uncharted

About two years or so ago, I started a quasi-ritual. Every morning that I was needing motivation, I wrote on the inside of my left wrist. In sharpie, very small, and few words. It almost always was a song lyric or title. The first was "Don't Do Sadness" (from Spring Awakening). Other times it might be "Swim" (courtesy Andrew McMahon).  Or "Seize the Day" (Newsies).  All were inspirational for me.... push onward. McMahon wrote Swim while he fought cancer, with lyrics of "you've gotta swim/ swim for your life/ swim for the music that saves you/ when you're not so sure you'll survive." In Spring Awakening, Moritz was overwhelmed with life and tried to fight back, saying he wouldn't "do sadness, not even a little bit." All reminders that things aren't that bad, I just have to dig in.

For the last couple of months the word has become Uncharted. A couple of people have noticed and commented upon it, saying it was an odd choice, but never asking further what it meant. Ms Sara Bareilles, my generation's piano songstress (a la Carole King), is the author of this sentiment. And it is a constant reminder of my research and work.

During one of her live performances, Sara explains that this song is the "centerpiece" of her second album because she was petrified, unable to get over the writer's block associated with the "sophomore slump" so seemingly ever-present in pop music today. She said this got her over all her fears: "I didn't know if I had anything important to say. And it turns out I did, and it started with this song." One of its lyrics became the title of the album "Kaleidoscope Heart." And I am in love with the sentiment; as she puts it "It's all about being scared of the unknown, and realizing that the only way around it is through it."

I first just enjoyed the general piano groove she wrote (forgive the vagueness of that-- I'd rather not go all music theoretical analysis here), but then I kept hearing this lyric "compare where you are to where you want to be and you'll get nowhere." I didn't understand. In my mind, you're supposed to look where you want to be-- that's what goals are-- I see the end point that I want to get there. But I realized all I was thinking in the last year was getting the phd, getting a job, and building a house back on my family's ranch. The pressure of "will I get a job" which seriously is YEARS down the road was engulfing me. So I re-assessed my approach. Baby steps. I'm in my late 20s. I have 70 years to get back to the family farm. It might take a while, so let's just focus on the work here and now.

My life, my work is best left *uncharted*. I don't have to have the dissertation outlined tomorrow. I don't even have to graduate by 2014. It'll happen when it happens.  Perhaps I also relate a great deal because the thesis was my first attempts at a large academic tome; the dissertation will be my second. But I keep hearing the song more and more as an anthem for all of us with anxiety towards our work. She doesn't know where to begin, there's pressure weighing down upon her, but the resolve during the bridge is that

"I won't go as a passenger no
Waiting for the road to be laid
Though I may be going down
I'll take in flame over burning out"

She's going to fight back, be an active participant in her life. So instead of me worrying about extraneous factors that are to be dealt with years from now, I'll actively work towards the business at hand. Each day's work might not be perfect, but I won't allow myself to burn out from this stress.

Video embedded below. Notice for the video she used all of her fellow musicians, the ones who she said inspired her through the years. I think there's also a nice lesson with that as well....