant. Yes, I was having XEX, unprotected X EX. So I don't know if it was my partner or if it was me, um, as to why I couldn't have kids. So when I really accepted the fact that um I am entering the stage where I'm not able to birth the child, I got really sad. I was surprised how sad I was. I basically spent like one morning, one Saturday morning, just crying my eyes out. And I think a lot of it had to do with like um I didn't feel worthy as a woman and didn't feel worthy to be loved, um, because I'm still single, right? And I tend to like younger men a few years younger than me, and even just men my age too, like maybe they are looking for like someone that can have children, and so I thought that like it brought my value in the market in the dating marketplace lower. That's a really bad way to say it, but that's what I was thinking, right? And all those ideas were coming through my head, like I'm never gonna find anyone, no one's gonna want to be with me because I don't even want like I can't even have kids, because at least before I could just be like, well, if there were, you know, I don't know. At least like before I could I at least say I could I could physically have them, right? Like my body could do it. Um, but like then like once I was thinking about it, I was like, why am I crying? Like, why why am I mourning this thing that I wasn't really sure um I did I wanted? Um, and it's just basically like just it's letting go of an old part of me, right? That's that's like old Erica, right? The the one that was just in regular menstruation, it's an identity, right? There's this young woman Erica, the fertile Erica versus maybe not fertile Erica, and really understanding where my value comes from. But being okay with just being sad about it, like it's an end of an era. It is, it's the end of an era, and we if we don't process us our process our feelings around something coming to an end, it just kind of haunts us and it go stays in our body and it's just unprocessed and it comes out in different ways. And you know, we see how we see how people get when they don't process their feelings. So I'm glad I processed it, processed sounded like I said, prostitute, but I'm glad I processed it that morning. Um, because after I had like the good cry, like no one's gonna love me because I can't have children anymore. Um and like me like not giving birth, I don't I don't even want that stuff, so I don't even know why I was just so sad about it. But after I processed that stuff and realized that my worthiness is just me being me, like I'm just worthy because I exist in this world, I'm worthy because I bring value, and even though I'm not a mother, I am a mother, right? Like I'm like I don't have any biological children, but I have two dog child childs, right? And I'm very involved in my nieces my nieces's is that how you do the plural? I'm very involved in my nieces' lives. Um, and I'm just an extension of the parenting to my siblings, and I love being an ant. I could pour my love into those children that are in my life and that I love so much. Plus, I think I've talked about this before. My sister works in nursing homes, and um, she always tells me the ri the aunt that never have children, you know, the the nieces and nephews take care take better care of their aunts than they do their parents. So I'll be okay. I'll be okay. Um, and I do love babies. I do love babies, I love kids. I don't like teenagers unless I'm related to them because I have to like them, right? Because they're blood. But you know, the teenagers I don't really like too much. And my niece is my niece Miley. Um, she's she's she's turning into a teenager. She's gonna be 13 in a few months, and she's already getting those mood swings. And I'm like, I don't like it when you're like moody like that, when you're a little sassy, but there's some fun parts that I do love. Right. Um, when I went to go visit, there were some cool conversations we had, and I really loved that part. But then when she was just kind of um irritable, sassy teenager, I'm like, mmm mmm. And so that's kind of the joke my my sister and I have uh right going on right now where if she doesn't answer my calls, it was like I was like, oh, she being a teenager because she doesn't want to talk to us, she doesn't want to hang out with us anymore, we're not cool anymore, we're not the cool people, she doesn't look up to us and just want to be with us all the time. So that that's a sad part. That's the sad part too. That's that's another midlife crisis thing, right? Where your kids and your nieces and nephews don't want to um talk to you anymore. They don't want to talk to you anymore, but but that that part of life is is is done, is done, and I'm gonna be looking into doctors and getting the the treatment I need before it gets bad, because I know it can get bad. I luckily I haven't had hot flashes or anything like that. Um my mood swings I think are still manageable, but I don't want them to get worse, right? I don't I don't know, like maybe I think they're fine, but really I'm just like a raging, a raging bitch, and all raging, raging, raging. Why can't I say that? Maybe I am being a raging bitch and uh no one wants to tell me, or I'm just like spend so much time alone in my apartment and no one knows like what's really going on. