Is an inner monologue useful for improv comedy? (ft. NYC improviser Sabrina Banes)

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[MUSIC]

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All right, let's talk about that voice in your head.

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I think you might know the one, that relentless narrator,

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the internal debater, the one that's constantly planning

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conversations that haven't even happened yet.

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It's always on for some of us and some improvisers.

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What we're told to aim for is to get out of your head.

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We're told to silence that inner critic, to shut down the chatter,

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to just like be present in the moment on the stage,

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basically to not think.

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And look, there's a lot of truth and value in that, absolutely.

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We need to be receptive.

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We need to listen.

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We need to react authentically in the moment.

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But here's a thought.

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And maybe a little bit of a curveball.

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What if I told you that for many of us, that incredibly busy,

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sometimes overwhelming, chattering brain,

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it isn't just a distraction to be wrestled into submission.

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What if that thing is actually powerful,

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perhaps even some kind of untapped resource for your improv?

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That you can have an inner monologue that's actually useful for improv?

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What if that monologue, the very thing that you might curse when you're trying

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to find your flow on stage and get to sleep at night, can actually be useful?

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Now, I know that might sound a little bit counterintuitive.

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How can thinking lead to better, even more spontaneous improv?

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Kind of like, how can that being in your head actually get you out of your head?

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Well, in today's conversation, you're going to hear from my guest, Sabrina,

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who a lot like me navigates the world with a very active, very vocal inner speech.

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We get really honest about what that's like, especially in the context of a creative practice,

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like improv, that demands being in the moment, demands your presence.

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We explore how a constant mental monologue doesn't have to be a source of anxiety

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or nerves on the stage or lead to any of that onstage self-doubt that you might have.

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I know what that's like.

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And it's not just about fighting your brain.

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Instead, you'll discover practical ways to understand your brain

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and perhaps even harness it.

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Think of this.

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What if all those "what ifs" in your head are actually a form of like pre-computation?

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A way that your mind is already exploring the possibilities,

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running those scenarios almost like a flight sim.

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Yeah, I just watched the second season of the rehearsal.

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That's a strong recommend for me.

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Anyways, for social interaction and storytelling, that's what the flight sim is for.

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So you'll learn how you can use scenario building as one way to feel even more prepared,

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more grounded, and maybe unexpectedly,

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less anxious when you step into the wonderful unknown of an improv scene.

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So what if you've ever felt like your brain was just too busy, too cluttered,

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all that stuff for improv?

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If you've wrestled with that and all that internal commentary

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or you're just curious about the different ways improviser's brains function,

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this episode is absolutely for you.

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You're going to walk away with a fresh perspective,

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maybe even a newfound appreciation for the unique, complex,

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and sometimes noisy way your improv brain works,

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and then collaborate with it as it is today.

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Hi, I'm Jen deHaan, and this show is called Your Improv Brain.

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I create improv and comedy podcasts with StereoForrest,

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and I've taught and coached at several improv schools.

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Every week, I'm going to bring you a new episode of this show on Monday.

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This week, you're going to hear from Sabrina Banes,

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who's an improviser and tarot reader who lives in Bed-Stuy and improvises

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with us here at StereoForrest Podcasts and also with Improv College and Highwire.

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And one more thing, before I play the conversation that I have with Sabrina,

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stick around until after the interview,

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because I've got extra insight that I want to share,

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something that we didn't quite touch on in our chat,

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about how this internal rehearsal mode,

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the habit of mental scenario planning,

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can directly feed into one of the most crucial skills in long-form improv,

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something that can make scenes click really quickly,

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and you won't want to miss that.

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So here's the interview.

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I'm going to roll tape.

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So we were talking about inner monologues and improvisers,

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inner because I've noticed at least that there's a lot of people

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that discuss having very active inner monologues.

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And then we were, I asked people about that.

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I was asking you about that.

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And you mentioned that you have a very active inner monologue as well.

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I do.

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But pretty much at any time that I am not actively engaged in a conversation out loud,

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I am actively engaged in a conversation in my head.

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Yeah. Yeah.

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That's that's the same as me.

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Like when I I mean, I'm I'm live a very isolated life.

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So it's sort of it's leveled up how active my inner monologue is.

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But it's always been this ongoing thing inside my head talking to somebody else

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who isn't there necessarily having working out problems.

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What would the responses be?

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It's like quasi like rehearsing a conversation.

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But these are conversations I know it probably won't have.

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But it's like verbal processing in my mind or out loud.

