Recently, I had the opportunity to visit the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio. This was my second visit to the hall of fame (my first visit was back in 2004). I saw displays from numerous musicians and musical artists.
Some of my favorite displays included:
- Elvis Presley's military uniform
- One of Michael Jackson's Grammy Awards from the music video/short film "Thriller"
- Clothing and jewelry from Run-D.M.C.
- A Pearl Jam Rock n' Jock Softball Uniform
- Gear from the Beastie Boys' music video "Intergalactic"
Each of these items stood out for one reason or another. Each was distinctly recognizable. However, the display that most caught my attention was this quote from Billy Joel:
One simple quote. "If you are not doing what you love, you are wasting your time." So simple yet so thought-provoking. 'Oh, these musicians, they must love life--they get to do what they love to do all the time.' Is that true?
I am not sure how many times throughout my life that I have thought about my career and other aspects of my life wondering about whether or not I was doing what I was supposed to be doing, whether or not I was with whom I was supposed to be with, or whether or not I was where I belonged.
Life is full of decisions, successes, failures, regrets--all different types of experiences, emotions, thoughts, and memories. We must not beat ourselves up over individual moments or individual decisions. While each moment and decision will stand out and be distinctly recognizable, we still get to keep experiencing moments and making decisions until we are not able to do so anymore.
"If you are not doing what you love, you are wasting your time." Sometimes we do not always get to make that choice. In life, we have to make sacrifices and experience pain--including pain in pursuit of doing what we love. In life, we will get hurt.
Overall, life is a collection of moments over time. Some moments will last longer. Some moments--like the people we meet in our lifetimes--are ones that we will keep closer to our hearts.
No matter what, we must not let limitations, painful moments, getting mistreated, or other disappointments hold us down; we must not let these obstacles stay in our way.
Admittedly, every basketball season, I still have at least one dream at night about playing basketball on a basketball team with my friends. My time as a basketball player ended a long time ago, but I still carry with me what I learned into other aspects of life. The regret of not playing longer eventually evolved into the creation of a blog to share my passion about basketball and my favorite team, the Cleveland Cavaliers. This blog eventually led to other writing opportunities, including writing for a blog for BGSU's MBA program as a graduate assistant, writing on this personal blog about career & life development, and random small freelance opportunities. All these opportunities to do what I love to do!
Meanwhile, I remember drawing a lot throughout the years. I drew by myself, with my brothers, with my friends, with my classmates. I drew at home, at school, at work. Still, aside from taking art & drawing classes in high school and college, I do not think I have spent enough time drawing. Oddly enough, I found a great opportunity recently to draw at work while waiting for a conference call to start. I quickly Googled a picture of the Grinch and, in 7 minutes, drew this on the dry erase board in one of the conference rooms:
It was a great reminder of one of my passions. Since drawing this, I have drawn other drawings and shared them with friends on Facebook. As I know, drawing is doing what I love to do.
Fitness? There is that basketball influence again. Over the years, I had grown to believe that I could not get any more fit--I did not have it because I did not play sports at a high enough competition level. Thankfully, my brother talked my ear off about P90X and other fitness and medical jargon. I finally caved in and accepted a P90X package of DVDs & the enclosed workout booklet, which was given to me as my birthday present. It was amazing how much healthier I felt after 3-4 months of this stuff. Fitness has now become a key part of my daily life. The last time I did not get daily exercise was Memorial Day Weekend. (As in, late May 2013: 227 days in a row.) My goal is to work out/exercise daily until my birthday in July. It is what I love to do.
Music? I was not supposed to have anything to do with that. I once sang in a duet at a grade school concert in 2nd grade and did fine, but by the time I had won a solo for a 4th grade presentation, I realized that I had stage fright and declined the opportunity to sing in front of everybody. Over the years, I still had an ability to play music by ear, but at a very elementary level. I could figure out random theme songs for TV shows and cartoons (lol, I was at the music hall playing the theme to the Rugrats a couple weeks ago) and other nonsensical stuff. Thankfully, I was surrounded by a number of different good musicians over the years; their influence caught up with me. Also, thankfully, my other brother encouraged me to take piano lessons for a semester during my freshman year of college. 30 minute lessons once a week for about 12 weeks. It took some time and some experience of different momentous occasions and heartbreaks, but now I consider music a big part of my life. I even had a video retweeted by the band Blessid Union of Souls; this recording (the better one) has over 400 views, while the original one from a few years ago has over 1000 views.
Here is one of my favorites now, a video of me playing a piano cover of Lonestar's "Amazed" and sporting a better look for myself. Sure, there are a lot of pianists and musicians that are a lot--and I mean, a lot--better than me. Yet, why should that stop me? I keep getting better at it because I took the time to try, I believed that I could. I experienced all of this because I took the time to do what I love to do.
When it is all said and done, doing what you love to do does apply to many careers. However, doing what you love to do does not have to be limited to career and job decisions. You should take time to do what you love to do every day of your life. And, may I add, never taking time to do what you love to do is a waste of you.
