Meet Andrew Giordano
Circus Artist, Professional Speaker, Life Enthusiast
In 2008, Andrew ran away and joined the circus. The Festival Circus, to be specific
Andrew's Story
Andrew’s confidence on stage can be misleading: his nerves are so bad that he almost threw up at a grade 5 chess tournament! He was always extremely shy and nervous. You might think that this would make a career on stage a very unlikely prospect… and you’d be right! So how did he get here?
To start, Andrew grew up in a household with very high expectations, and an older brother who was a certified genius. By the time he got through high school, he was convinced that he would never measure up to everyone’s expectations.
Andrew and his much smarter brother
On October 11th, 2005, Andrew’s parents took the family to see Cirque Du Soleil. Seeing the performers on stage achieve impossible things, with style and grace and, most importantly, JOY, everything shifted instantaneously. The acrobats and jugglers and aerialists not only performed impossible feats, but they were so filled with joy that they had no choice but to give it away to the audience!
By this point, Andrew had moved away from home to study Psychology at the University of Guelph. Despite lacking facilities, equipment, teachers, or even supportive friends, Andrew’s new passion drove him to find solutions and pathways into the unknown. What he saw that night was too powerful to dismiss - at long last, a way to escape the path of constant evaluation, and to live in joy instead! But he was just a “normal” person, with no special aptitudes, talents, or even experience with difficult physical skills! And to make matters worse, he finally discovered that he wasn’t just shy - one day in his Abnormal Psychology class, he learned about Social Anxiety Disorder, and realized that he checked all the boxes for it.
It wasn’t just normal anxiety, it was so severe that he couldn’t take the bus (one too many panic attacks…), he had trouble going to class (too many people), and he would go days at a time without leaving the basement that he lived in. On the rare occasions that he would leave, the sight of everyone else laughing and smiling and effortlessly fitting in would make him sick, and confirm his deepest fears - that he didn’t belong.
Like so many with anxiety, Andrew was caught in a paradox of needing connection with others but fearing it too much to seek it out. His answer came slowly and took much time and energy to cultivate. Teaching himself to juggle, ride a unicycle, and stand on his hands, he was astounded at how much he was capable of. There seemed to be no real limits - as long as he was willing to invest the time and energy, he could learn anything! So he taught himself to juggle 3 balls. Then 4, 5, 6, 7, and eventually 8 balls! Then clubs, rings, and even flaming torches and knives! Each step of the way he discovered an underlying wisdom: That our ideas of what we can and can’t do are VASTLY inaccurate. This discovery was too important to keep to himself, no matter his anxiety.
In fact, what if the same thing was true about anxiety itself? What if it only has as much power over us as we give it? Being forced out of his basement by the need for larger training space, Andrew had to use public spaces like parks or the University Centre. And he began to notice that, while doing the things he loved, he stopped caring whether anyone was judging him. In fact, people even started to come to him to learn! Swallowing his fears, he realized that this was not only the answer to his own anxiety, but that it could be helpful for others to overcome their own internal barriers.
Knowing this, he pushed through the immense difficulty of being seen by crowds in order to leave his audiences inspired and curious about their own unquestioned “impossibilities”. After all, he used to think that he wasn’t even capable of riding the bus, but now here he is juggling torches on a 6-foot unicycle in front of thousands!
Some noteworthy accomplishments
Here are some things I'm proud of that took a lot of courage and hard work.
2010
In 2012, Andrew opened Guelph’s first Circus School, teaching circus arts and confidence to hundreds of youth
2015
In 2014, Andrew founded the Youth Circus Project, taking circus classes into schools, summer camps, and events
2018
In 2020, Andrew set 5 world records, for juggling 3 and 4 balls, and 3, 4, and 5 rings while riding a tall unicycle
2021
In 2021, Andrew published Juggling Wisdom, a book using the fun approach of juggling to explore the serious topic of mental health
2023
2015
2018
2021
Andrew's Perspective
What my journey has taught me
“Whether you think you can, or think you can’t - you’re right” - Henry Ford
Without knowing exactly what my path was or what my goals were, I set out into the unknown to challenge the meaning of life that had been given to me - That we exist just to appease the expectations of other people, and that we need to live in constant fear of failing to meet those expectations.
