Waking Dreams

I'm really struggling right now with staying positive about the here and now moments, because every day feels like I'm falling behind somehow. Like I should be further along than I am. As though there is something incredibly important that I'm missing out on because my teacher is moving me along too slowly, or I'm not working hard enough, or there's something that I'm not quite understanding about what I'm trying to accomplish.

In short, the name of the game is patience, and lately it's been feeling like patience is winning the game handily over me and my own desperate need for success and instant gratification.

Part of the problem is that I'm almost too good about planning for the future.

It's that fine balance that I think we all probably struggle with; knowing where to draw the line. Where dreams have to stop, and we have to take some time to just live in reality for a while. Knowing when the moment becomes necessary to wake up for a time, and stop dreaming the days away.

Because I certainly know what I want in my life.

But because I have the same insecurities that anyone out there has about whether or not I'll get there, I'm desperate to move forward so that I can move through the uncertain times and jump to the success and security.

I want to go to Europe.

I want my life to really get off the ground.

And talking to my voice teacher about it is equal parts wonderful and terrible all at once. Because on the one hand, he thinks I have what it takes, and fully plans to help me get exactly where I want to go. But on the other, he throws around statements like "The next few years..." and "Well we need to give it at least eighteen months before..." and I want to scream! I'm restless! I want change! I feel like I'm spinning my wheels!

Now bless his heart, my teacher was very understanding and patient with me, and gave me the best advice he could - namely to just immerse myself fully in whatever I can with my music in the here and now - but it still at the end of the day boils down to me and how I deal with it.

It's not getting any easier.

But it's not like there's anything I can do about it.

So I'll just work on narrowing down my world to one day at a time. Every day I wake up, I'm just focused on today. Or at least, that's what I'll have to do when I start getting the proverbial ants in my pants that we all get at times. Nothing wrong with dreaming and planning for the future...but I have to remember that life is still happening in the here and now too.

...In Which I'm The Tortoise

So then...the topic of today's lecture is patience. Those who have it. Those who need it. And those who are constantly feeling like their lives are forcing them to take a step back and just wait, but who find such a concept exceedingly difficult (i.e. me).

It's always felt strange to me that one of the first words most people use to describe me is 'patient', when if you ask me I'd say patience is one of the qualities I've never mastered.

I'm always looking towards the future and tapping my foot, demanding it get here faster. Wondering why I can't just have what I want right now. Seeking not necessarily instant gratification, but fairly instant results. It's why weight loss over the years has always been such a challenge. You don't lose it over night. It's a fairly extended, sometimes seemingly endless process.

Of course, in the grand scheme of things if it takes you nine months to lose all your weight, that's not a long time...but when you're sitting at the starting line with no end in sight, it feels like eternity.

And that's where I have all my problems.

Which is why I'm going to have to learn some serious patience as I embark on the next step in my musical career with my new instructor. Because he's right; people don't become opera singers overnight. Rather they work at it for many, many years, and it isn't until a singer's mid-to-late twenties that they really start making any money with big name contracts. It doesn't mean you're not singing in the meantime; it just means it's always evolving, and you start on the low rung of the ladder and have to climb each rung individually. No skipping ahead!

Sure, there are some singers that seem to pass over certain rungs faster than others, and sure, I'm crossing my fingers and hoping and praying that I'll be one of them.

But here's the reality: I know at the very least I'll be here in Oregon through December 2009. Why? Because of some fairly poor mistakes that I will probably go into detail about some other time. So obviously no big, grand fireworks can happen before then.

Not awful, I suppose.

It guarantees I'll get at least another seven months of studying with Mr. Blaylock, which I think would be fantastic if the progress I've already made is any indication of where I can go with him.

But I can also confess to what I'm hoping will happen after that:

Deep down I'm hoping that somehow, between now and then, I'll magically acquire plans to travel to Europe as soon as I'm free to go after December. I can feel myself saying I don't want to wait much longer than that, and I certainly don't want to be in Oregon for a whole year plus.

I want to go.

Now!

And I have to slow down and learn to trust in my teacher and that he'll know what's best for me. Trust in the process, and trust that eventually he'll get me right where I want to be. And in the meantime...I have to be patient. I have to let all those other 'rabbits' jump ahead of me and not panic.

Because there are definitely rabbits.

I have so many friends who I feel are so far beyond where I'm at; with lives where they're seemingly doing everything I want to be doing. Everything I hope to be doing. And then the jealousy sets in, and then I get desperate and anxious and start demanding more for myself. Demanding that time hurry up.

But I can't do that.

As we all know, time is going to march along at its own pace and nothing and no one can rush that along.

Of course, I know if I emailed my instructor tomorrow and asked what he thought a rough timeline would be for me, he'd probably give me one. And maybe that's why I haven't yet. Because I'm afraid of the answer. Afraid of seeing something like "Well Megan, I'm hoping that in another two-three years..."

Which is silly.

So what if that is what he says?

If it means I have the huge career I want in the end, won't it be worth it? After all, in two-three years I'd still only be 24-25 years old! A young pup, by the standards of most opera performers!

But that piece of me that hates to wait...she's in my head too, tapping her foot and demanding we move faster. Harder. Move now!

And yet that's part of what's always gotten me in trouble in the past: pushing the envelope too soon, and watching the opportunity absolutely dissolve and erode under the pressure of it all. So I'm now trying desperately to learn from past mistakes, reign it in, and really trust the people I've supposedly asked to help me. Because they can't fully do their jobs unless I give them free reign to do it. Unless I stop questioning everything and thinking I know best.

But like I've said over and over again...it's hard.

Let me tell you, the older I get, the more respect I seem to acquire for that damn tortoise...