Episode
65. I Almost Quit Acting… | Experiencing Burnout, Therapy, and Creative Revival
- Podcast
- Get Messy with Maddie
- Published
- Jun 3, 2026
- Duration seconds
- 2802
- Processing state
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Summary
There's a version of yourself that keeps showing up — even when everything feels broken. This episode is about her. In 2022, I almost quit my creative career. Not in a dramatic, "I'm out" kind of way — more like a slow, disorienting fog where nothing felt aligned, my voice felt restricted, my compass felt completely off, and I didn't trust a single thought I had. I was in the messiest of middles, and I want to tell you about it. We go all the way back — from a painfully shy kid in Chicago, to grinding in LA from seventeen years old, to the season when voiceover, acting, and my sense of self all seemed to crumble at once. I talk about what burnout actually feels like from the inside, what a worthiness and identity crisis looks like when you've wrapped your entire self around a creative career, and the one phone call from my agent that cracked something open. This episode is also a love letter to anyone currently in the messy middle — the place where you feel bold and completely directionless at the same time. (Spoiler: that's not a contradiction. It's what choosing yourself actually feels like.) TIMESTAMPS [00:00] — There was a time in 2022 I almost quit — and I want to tell you about it [01:06] — Welcome to Get Messy [01:48] — The origin story: a painfully shy kid who found acting at 10 [06:45] — Pounding the pavement in LA since 17 — what "all in" really looked like [09:37] — Years of grinding, and things slowly starting to come together [13:22] — Voiceover takes off — signing with my agency and booking my first job March 2016 [16:27] — The floodgates open: campaigns, momentum, and making real money for the first time [16:27] — When unresolved stuff started bubbling up and restricting my voice [17:47] — The slow creep of burnout I didn't have a name for yet [20:06] —…