Sofya Gollan

Sofya took part in Sync Australia in 2015

Sofya started as a children’s TV presenter, moving into filmmaking and broadcasting as an award winning writer, performer, commissioner.

That shift in responding to the opportunities in my life came directly from the inaugural Sync Leadership workshop that was held in Australia, and I was fortunate enough to be part of that first cohort. All the acceptances of opportunities leading from the workshop led to a period in my life where I was financially stable, able to look after my two boys as a single mother and enjoying the incredible insight into my chosen industry as a decision maker, which was and still is highly unusual to have a Deaf person in those roles.

I kept a little creative pilot light going for side projects, knowing I would come back to a creative practice as these roles are not forever. Perhaps the snake skin shedding was an instinctive analogy knowing situations always change.

Mid last year I left the stable job of 7 years to become a filmmaker again, to find not that much has changed in the industry when it comes to employing Deaf/Disabled people as project leaders ie writers, directors and producers despite my work in that area tracking and elevating DDN talent to write and direct.

But I have a lot more knowledge than I did before, thanks to the opportunities I was able to experience. This next season will be interesting, as I see how far I can push my projects into being, testing this new culture of inclusivity and DDN acceptance. I had lost the art of saying yes to myself, and decided I would test it once more. Saying yes to a film and character part I was doubtful about means I’ve just finished acting in a feature film, discovering I still have the acting chops, and had a wonderful time being part of a passionate team. I know this will lead to other opportunities and will lead to me getting my projects into life. So learning from past experiments, yes to stretching and reaching for new opportunities will be my focus since it has brought so many good things into my life.

I still remember the year that I decided to say ‘yes’ to everything even if it didn’t look like where I wanted to go.

Sofya Gollan

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