Here’s To 2012! Finding A Way To Make Dreams Come True Or At Least Give Them A Fighting Chance

Some time ago I wrote an article about deciding to audition to study jazz vocals next year at University.  I hadn’t been doing anything around music for a while, then one day I sat down at the piano again and it all came flooding back - the lust I have to make something serious of my music, mostly my singing.  It’s always been so strange that my passion for singing could rise to the surface at times and burn at me ferociously, all-consumingly, then just seemingly disappear. 

When I play the piano something often unlocks in my heart and mind, I can’t think of another way to put it.   It clears my thoughts.  I realized that day that it isn’t enough any more, to just have these highs and lows, because consistency in the doing of music is what leads to anything of any real value.  Doing it when you don’t feel like it.

My heart is not finding the fulfillment it craves from singing because I’m not taking my singing seriously in any kind of consistent way.  In a way I treat that part of me the way my mother treated me.  Sometimes there but often not.  So there I sat playing, seeing more clearly than ever that unless I make a commitment to my singing it ain’t ever gonna happen folks.  Not in the way that I dream of. 

I chose my University audition date.  But despite my light bulb moment, in the back of my mind was a kind of devil-may-care attitude, I might as well try, what have I got to lose.  I started my preparation - to pick three songs, to learn to sight read, and to recognize intervals.  Not that easy to do in a short period of time.  Also, I finished my book, and got preoccupied with getting it ready for internet exposure.

My book took up a lot of time and energy and I began to see that if I got accepted for a music degree next year my time and energy would be totally absorbed and my book would fall by the way.   A singing degree is a huge amount of work.  It’s not just tra la la, having a good time.  Was I rationalizing my fear of the audition?  Partly, probably.  I found it hard to let myself cancel, knowing that that fear existed, worried that I was just running away again.

I wrestled with it right up until the day before the audition.  Everything else aside, though, I knew I wasn’t properly prepared, and that I’d go in on the back foot and not have confidence.   Singing jazz isn’t just about opening your mouth and letting out your soul.  There’s a ton of technique and hard work behind even a mildly polished sound and if you haven’t done the work it shows to people who have a trained ear.

Everybody was saying just give it a go, you’ve got nothing to lose.  But in the end I flew in the face of them all and cancelled, the day before, because I had everything to lose, including knowing that I wasn’t properly prepared.  I knew I’d be a bit sad, and feel as if I’d betrayed myself at some level - you know, copping out.  I did feel that way on and off, but as the days have gone by, something else has become apparent to me.

I don’t want to have a devil may care attitude about my singing, because it’s just setting myself up for failure.  I seriously doubt I’d have made it and if I did it would have been as a second-rater.  I don’t want to be that.  I want to be taken seriously, which means I have to take myself seriously.  I want to prepare well for an audition so that I go in having given myself the very best chance.  I want to do that for me.

Are my standards much higher than they need to be?  I don’t know, but they are what they are, and I can’t be satisfied with less.  There just doesn’t seem to be any point in doing something unless I put everything into it, heart and soul.  The risk of being devastated if rejected is much higher, I know, but better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.

Also, I’ve started this process of my book and I don’t want to just drop it.  I want to give myself the opportunity to put my heart and soul - and my time and energy - into trying to get it onto the world stage.  People have often said you can’t have split focus and be successful.  I don’t buy it, but I know that developing two dreams means good time management, sensible strategies, flexibility, being aware and being present.  And not watering down your passion as some kind of insurance against being hurt if you get rejected.

The idea that I have two long-term goals for which I’m capable of forming strategies is strangely calming.  I may reach a point when I let go of one, but at the moment I can’t, so I want to give as much as I can to both dreams, feeding and nurturing them as best I can.   Allowing myself to dream as big as I want, but also keeping my feet on the ground and being practical.

2011 has been a year with a lot of challenges, big changes and major breakthroughs.  I’m sure 2012 is going to be a good year, not because success for either my music or writing is definitely going to happen, but because what I can and am willing to put into both is guaranteed and I'm open to learning.  Plus I’m more focused and more in my power than I’ve ever been in my life.  So, here’s to next year!  May it be a brilliant year for you too.