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. You know, you know what I'm saying, you know what I'm saying. Um so the other topic I want to share, um, just talking about how the do the part of this podcast about being Dululu and following my dreams in my 40s that I wanted to share is just how um how currently I'm just seeing so much of the things that I had wished for, hope, hope for, right? Like I just sat on the edge of my bed being like Ave Maria Purisima in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen. Oh dear God, please give this to me. I want this life. How much of that I'm seeing manifesting before my eyes, like it's happening, it's happening, guys. Oh my god, I'm so trying to like I I'm starting. My like my dream life is happening. I'm starting to live it like after all these years, like things that I've done in the past few years, especially the past four years, right? I've I really started this path four years ago, and maybe before, how everything is starting to fall into place, and I see it and I'm so excited. Um, so as some of you may know, I'm taking improv classes at the UCB. Right now I'm in 201, which is the second level. I'm halfway through. Yay! And um with that, we have to see shows. Um, just a minimum of two shows. They're free for students. There's some some shows that they show that are not free for students, um, but for the most part, almost all of them are free. So after class, I've been staying and even driving out. I drove out last night um driving out there to go see some shows. And I love it because in that area, um, because the UCB is there, you start seeing people that that you recognize on TV um and or the internet. Right now, like really loudly, the internet because um Try Guys, Dropout, Smosh, those and and and there may be more company companies that that do it, but those are the three I know. Um those YouTube channels, uh a lot of their current cast are alumni from from UCB or have improv groups that perform there. And so I either see them or I see other cast mates that that work with them. And so on like a few weeks ago, like I saw somebody from the Tri-Guys there. They just like kept they were walking back and forth, and I'm like, oh my god, that is Quazy James, and then um somebody else who's actually on a TV show on I think it's on Peacock that has um what's her name? Emily Clark, I believe. Uh to uh Daenerys Targaryen. Um, so she's like in a show with her, but also I know her from the internet. She was just outside as I was walking in. I was I've been able to see certain performers, and it's a very small theater, so some of them are like literally like in my face. Like last night I went to a show and a performer, I think he's on dropout. I've seen him through other internet stuff, but he was like his back was to me and he was doing a bit where he was like shaking his booty. So basically his butt was in my face. I I'm not complaining, I'm not complaining. It was all consensual, okay? Okay, yeah. But it was it was he was doing a funny bit where his like jet pack was making him like shake like making his butt body shake, and so um that was like really fun. So being able to be ah being able to. Be in these spaces and see internet celebrities that I know. And then on top of that, I went to like another show. Um, totally somebody that's a stand-up comedian, they're a comedian, they're from Canada but live in the UK, and I saw Rebel Wilson there just in the audience, like there. And I'm like, oh, I'm starting to be in the same spaces as celebrities are at, right? I'm starting to be in the spaces as actors and improvisers, like my worlds are starting to collide. Where before I just felt so far away, and it felt like just a dream and felt like something I could not achieve. To now, like, oh, you're just an audience member of like me. You're just normal like me. Like, we're just here. And yes, celebrities are just normal, but but it's it's it's taking that life off of a pedestal and me just slowly aligning myself to it. So, like I had the celebrity life up up on a pedestal, right? It's like level three, and I was on in the basement floor, and I've been slowly changing my energy, shifting with everything I've been doing, right? Like here I am shifting, shifting, shifting to have my energy um calibrate to that level where I need to be in level three. And I think that was pretty freaking awesome. Like just seeing seeing how much I've evolved in the year that I've been here, year and a half. Um, and it's so funny, like I was thinking about it this morning as I was thinking about this episode that um like like um when I first lived out in out here in LA in my twenties, like because it felt like because I f you know when