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How does it work for you?

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Even when I was a very small child, I would be having these conversations,

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like mental conversations.

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The first thing that that I remember like the first way that I remember it manifesting

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is when I was maybe four years old, we were.

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Yeah, I was four.

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We were driving across the country because we were moving from Maryland to Oklahoma.

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Yeah.

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And I kept myself entertained by having little conversations in my head with imaginary people.

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And then that continued because I grew up an only child.

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I have a half sister, but she's much older than me and we didn't grow up together.

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So because I was raised as an only child, I spent a lot of time alone as a kid.

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Right.

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And so I was always I was the thing about having a really active inner monologue

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is that you don't feel lonely.

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That is because you're you're never alone.

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You're always with someone.

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Exactly. Yeah.

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I think that's probably why mine has gone so active.

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Being isolated, right?

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Like it's a loneliness thing.

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And why like listening to podcasts, too, because it's like it gives you a little

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bit of relief from the ongoing onslaught of your brain.

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And somebody else can take over.

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How do you how do you find that affects your your improv practice or your performances?

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Well, I I always have a.

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How do I put this?

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Because I'm having conversations in my head anyway, I don't have to take a lot

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of time to formulate a response to something that someone says to me

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because my brain is always preparing for that.

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My brain is always preparing to respond to someone.

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It's like I've I've practiced every possible permutation of every possible

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conversation a million different times.

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Yes.

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Yeah.

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So this conversation, it's, you know, I've rehearsed it.

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You've rehearsed it a few times.

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Was I more engaging as a person in the rehearsal?

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No.

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Really?

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Yeah. No, I find you.

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I find you very engaging as it is.

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I yeah.

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You don't have to say that.

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No, I'm not just I'm not just saying that.

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That's that I wouldn't I wouldn't continue engaging with you if I didn't find you engaging.

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And really, you would just shut it right down.

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It's just like, oh, right.

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Brows are close.

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That's done.

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Yeah.

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I love that.

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I love that.

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I love that for me, too, to think that.

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Well, because that means that you're actually you're you're a fun person to talk to.

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Yeah.

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Otherwise, I would just be in my bathtub talking to myself.

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I would.

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I actually also like it that it would just be closed down if I wasn't engaging enough.

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Like, because then I would know it would give me that immediate feedback

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that like the scene was over.

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It'd be like, OK, you didn't you didn't pass see none and see.

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All right.

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Yeah.

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Nice.

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What do you have conversations with yourself about?

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Oh, every everything.

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I would say that a lot of most of my conversations are about solving problems.

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Very much less rehearsal now.

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And that's just due to the isolation element of it.

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And a lot of as you might know, a lot of the engagements I do have are improvised.

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So it is fiction.

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So I don't really need to ever rehearse for that because I can't.

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So I don't really have a lot of conversations that need to rehearse for.

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So most of it is just like problem solving going through and going, OK,

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this is this is the situation.

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How do I solve it?

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Or this? How can I be happier mentally and like and just processing

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through those things or what can I do?

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What can I do differently?

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How can I make my life better and just kind of having those internal discussions?

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Seems healthy.

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I'd be I I'm having conversations where I'm like rehashing old arguments

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with people that I haven't spoken to in 10 years.

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Yeah. Or and then I also any time I have an improv show,

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there is a 100 percent chance, especially if that show is in person

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and I have to go to a theater.

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There is a 100 percent chance that I have gone through about three different

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variations of how that show is going to go.

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Oh, really? Yeah.

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Like I've and it never goes anything like I imagine, right?

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Because you get a different suggestion when you're actually in the theater.

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You're you're interacting with people.

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So it's not like you're not just offering up whatever is in your psyche.

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But but my psyche is preparing.

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Right. So do you find that that helps your improv performance

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to sort of think about those things in advance?

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Or is it more of a stress or something that you like to not do?

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No, it's it it's kind of neutral for me.

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Like it doesn't it's not something that I'm doing in an obsessive,

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you know, anxious way.

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It's not like I'm imagining the the show out of stress.

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I'm imagining the show because I'm going to the show and I'm going to do the show.

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And I'm thinking about the show before I do the show.

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Right. Yeah.

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It's all it's all just it's just natural.

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Um, it's kind of like I imagine people who

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who are doing disaster response for FEMA,

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they imagine all of the potential disasters that could occur.

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Yeah. Yeah.

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And they're not necessarily stressed about it when it's not

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when they're preparing for something, they're just thinking, oh,

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we could have a hurricane or a tornado or, you know, sharks could attack.

