Top 25 Career Goals

I know that there is a school of thought that says that you should keep your goals a secret if you want to achieve them, however considering that fact that I travel and move quite frequently in my current lifestyle, I'm too worried that I'll lose this notebook that I've written my Top 25 Career Goals in. I figure that by posting them on my website, I'll have this list to refer to for years to come. So, here we go. You might want to grab a snack, because this is going to take a while:

1) Be on Broadway. Doesn't matter what role. I'd be beyond over the moon to accept absolutely any role on Broadway. I've never cared about being famous, and that's not my motivation for wanting this dream. I want this because it's something I've dreamed of my entire life. But more importantly, as my high school friend Sonya once said, "It's a tremendous honor." Knowing that I was entrusted with the responsibility of working on one the highest level shows in the world would be the honor of my life.

2) Work on a cruise ship so that I can continue traveling, but also on a practical level, this would be phenomenal opportunity to save some serious money since basic living expenses such as food, housing and transportation are covered

3) Perform in a national tour. Remarkably, this has already happened to me a year before graduating, and I'd do another national or international tour in a heartbeat! I loved every minute of it!

4) Work for English Musicals Korea. Enough said.

5) Create original music videos for my original parodies (all lyrics written by me), including "The Dirty Mouthed Girl With Disney Hair" (parody of "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air Theme Song"), The OG Atheist (parody of "The Real Slim Shady" by Eminem), The Hippie Bro Rap (not a parody. I wrote the lyrics based on an actual person I met), Working Actor's Anthem (parody of "Party Rock Anthem" by LMFAO), Talk Philosophy To Me (Parody of "Talk Dirty To Me"), Art Never Dies (parody of "Love Never Dies"). I'd like to get these on a platform like Funny or Die, College Central, College Humor, etc.

6) Get my article "Unsuccessfully Seducing A Weed Farmer" published, because hopefully it'd help someone else feel less alone

7) Write a book with tales from my travels around the world that discusses my experiences of combining my ostensibly conflicting passions for rugged travel and being a professional performer.

8) Writing an article or book about how I've refused to let my personal challenges stop me from going after the life I wanted

9) Write, star in and possibly direct my original movie musical with the working title "Nice Girls Don't Run Away To Alaska"

10) Create a podcast to tell funny anecdotes (from bad dates to audition mishaps, and so much more!) called "What's Bakin' With Aiken" (credits to the massively talented actor Seth Kruger for coming up with this name)

11) Create a TV show based on my time at Berklee

12) Perform in a theme park internationally. Though I've performed in theme park in Alaska, I've always wanted to live in a place vastly different from my home country for a while, and companies such as, say, Universal Studios Japan or Shanghai Disney would be a terrific opportunity to do that. I also have always wanted to play a Disney character or other famous character (such as say, a Harry Potter Prefect), which I will be doing this summer, but only one day a week (more details to come in later months), as opposed to full time.

13) Become a member of Actor's Equity. I'm not currently in a rush to join Equity, since there's plenty of non union work that interests me. However, at a certain point I'll want to have the rights and benefits (such as health insurance!) that Equity awards.

14) Become a member of Screen Actor's Guild (SAG). Same logic for SAG.

15) Create an album that includes my parodies and original comedic songs, with some talking about the creation process for each song, and the inspiration for each of these songs.

16) Create an album that takes musical theatre songs and makes them either an acoustic version or more pop, and takes pop songs and makes them sound more like musical theatre songs. Just wait until you hear my musical theatre cabaret version of "Creep." As the Leading Player says in Pippin, "You ain't seen nothing yet, folks!"

17) Perform in a show person show that'll hopefully get turned into a Netflix special. Possible titled include Woman on The Verge (of the ___) (I'm not ready to reveal what the blank is yet...one day), Classy Is My Middle Name, or "Confessions of A Needy Feninist"

18) Have my concept for a show based on my mixed race, blended family (my stepfather is black, my step siblings are mixed race, and my mother and I are white) called "Mix It Up" on a channel like Comedy Central. One of the reasons I hope this particular project comes to fruition is that I want to do my part as an artist to foster diversity, and tell unique stories that represent the America of today.

19) Possibly get an MFA in Acting, Musical Theatre or Screenwriting. Getting more training would be amazing, but I think I'd also just feel a tremendous amount of pride in getting a Master's Degree, since although graduating college was satisfying, so many people have college degrees now that I think it's lost some of its original prestige.

20) Start my own entrepreneurial coaching business that helps actors with the "startup" materials (headshots, reels, resumes, websites, etc.) so that they're able to succeed

21) Get a job at Mursion Inc, a virtual reality company

22) Narrate audiobooks, particularly new ones

23) Break into the voiceover business and narrate the voice for an original role

24) Create, write and star in a film based on my close relationship with my extended family titled "The OG Cousins"

25) Originate a role in a brand new play or musical, and see that role to completion

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