you're in your 20s, you feel like you could do anything and nothing's impossible. So when I was out here and got the job in casting and was in already in the scene, I used to see celebrities left and right, like all the time, anytime, anywhere I went, didn't matter where. Like I went, I remember I went to Target and I saw somebody that was on ER, I believe uh Luca, I think that was the name of the actor. He was just like in Target shopping. Um, and then I think I just went to like a gas station and one of the guys from American Pie was there, and he and I actually asked him a question because my gas pump wasn't working. I didn't realize it was him, so I started talking to him because he was on the other side, and like I thought it was weird how he like came up and walked to like like was kind of walking towards me. I was like, What's up with this guy? And when I was just asking him about the gas, he kind of like stepped back a little bit. He's like, Oh no, my friend, my friend's the one that's pumping the gas, but he went to go get something. I'm just out here. Um I don't know why he was out there. No, we didn't have iPhones back then because it was like early 2000s, but like I drove off and I was like, Oh, that was the guy from American Pie. He probably thought I was gonna ask him for his autograph or something. That's why he was like so, like, there was so many random things where I just was already c calibrated to that world that I would see celebrities everywhere. I I remember I went to a bar to meet meet up with some friends, and Bobby Brown was there. This is like after him and Whitney divorced, so he was there with like some young girl. But like it was it was crazy that I would just see these celebrities randomly at a gas station down the street from my house, right? At a Target, at a bar that was by my house at that time. So I would just I would just see these people like all the time, constantly. And then ever since I moved to LA this time, um I haven't seen anybody until recently, until in the past few weeks. But like I really haven't seen anybody anybody like just walking around. And I know it has to do with like just my energy and what I was willing to to accept into my reality and be ready for, like, I just wasn't ready for it. Um and I I do feel like you taking the time to rest was the crucial part. I got burnt out last year. I tried the internet thing and the being being like an influencer or a content creator and it it like drained me. And uh I'm working with Marley Ansel, who is a spiritual coach. Um, and I had hired her to help me get motivated, and what we realized was I needed rest, like I needed to just do nothing and focus on fun and and be around people and be more in like a social environment, and through that we realized like, oh, I need to take improv classes at the UCP, and so this that rest time at first I fought it a lot, I fought it so much because I was like, I just need to do things, but it was just like I just needed that time to just be with me, and and and I I call it rest time, even though like at times I was going out with friends, I was just hanging out with people I liked and just doing things that I loved and that had nothing to do with acting or Instagram or anything like that, but it was just purely on that, and it felt it was really it was it's kind of like it feels like a contradiction, right? Like, shouldn't you like go balls to the wall for to uh for your dream audition? Because I had like a big goal last year to like audition and be on set. I didn't, I I think I did like one random audition and that was it. Like I just got overwhelmed and I couldn't do it. Um, and I really took that focus away and just like nurtured me and what I needed, which was just fun being around people and rest, right? Um, and I had to learn to let go of hustling, I had to let go of that. I had to let go of the fact that like that resting is a bad thing, that resting is lazy. And now that I'm on the other end of it and seeing these things manifest, I'm like, oh my god, I see why. Like, this is why I rested. Like, I well, like, oh snap, things are coming in fast. My my life is happening, and now I'm feeling more ready and like and and in my improv classes, I have been really, really just enjoying to perform. Yes, I've always loved performing, but sometimes sometimes when I have a lot of eyes on me or had a lot of eyes on me, because it's past tense, I I like wanted to get get off stage really quick. Like when I first when I like really first started doing improv when I was like in high school, I remember I would like we would play like games and I would do the thing to just get offstage right away. But what I'm learning now in 201 is like really enjoy to be present in that moment and and like let the scene evolve and enjoy that dance and that energy exchange that you have with the audience. Um and I really, really like my teacher, and there's been a few times where I've done something and I see like a spark in his eye. Um like I got