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But yeah, sharks could always attack.

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Yeah, they could always attack.

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But they're not they're not thinking about it when they're preparing for it.

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Like they're not thinking, oh, this is really scary and I have to be freaked out about it.

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They're just thinking, OK, well, if sharks attack, then what what do we do?

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Right. So exactly.

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Yeah. What are the possible things that we would need to have with us?

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Or exactly. Or yeah, it's meant to it's just mentally preparing for all the possible outcomes, which is.

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Yeah. So I'm imagining an improv scene before a show.

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The scene is not going to take place the way that I imagine it,

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because the input that I'm going to get from my scene partner will be different.

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The the suggestion from the audience will be different.

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The just every, you know, the whole setting is going to be different.

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But I I'm kind of warming up like I'm doing warm up scenes in my head.

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Yeah. So there is a benefit to it.

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Yeah, as long as it isn't inducing some level of anxiety that puts you in your head during the show,

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then that's how you do you find that that helps you get yourself out of your head then?

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Because you've you've pre-prepared these things.

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You've already thought out the possible things.

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Or does it is that also neutral for you?

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No, that's also neutral because that's I mean, again, the inner monologue is just

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what my brain is doing when 100 percent of the time that I'm awake.

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Right. Yeah.

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So I'm since I'm always having that conversation, there's there's no value

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judgment that goes with it.

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Like it's neither beneficial nor

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detrimental. Yeah. No, that's good.

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And I think like for me, the only when I was doing

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dance fitness, which is something I did like three, four or five times a week.

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I don't remember doing any sort of prep work in my head like that.

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However, what I did do was I shut out for over an hour.

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I would shut out any potential area of stress for me.

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So it was like, I'm not going to check email.

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I'm not going to check the news.

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I told anybody that I knew well enough to have the conversation.

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And I was like, just don't bring up anything where we might

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get into a stressful conversation.

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Just, you know, the only time that I would really welcome small talk

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was was an hour to an hour and a half before I had to go perform on stage

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for teaching the fitness class because

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because I knew that if I got into the stressful thing, it would just put me in

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my head and I wouldn't I wouldn't be able to perform that way.

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So I would just be purposefully avoiding any of that kind of stress.

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Bring it up right after the class.

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That's fine. And actually a good time because I'm super relaxed after a class.

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Right. Like I'm in a great mood.

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So bring on the, you know, the tough stuff at that point, but not before the class.

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The things that stress me out like right before an improv show are

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but they're probably pretty predictable.

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Like anything that's going to trigger my misophonia, if I'm backstage

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and there's someone smacking gum, that's that could ruin the whole show.

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Yeah, yeah. That's just.

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But I do. Yeah.

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So I do tend to avoid stressful conversations,

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but you can't avoid, for example, if you're taking the subway in New York City,

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you can't avoid that there's going to be stress on the on the train trip

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because that just is.

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So that's there's always, I feel like being a performer in New York,

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there's always this wild card where you you don't know what's going to happen

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on the journey from your home to your theater.

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Yeah. And and coming up with those sort of strategies to deal with that is,

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I would guess, pretty difficult or it takes a lot of time.

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I wear I wear noise cancelling earbuds on the train.

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So yeah. Yeah.

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I I have I'm pretty like I shut myself into a cocoon when I'm

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when I'm moving around the city. It's a little weird, but yeah.

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No, I think I get it. Yeah.

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No, I get that because that's I think what I'm doing on in a different way is

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just basically cocooning my brain as much as possible, at least

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not having those kind of conversations or, you know, dealing with other kinds of stress.

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I think also that was why I was so methodical and having

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people would laugh at me.

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I had like this been only has these things in it.

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This been only has these things in it.

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And I was so regimented in the way that I had to bring things into the room and all that.

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And I think it was to sort of try to avoid all of that stress as much as I could.

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It's the more that you can control like tiny little things within your environment,

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the more you feel equipped to go into a situation full of unknowns.

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Exactly. Yeah.

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And yet we love the unknowns because we're doing improv, which is the ultimate unknown.

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Exactly.

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We can't plan for anything.

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And that's what we want.

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But before the show, I'm going to control it as much as possible.

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Well, I will say that I have missed.

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I I do some online shows with a theater out of Canada with improv college.

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And I have missed a couple of shows this season

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because my next door neighbor blasts his basebeat

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in the wall that we share.