My spirit was dying every day that I tried to live with this as my purpose. Especially so because I am very different from those around me - adopting their expectations felt like nothing less than a complete betrayal of myself.
Even winning awards felt hollow to me - My mother was excited but I obviously wasn’t...
Until we find our own reasons for doing things, everything we do will only serve to reinforce the fact that our choices don’t belong to us.
When I saw the performers in Cirque Du Soleil perform impossible feats, and do so with the most intense JOY radiating from every particle of their being, it tore down a wall in my mind. If THEY could do something meaningful that brought them joy, why couldn’t I? It was clear to me that there was an intensely powerful force at work here, but I didn’t yet know what it was.
After I had taught myself a variety of very difficult circus skills, I realized that JOY ITSELF is the fuel for achieving the impossible. I disliked my schoolwork, therefore I cut corners and tried to spend the least amount of time and energy possible on it. The result was that I was only as competent as I absolutely needed to be to get good marks. For the most part, I only learned school-related subjects because I had to, and that meant little to no learning-for-curiosity’s-sake.
In contrast, my circus skills took off because they filled me with joy. The joy caused me to spend the greatest amount of time and energy possible on it. That meant going out of my way to learn more and more and become the best I could possibly be. Pretty soon I would only take time away from juggling because I absolutely HAD to.
Rather than spend my time IN class, I would spend it juggling just outside of my class!
I’m sure that I could have continued the path of finishing my University degree in psychology and gone on to a half-hearted career, coasting along in an unfulfilling job, but I’m also sure that I would not have made much of an impact on the world around me if I did so. Why not? Because my heart was obviously not in it!
Though it was the scariest thing I had ever done, I opted for a life where I could both provide the maximum amount of value to the world and also be rooted in my own sense of joy. Accidentally, I discovered that the two are very closely linked - the more joy you have while doing something, the more likely it is that you’ll spend your free time on it, which increases your skill and therefore allows you to surpass your peers and give more! Not to mention that bringing joyful energy to your work vastly increases its value, independent of skill.
I’ll put it this way - would you rather rely on professionals who are only there to “punch the clock” or ones that are genuinely joyful in their profession? If you’re getting pulled over by a police officer, would you like them to be genuinely joyful to serve, as opposed to just being there because they have to be? How about the folks who built your house - would you like THEM to care about doing it right because it brings them joy? Or would you rather they cut all the corners possible so that they can get home early?
The difference between doing something that brings you joy versus just “going through the motions” is like night and day.
Joy is contagious: It makes the whole world smile at us!
Over all the years of performing, teaching, speaking, and working with fantastic people from many different walks of life, I’ve found the same thing over and over again - when we are living in our joy, we become capable of anything. I have seen people’s lives transform completely from the simple fact that they did something that brought them joy, and were celebrated by the people around them for it.
This unlocks an incredibly powerful positive feedback loop - it feels good to be recognized and celebrated, and eggs us on to greater and greater acts of service, which in turn are celebrated even more! Fast forward a few years and you won’t even recognize the person who first picked up the juggling balls and discovered the joy of pursuing mastery of a new skill.
It’s no surprise that our world (along with everyone in it) is facing some pretty extreme challenges, the likes of which have never been seen before in human history. It is my strong belief that the only way we’re going to be able to tackle these challenges is if we’re all rooted in our joy and can celebrate each other for our strengths and our diversity. I am profoundly humbled and energized by the task of helping people find their way to their inner super-powers.
Always remember - whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re right! So choose joy with me and watch as your world and the world around you is transformed by the unique gift of YOUR JOY!
It’s no surprise that our world (along with everyone in it) is facing some pretty extreme challenges, the likes of which have never been seen before in human history. It is my strong belief that the only way we’re going to be able to tackle these challenges is if we’re all rooted in our joy and can celebrate each other for our strengths and our diversity. I am profoundly humbled and energized by the task of helping people find their way to their inner super-powers.
Always remember - whether you think you can, or think you can’t, you’re right! So choose joy with me and watch as your world and the world around you is transformed by the unique gift of YOUR JOY!