him, I entertained him. And I think that's really cool because um that like reminds me that like this is what I love to do is when I perform and I'm able to get people to laugh with me not even trying, like I'm just in the zone, like and I just kind of go with like the first instinct, or I sometimes I don't even think, I just say, and the things that come out and the characters that come out and that are created with my mind, with my mind, the power of my mind. It is it literally uh fills my soul up. Like I just I come to life, there's energy, and there's just like this rebirth and excitement, and it I understand what Florence Welsh from Florence and the Florence and the Machine feels when she's performing on stage, and she has she has a song called Everyone Everybody Scream, and it's about her love for performance. And I like I get that song now, I really get it. I was like, Oh, this is what she means, and so like that the classes are really showing me how much I love performing and and really love it, especially when I connect with the audience. Like, that's what I love the most is that connection you feel with the audience when you're performing. Um and I was just like, damn, I've been pr depriving myself of this all my life. Like, this is what true love feels like. This is this is a more this is like just when you're in alignment, God, everything feels good. Like, oh man, like to think there was a life where I wasn't doing this and I wasn't in alignment and how everything just felt so bad and heavy. I still have the same day job, okay guys? Like I still have the same day job, but it's so much more bearable knowing like what I do af outside of that, knowing like what I'm what I'm what my goals are and striving for, and it's just so much fun, so much fun. So um speaking of like things happening before my eyes, life manifesting before my my dream life manifesting before my eyes is so um I started auditioning, like for real auditioning, I didn't have that as a goal this year. I have a goal to audition for um an improv group, like uh for the UCB, UCB has auditions, and I have a goal to audition. Um but the goal to audition um right now, like mainly um I'm auditioning for commercials, but the goal of that like came about really randomly. It was just like an impulse thing. So I I don't know, it was like I got I bought a butternut squash to make dinner. I haven't made it yet, but uh that that was like last week I bought I bought this but butternut squash and I like started to just have these characters like flow into me. So it was like I was like pretending to be this Russian lady, I don't even know how to do a Russian accent, it's just what I think a Russian lady should should uh sound like or not even Russian, just some Eastern European, right? I don't I don't know, like like I was like saying, today I'm going to cook, but they're not squash. Um, and I'm going to make this dinner for my friends that don't like me. I don't know, but I just started I started like this character this this character was coming towards me, Nadia. Nadia Nadia was coming in loud loud and clear, and she wanted to cook butternut squash to show Gloria, who didn't want to show her the recipe that she was the better cook than Gloria. Gloria's my neighbor, and Gloria is mad at me because I stole her boyfriend, but I am a lot prettier than her. Um she was coming loud and clear, and some like bits came to me. So some bits came to me and I started like writing them down. And one night after work I was like, well, I'm not cooking the butternut squash yet, but but I want to practice Nadia in front of the camera because sometimes I have these ideas in my head and they don't like once I get on camera they don't translate. So I was like, well, let me just like practice her. I'm gonna cook something else today, something easy, but let me practice Nadia, you know. So I started like doing her whatever, and it just like like I saw some of the playback and I was like, oh, like I do like watching myself on camera. I love it, I love it, I love it. So that's like the one thing with improv is we're not like watching ourselves back. Um we're just going off of feelings, off of vibes, off of feelings. Um so like I saw suddenly was like, let me look at like casting postings. And I just started looking and I was and like I saw some that I was like, I think I could do this one. So I just paid for it and then started auditioning. So I've only submitted one audition. There's two that I'm gonna audition to, but they're due later. Um, one's a voiceover thing, and one's um, it's an improvised scene, which hello, I've been doing improv, so I I've been thinking about that and thinking about the character and what to wear. So I'm gonna shoot those. I'm gonna record one because one's just an audio, but the other one shooting it. I don't know, sometime this week. Sometime this week. Um I have to look at when it's due. It's due this week, so I have to do it soon. Um, but I put it in my calendar and wrote it out. I was