Today we’d like to introduce you to Kate McLeod.

Hi Kate, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.

“Kate McLeod” and “actor” have been synonymous for as long as I can remember. My parents were always incredibly supportive of this, but they set a rule early on: I had to finish school before entering the entertainment industry. In hindsight, I can see how practical—and loving—that decision was. But at the time, it was the last rule I was going to listen to.
In middle school, a postcard for the Miss Teen Los Angeles beauty pageant showed up in the mail. I found it, researched it, and begged my parents to let me compete. They were beyond confused by my sudden interest in pageants, but they figured I’d do it, hate it, and get it out of my system. It wasn’t until the night of the pageant that they noticed something in the fine print of the program: one of the pageant subcategories was “Miss Teen Photogenic LA,” and the prize was a four-year scholarship to an acting school in Los Angeles. They watched patiently, understanding my scheme, as 300 contestants competed and then ecstatically cheered for me when I won the title and the scholarship. From that moment on, they acquiesced to my desire to start running toward my dreams as soon as I possibly could. They saw my adamant drive, my talent and my creative thinking that would ultimately sustain me through my career.
That win was the beginning of over a decade and a half of commitment to formal acting training. Fast forward to the next opportunity: I was offered a full-tuition talent scholarship to an acting school in New York. I moved across the country, started my training, and simultaneously landed my first professional jobs in film. Over the years, I worked in film, commercials, and theater. A few years later, I decided to pursue my Master’s to refine my craft. During that time, I realized my other creative passions for producing, which eventually led me into creative entrepreneurship and the development of my production company, 6’2 Productions, and platforms like ME³ (for defining one’s creative conscious™) and the Authenticated podcast, which focuses on expanding authenticity in individual creative thinking.
Looking back, it feels like all these experiences were one hand washing the other. I used to worry about how these were different identities, but I’ve come to realize that they all stem from the same core: I’m a creative thinker and an artist. I also have strong business and financial acumen, but that too comes from the same creative place of being insatiably curious about people and the way they think. Now, I’m a multi-business owner, blending my multi-hyphenate artistry with creative entrepreneurship to keep expanding in all creative fields and constantly push creative boundaries.
I think being myself and listening to my intuition—no matter how nonsensical it sometimes seemed to others—is what led me here. Trusting myself, and what felt good for my brain and creativity, is what got me to the place I’m at now. I’m determined to continue expanding, not only for my own growth but to offer opportunities to others who feel that same magnetism to their own creative evolution—but with tools I’m offering from my own journey.

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?

I’m a big believer that things always work out in my favor. There can only be opportunity where you decide it can be. I’ve absolutely had struggles along the way—some of them undeniably comical, and some of them absolutely horrendous—but all of them have led to pivots that put me in more informed positions. More opportunity, because I refuse to walk away from any experience with less or the same as I walked in with. The struggles I’ve experienced are familiar to a lot of people, so I’ve added them to my list of improvements I want to make in the spaces I can.
One of the biggest struggles was actually adapting to my own creative potential. Which stems from listening to my own intuition instead of other peoples opinions. I was so married to what things “should look like” for so long, as opposed to what they could look like. I was stuck on the idea that I could only be one thing (an actor and only an actor) until the truth that this isn’t a sustainable thought anymore illuminated for me. Being one thing isn’t even human, because to be human intrinsically means to be so many things at the same time. And since life emulates art and art emulates life, both have to be dynamic and multifaceted living things to reflect the other.
Society will try to box you in to make you more digestible for others—really, to make you work better for others and for already established circumstances. That is an innate survival mechanism ingrained in our species, meant for avoiding anything different or unknown. To keep you “safe.” Well, that and being a part of capitalist society, but that’s for another interview! Part of my creative platform now is about habituating exactly the opposite, and that unequivocally derives from my struggles of refusing to be digestible to everyone all the time. I would rather be more of what I want to be, instead of what I am told I have to be. So, I am an actor, a writer, a producer, a creative entrepreneur, a creative consultant, and whatever else is meant to be part of my evolution—I am Kate McLeod.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?

I specialize in the creative conscious™, which is the malleable form of consciousness that you write the manual for. It’s the active participation in your own creative evolution through constantly improving your user experience of your own patterns of thinking. It is the optimization of creative thinking at its core.
I arrived at this specialty through my work in the entertainment industry—acting, writing, producing, and creative consulting. All of these professional facets had me in a constant state of emotional and intellectual attunement to various characters. Essentially, my art had me in the daily practice of trying on so, so many thoughts that I realized we have a heavier hand in our own thoughts than we might have originally been taught. Feelings come from thoughts, and we have so much control over our thoughts, especially when we acknowledge and identify the ways we want to think and feel.
I have two degrees and a plethora of certificates, and while they informed me greatly, they also represented a box of their own—one that put me in perpetual “student mode.” This mode tricked me into thinking that everyone I listened to knew more than I did, and that isn’t a steadfast truth. It’s actually a trap. Steering away from the “student brain” within systemic educational systems led me to realize there were better systems for thinking—systems that I write for myself. It’s what inspired me to work for myself, in so many ways.
Education can be an incredible resource, but the mindset of “knowing less” can be its own kind of individuality succubus.
This shift is what I am most proud of today. It came from introspection and a lot of work setting my ego aside, allowing myself to feel safe in spaces of uncharted territory. It’s what empowers me to take action from my innate sense of insatiable curiosity, and ultimately, it is what sets me apart from others and what empowers all facets of my artistry and creative entrepreneurship.

What sort of changes are you expecting over the next 5-10 years?

Oh, I am absolutely building my own empire within the industry! So that is happening. I have massive goals, and the journey there will reveal itself to me along the way, which I’m so excited for. I’m really interested in seeing what others are going to contribute and the opportunities within that effort to collaborate, because the industry is already in the midst of an overdue, necessary overhaul. There will be massive openings to hear from more voices than just the ones with the biggest purses. Since our industry makes art for people, the systems that facilitate and generate the making of that art actually have to be made for people if it is going to be a sustainable system for art-making.
I see a bigger shift of focus toward indie films, for example, and I think that comes from a desire for more intention behind creativity—not just for the sake of making to earn a bag. Because our current administration is adamant about dehumanizing society, I know that the artistic response to that will be to offer more humanizing efforts. Art has always been the mechanism of balance in chaos and upheaval.
I also think the overhaul will include a shift in how content is created and accessed. Social media has completely torn down the barriers to entry for creative expression. Creators with online audiences are literally building their own artistic leverage. Creation and attention are no longer exclusive to the industry elite. This is something I talk about in a recent episode of my Authenticated podcast with Sibel Damar, where we talk about how social media has empowered people to create without gatekeepers, she being a brilliant example of it. Since the current administration is stifling this creative expression, I see the vacuum created by them will be filled by another creative social platform—or possibly even a rewrite of the current ones.
I love this question so much, too, because it offers a lot of potential for new ideas to implement. If this topic excites any readers, I’d love for you to reach out to me to see if there’s potential to leverage our artistic lenses on one of my Authenticated podcast episodes, because authenticity is going to be the mitochondria of all these potential big shifts. Let’s brainstorm that potential together!

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/foxymcleod/
• Other: https://linkin.bio/foxymcleod