Oct. 30, 2001
I’ve been hearing from so many people who have come to this site and after reading have said to me, that they felt the exact same way I did when I was in corporate america and wanted to get out and also from artists who share the same struggles I’ve had on my creative path.
This has been a huge comfort. The stories I used to read of people were how they left their small home town with $20 in their pocket and the next thing you know, they had acheived their dream in a big way. You never heard about the inbetween, and that inbetween is so critical.
The first few months of all of this I questioned myself. I questioned my talent. I questioned my abilities. I questioned if the want was more than the substance. I wasn’t sure if I was kidding myself, that the blocks I was having were really blocks and not just lack of talent. I was overwhelmed, confused. I felt stupid. And I would have sworn that I was the only person that felt that way.
But I wasn’t, and I’m not.
Last night, Chris and I were talking. Just a little over a month ago he started his life long dream of learning the guitar. He’s got such a passion for music and creating and that’s all he wanted to do. Not for a job, but just because he loved it. So every week he’s been going to class and although he’s getting better, he’s not making the huge leaps he wants to.
He thinks maybe he’s too old, or that he just doesn’t have talent. He can hear what he wants to play but his fingers don’t know how to move the right way. He’s frustrated. “It’s only been a short time,” I said. “Maybe I’m kidding myself,” he said. “Maybe I’m blinding myself because I want it so bad I don’t stop to think that maybe there’s nothing there.”
“It’s there,” I said. “If it wasn’t, it wouldn’t mean so much to you and the frustration wouldn’t be so great.”
He looked at me and said, “I’d guess you’d know. You’ve already gone through this, haven’t you?”
I nodded. I think when you do something non-linear, or something that you’re passionate about that doesn’t have a set of rules to follow, you can get overwhelmed and frustrated so easily and quickly. But I think the thing to remember is that if it means so much to you, it will work out. Maybe not exactly as planned when you’re sitting in a cubicle or in a perfect dream-like way that you once read about in a book.
But it will happen to you because life happens and you can choose the path to follow and the dream to make real.