Advice to a former student

“Do it. Or don’t do it. But you know. You know.”

Recently, I received an email from a former student who has been on the front edge of carving out a niche in the entertainment business in Los Angeles, confronting several possible options as to how to proceed including giving up their creative dreams. Here is my response:

Lots to consider. Reminds me of when I had taken a year off after getting my masters degree to see if my interest in music / singing / songwriting / performing had any merit whatsoever. I had made my way to Aspen, Colorado and was living in the Tyrolean Lodge, a dive at the edge of town. I had done a couple of hoot nights at Jake’s Abbey and had been embraced by some of the local musicians, so I had gotten positive feedback on that front. But how to survive? Plus, it was the fall and if I were to apply to doctoral program, I needed to start getting my act together. And oh yeah, my few thousand dollars savings was dwindling despite surviving on peanut butter and pop tarts.

As I think back on it, when faced with various choices, I ended up taking a two-pronged approach. One was quite logical. I took a yellow legal pad (that’s how I wrote lyrics) and made two columns:

Go back to school
Play music

I listed pros and cons for each pathway. I spent an entire afternoon alone in my motel room, writing down each point and reflecting upon them. Frankly, the pros in the ‘go back to school’ column outweighed the pros under play music’. And as you can imagine, the cons were vice versa.

So logically speaking, it was quite clear: Go back to school.

Then I took another approach. I went for some long walks. Over a couple of days. Now I say this as if I had formulated this process, but that’s not true. I was being led by some instincts, not just logic. You know my affection for Joseph Campbell and you’ve heard me ‘preach’ about the importance of ‘follow your bliss’. Well, I think that’s what was going on: I was in my own youthful, stumbling way attempting to peer beneath my well-developed intellectual approach to life and get in touch with my bliss. Or as Obi-Wan might have said, “Go with your feelings, Scott!”

I’m not really sure I actually made a decision. The next Hoot Night, I saw an incredible musician perform. His name was Pat Flynn. After my short set, he approached me. ‘We should get together and jam.’ We did. ‘Hey, why not do a duo?’ We did. I stayed in Aspen for 2 years playing with Pat and although grad school remained an option, I was pretty much down the music pathway at that point. That eventually led to screenwriting (but only after numerous other times when I had the same inner conversation: Should I really be doing this? Go back to school, doesn’t that make more sense?)

The thing is, Campbell said if we take that leap of faith (not his language) and embrace our bliss, that part of ourselves which brings us the most joy and is the most authentic aspect of our Self, doors will open. The universe will respond and provide us opportunities.

Now I can’t answer for you. You have your own path. Where it will take you, who knows? That’s the scary part. The uncertainty of the future. But if you can flip your perspective, even if for a few moments each day and look at uncertainty as possibility, that can help you open up your thought process into a feeling process as well. You need both. And some version of ‘faith’ as well (not religious per se, just a belief in who you are, in the importance of identifying what is your most authentic aspect of your being, your bliss, your rapture, in the weird, mystical knowledge that if you choose to pursue that, doors will open for you).

The choices you make may only be about this year. Or the next few years. You may find a new opportunity down the road which takes you in a somewhat different direction. I never thought I’d end up in academics, but nearly four decades later, here I am!

And it’s not like if you follow your bliss, it’s all peaches and cream. Pursuing one’s creativity, in particular, can be a tough road to hoe. As I’ve blogged about in the past per a quote I read from the musician Levon Helm, “Music don’t owe anybody a living.” You can extend that to any form of the arts and creative expression. If money is super important to you, this is not the most obvious path to pursue.

But if living a spiritually, psychologically, and emotionally fulfilling life is a primary concern for you, then ‘follow your bliss’ is a legit part of the process. You just have to balance out what that fine mind of yours churns up with its thought process with what your gut says, your instincts, your Deep Feelings.

I didn’t intend to go into a sermon, but that’s an example just following my instincts. Maybe you needed to read something like this. Maybe I needed to concretize my own thoughts on the matter. Probably both!

Anyhow, let me close with one of my favorite anecdotes. When you’re a musician, you hear all sorts of musician stories which are often quite ridiculous because… you know… musicians. Here one’s of them.

The way I heard it was there was this musician named David Grisman. You can look him up. He created a hybrid of jazz with bluegrass instruments (minus the banjo) called ‘Dawg music’. Great stuff. Anyway he’s basically a hippie type who I’m sure smokes a lot of pot.

He’s backstage at a concert somewhere and some guy, a friend or an acquaintance, is bending David’s ear about, ‘Should I do this, should I do that,’ basically life advice. After listening to the guy go back and forth about what to do, David finally plants both hands atop the dude’s shoulders, peers directly into the guy’s face, and says, “Do it… or don’t do it. But you know. You. Know.” Then walks away.

You have to read those lines by Grisman with a kind of stoned voice to get the humor of it. But there’s also a big truth there, too.

You know. You. Know.

It’s just a matter of opening yourself to your Self… and the Universe… and your Mind… and your Soul.

To take a little pressure off, like I said, this is not like !!!THE BIG DECISION WHICH WILL DETERMINE THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!!!

It may be for the next year. Two years if you go for a masters. Perhaps a bit longer. Or maybe for several decades. My advice: Treat your decision as if it’s a near-future type of thing. Seeing as you’re young, you have time to explore your options.

All I can say in closing is…

Find that which enlivens you, which brings you joy, which makes you feel real, for which you have a genuine passion, something you believe you have talent for and you want to develop, something which can be part of your contribution to the world…

Discover that and do that.

That is in my view the essence of ‘follow your bliss’.

It may not be the easiest life… but it’s probably going to be the most authentic experience you can have.

The very first thing I did when I entered my new office at DePaul University was write this on the white board:

It’s still there to this day and will remain as long as I’m alive and teaching. I want every student, indeed, every person who visits my office to see those words. To me, they are not some idealistic blather. Rather, they represent perhaps life’s most central truth, certainly so for anyone interested in exploring their creativity.

Find your rapture, the unique thing inside yourself which brings you authentic joy… and do that.

And so I offer these words to any of you who are facing choices. I hope they bring you insight.

Onward.