This is a story about the moment that would change my life forever. A moment that seemed both inevitable and unexpected all at once.
You see, I had built a pretty comfortable life post-college after my hustle of a dance of various jobs in the years following. Eventually, I landed a full-time job in a communications position that didn’t feel life-sucking but felt rather exciting in different ways. I felt truly seen and appreciated by the organization… Needed might be a better term. I felt needed.
This job allowed me to barely afford an apartment in downtown Salt Lake City where I could walk to work (a dream back then) and I could live solo in the most bustling city available to me then. Plus, I got to use skills I was naturally good at, which felt like I was being useful in a way I liked.
Not only was happy with my job, but I filled my evenings with rehearsals and performances for a couple of the local community theaters. In essence, I was doing everything I felt I wanted to do! I could use my skills as a writer and editor at the office, then turn on the glitz, glam, voice, and show in the evenings with other artistic folks who are just as off-beat as I am.
(If you haven’t met that side of me, hello starshine!)
So much of this time I wouldn’t change for anything. I met wonderful people, had a job I enjoyed, and got to engage my creative gifts quite a bit. It felt very balanced. And I was content, if not happy, with how I was living.
That’s why this felt so… jarring.
Since I was (and still am) a very efficient worker, I’d often start my mornings with inspirational readings from a couple of email subscriptions to boost my energy and spirit. Primarily, at the time, I read the DIY Daily, which was chockfull of inspiring entrepreneurial folks, doing all kinds of cool things with their lives, making waves, and doing things I thought were quite revolutionary at the time. It also catered to musicians and other artists as well, so it hit all the notes that felt compelling to me. As I’d read these articles, important life questions would be presented, but there were a couple that really stuck out to me.
Keep in mind, at this time, I was very content with work, loved living on my own, loved the show I was in at the time as I had been recently cast as Rapunzel in Into the Woods, and was fresh off a dream role experience as Doralee in 9 to 5: The Musical.
Things were GOOD in my book.
So, I sat back in my spindly office chair pondering these questions from my little cubicle. Closing my eyes, I took a breath and asked myself:
When I look at my life, could I see myself doing what I am doing now for the rest of my life and be happy doing it?
Nope.
I knew in my bones that would make me feel stagnant… And being in motion, though scary, is far more fulfilling to me than staying in the same place, doing the same things, over and over again, until I return to the ethers.
And this question surprisingly got to me:
Would you want your boss’s job/life?
Now, don’t get me wrong… I very much respect and enjoyed working for the bosses I’ve had—they are tremendous individuals who’ve done great work, continuing to grow and expand into new arenas. But at that time… When I thought about the kind of life they had in Utah where they were executives at their organizations, had loving families in the suburbs of Salt Lake, yada yada yada…
I felt a visceral “no” throughout my whole body.
I don’t want that.
I’ve never wanted that.
So, that made me schlump forward.
What the heck did I want then?
Because it certainly wasn’t that kind of future in Utah.
In a flash, I felt different versions of myself clamoring for attention.
I thought of the 12-year-old girl who wanted nothing more than to grow up so she could move out of the house and live independently without the chaos that comes with growing up in a blended family of divorce, despite how supportive and loving it was still.
I thought of the 16-year-old me who so badly wanted to attend Juilliard in New York City, but upon realizing the cost of such a venture, opted to get her bachelor’s degree at a state university, attended a summer program at Berklee instead (still ridiculously expensive), then go from there.
I thought of the 19-year-old who, after studying voice and music since childhood, switched gears from a voice performance major to an English literature major, excusing away the shift with a lock jaw diagnosis over the summer. But really she just didn’t like the environment, hated the idea of losing the enjoyment of one of her main forms of expression, and felt like if she had to do college, she wanted to be challenged in something she was actually interested in learning more about.
(Also a secret until now: I put in the change order for my degree before my jaw locked shut… I still remember it clicking like a stuck typewriter at the meeting with my student counselor.)
And I thought of my 25-year-old self at that present moment, who was committed to a 9-to-5 job, in an office, five days a week, where—though doubly fulfilled through community theatre endeavors—was often exhausted, falling into binge-watching TV shows to relax (not knocking it… it works), and feeling like there was only so much I could do from that space. I could feel the ceiling and the time crunch all around me, especially when I realized that wasn’t all that I wanted out of life.
Okay… If that’s not the life for me, what is?
What is it I most desire to do?
Like a beacon of white, I saw the words in my mind:
New York City.
And I knew…
It was something that had been on my radar forever. Movies and TV shows based in New York (verrrry glamorized, by the way… wait ’til you see the cat-sized rats, the tiny and pricey apartments, and the smelly streets/subways… and the pandemic made it worse).
I had visited at age 16 with my performance troupe, falling in love on day one, and deciding then and there that I would live in New York one day.
New York was always something on the horizon. Maybe. Someday.
When I decided to make the leap, I labeled the guise of wanting to move to New York as wanting to pursue my performing ambitions. And sure, those existed to a degree and were relatively true at the time. But honestly?
I just felt in my soul that that was where I needed to be. I needed to move to New York, even though the reasons weren’t entirely clear why.
And literally one year and ten days later, I stepped into the first room I rented in New York, just a block away from the Port Authority Bus Terminal—right near Times Square (why this was not an ideal place to live, but also why it was, is a story for another day).
But it took that moment to sit back. It took assessing my life, looking at it how it was, and anticipating—if I stayed on that track—how it might look if I kept going down that path… And then asked what it was I truly wanted.
Have you ever done that with yourself, lovely?
I think it might be worth it.
Actually, it is worth it. You’re worth it. Go ahead.
Take a deep breath and ask yourself:
What is it I most desire to do?
I hope something that stirs your soul comes to mind.
***
Originally published on magicwithmikael.substack.com