Life Unscripted: Using Improv Principles to Get Unstuck, Boost Confidence, and Transform Your Life

Learn to collaborate with others, think on your feet, and celebrate mistakes using the skills of improv theater

So many of us go through life following scripts we didn’t write for ourselves—scripts designed by our family, shaped by our friends, and influenced by the expectations of the people we meet. But the script that worked when we were younger can impact us in different ways as adults and make it tough to get along in the world.  
 
Drawing from contemporary understandings in neuroscience and psychology, psychologist Jeff Katzman and Dan O'Connor, cofounder of TheaterSports LA, explore the nature of our personal capacities and limitations. Through an application of ideas from improvisational theater, we can all learn to collaborate with those around us, to think on our feet, and to celebrate our mistakes. Life Unscripted offers the reader critical tools to enrich relationships, unleash the imagination, and build a more personally meaningful life. Using exercises like “Yes, And,”, “Mistakes as Gifts,” and “No Waffling,” the authors convey practical take-aways for every chapter.

JEFF KATZMAN, MD, is a Professor of Psychiatry at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine. He studied at Stanford University where he received his BA, UC San Diego for medical school, and then UCLA for his psychiatry residency. Before this, he ran Behavioral Health Care at the New Mexico VA Medical Center specializing in treating veterans with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. He is currently the Chair of the Education Committee of the American Association of Psychoanalysis and Dynamic Psychiatry (AAPDP). He lectures regularly at approximately four national psychiatric conferences a year on the topics of psychodynamic psychotherapy, attachment, applied improvisation, and educational techniques. DAN O'CONNOR is a multi-faceted actor, improviser, writer, and director. Dan is the founder and producing artistic director of the critically acclaimed Impro Theatre. He is a co-founder of BATS Improv in San Francisco and LA Theatresports. Dan is one of the world's most foremost innovators in the world of unscripted theatre. He is the on the advisory board of the International Theatresports Institute which includes over 300 theatre companies and festivals globally and is an officially recommended ITI teacher and performer and a member of the Applied Improvisation Network.