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And that will send me into such a stressed out like

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it'll it'll just mess up my

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my headspace so much that I can't perform because I get.

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Yeah.

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So anything that that interferes with feeling like you're prepared

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is just going to immediately put you off kilter.

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Yeah. Yeah.

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For the thing that we can't plan for and can't prepare.

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I wonder if there's something connected there of just

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like put where we're getting ready for this this thing that we absolutely can't control,

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which is in itself.

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I mean, it's stressful, but it's not stressful.

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Still, it's such a it's like a joyful stress, I guess.

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Right. It's a very it's a different kind of.

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So if you can minimize the

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the detrimental stress that that gets into your brain

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before you engage with the joyful stress.

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Yeah, and that makes it somehow more joyful.

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Yeah, I think so.

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And I think that these things like the performance, the improv, it's such,

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you know, even if it can be, you know, hobby number three, but it's such

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an important thing in so many of our lives.

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It's something that we love to do and things that you love to do and are important to you.

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You want to protect and you want it to go as successful as you possibly can.

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Yeah, exactly. I do the same thing.

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You know, I read tarot and I I do these parties sometimes like these corporate events

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where I'm sitting there for two to three hours, just reading for

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20 or 30 people over the course of of a couple of hours.

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And one thing that I do for those parties is I take an Uber.

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I will not screw with the subway on a day that I have to be

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that everything like if everything has to go really, really well, I I'm just

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I I put it in the contract like you have to pay for my transportation.

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Yeah, no, that's that's super smart.

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And and really, I mean, these are just

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self accommodations that we know we need and that we make.

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And yeah, it's very important to do.

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Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for joining me today.

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Thank you.

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OK, so much to think about there with Sabrina, right?

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It's fascinating how us improv enthusiasts develop our own personal strategies

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like these invisible frameworks that control and give you mental preparation.

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It's all really in service, though, to being completely spontaneous

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and uncontrolled on stage.

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That idea of pre computation of your using like of using your own inner monologue

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that it's not really a bug in improv, but it can actually be a feature.

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If you channel it and understand it, that's really powerful.

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It's like a testament, really, to understanding how your own improv brain works.

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And you'll hear the surprising thing that I teased about in the intro in a second.

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But first, make sure you check out improv update if you want to get my free newsletter that summarize.

:: 21:53

If you want to get my free newsletter that summarizes ideas like this

:: 21:59

and links to all the new episodes of this show, which again, now come every Monday.

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You can find a link for that in the show notes or the description

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and also to the discord community.

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You'll find link to that as well, where you can chat about this thing

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and anything else, improv, acting, voice acting, performance, all that stuff in this space.

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And you can check out Sabrina's show on YouTube.

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You can find a link to her team, The Fay with improv college in the show notes as well.

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And also a show that she and I have on StereoForrest called manifesto update.

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All right.

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So that bonus insight that I promised you about how all that pre show mental

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preparation, all those what ifs and everything from tricky conversations to yes, even sharks,

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how that actually helps you find the game of the scene faster.

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So here it is when your brain is completely constantly all the time.

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It's always running scenarios, solving those hypothetical problems

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and imagining different outcomes in real life.

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It's essentially training itself to rapidly assess situations and identify patterns

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and anomalies and unusual elements in what's happening.

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It's well, you, your brain is becoming highly skilled at asking what's different here.

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What's the interesting angle to this thing?

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So when you step out onto that stage or you start streaming or recording audio,

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however you do your improv and your scene partner says or does something.

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Now your finely honed scenario scanner muscle is prepped and ready to go

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because of all that work you did.

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You're already primed to look for the hook to find the deviation from the norm,

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your norm, the thing that makes this moment unique, which is often the heart

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of the game of the scene.

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Your brain has already been practicing finding that thing in real life all day long.

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So it gets much quicker at spotting it on the stage or in the podcast

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or wherever you're doing your improv over thinkers unite.

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Am I right?

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Anyways, thanks for listening to your improv brain.

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I'm glad to be back making these shows and I'll be back next Monday

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with another look at the fascinating world of improv and the brains

:: 24:30

that make it happen like yours.

:: 24:32

See you then.

:: 24:33

You have been listening to your improv brain as Stereo Forest production.

:: 24:39

The show is created and is written, edited and produced by a Jent Hanh of Stereo Forest.com.

:: 24:46

You can find show information, show notes, transcripts and contact information

:: 24:51

at the show's page at Stereo Forest.com/improfbrain.

:: 24:56

Thanks for listening.

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