gonna do it today, but I took a nap instead because I was tired. But I just like it's so funny to me, not funny to me, but last year when I looked at the casting listings, it was so overwhelming. And I was like, no. And then this time around, I just looked at him and I'm like, I could do that. Let me pay. Okay, let me find a reader. I found a reader, Leia, my friend Leia. She we zoomed in, she read, she read with me, and I got that audition out the same night. Um, and then it started what was happening was I was feeling excitement instead of overwhelm. I started to feel excitement over auditioning. And and I love I love that feeling because when I'm auditioning and when I'm doing this, it's I'm not I don't have the pressure of I need the money because I have a full-time job. I just I'm just doing this for well, I'm doing it because I eventually want it to be a career and I want to do it for money, but um like I don't have I don't need the money at the moment, right? And so I'm looking at jobs that kind of pay like the day rate's kind of similar to what I make. Um I have some some thresholds, right, that I'm like, I'm not gonna work something that's like a hundred dollars a day, right? Like I'm just I'm not gonna like you know, I'm not gonna work something that is like very low paying or exposure unless I really, really like I really um love the project. Like there was this project I submitted to. I didn't audition, they didn't ask for an audition, they just asked for pictures and all that. But there's a there's a project, a short film that seems like it's a really like whoever gets the parts and gets to work on it so lucky, so lucky it um I wanna I do want to be a part of that because of just the energy of the movie. But if I'm gonna do like commercials, like they're gonna have to pay me a certain amount of money. Like I'm I'm just I'm just that's my mentality. I'm not just doing things for like cheap. Like, I don't need the money, I have a job. I have a job, baby. I have two jobs. I could I could do whatever I want. Uh so um I think it like auditioning with the pressure of of not being of being perfect not on me. Uh the pressure of not needing the money too is uh there is no pressure basically. So like there's no pressure of being perfect on my end, there's no pressure of needing the money to pay rent on my end. It's just for me, it's exposure and practice and a way to perfect my craft. Um, because I I haven't like done a commercial audition, so I'm still learning how to be a better auditioner, how to to work with nobody there, right? And really build the the world with my imagination and and do what I have limited, right? Like basically how you guys see me, this is like the audition, and some stuff it's like there's a lot of action going on, and you're just like reading and talking, and it could be kind of like weird because like in your head you have the whole scene played out, and then you're auditioning and you're just like here, you're not doing a lot. Um, but I'm just really excited. I'm excited for that stage and what's gonna happen. And right now my focus is commercials. Um, I don't have an agent, so I am self-submitting. Um, and so right now I'm looking at non-union, even at union stuff, because you have to do a few union jobs before they let you in the union. But looking at commercials so that I could use that money to feed my dream. Um what I remember is commercials pay kind of more than like a like one like a small guest role on a TV show. Um I've I've I've heard some actors like buy a home off commercial money, make a living, you know, like really make a living off of it, or are able to fund fund their dream based on that. Um, so with commercials, it's like it's kind of like, oh, that's capitalism. So we're gonna like like the they're like lower stakes, right? You've guys seen commercials where like people have just very limited lines, or maybe they're smiling and just drinking like a coffee. Um, and those shoots are usually like a day or two, so they're like short shoots, but you could make good money off of it. Sometimes you can't, but sometimes you can. So um, that's why I'm focusing on commercials right now because I think it's fun too. Like, I don't know, I find it kind of fun. I used to do commercial casting, so like I understand some of that. Um, and then also continue to take classes. Um, I'm in the market for aside from a gynecologist and a new doctor, uh, an acting teacher. I I got a suggestion last night, so I'm gonna look into it. Um, I really want to perfect my craft and continue learning. So that's my life update. This episode did not go exactly how I wanted it to, but it went exactly how it needed to. I feel like I'm jumping from like subject to subject really quickly, but I'm gonna watch the Olympics. The sun is setting. I don't want to turn on my ring light, so I'm gonna let you guys go. I'm gonna let you go. Thank you so much for listening. This has been Midlife Crisis, and until next time, stay the lulu. I love you, bye bye.