I’m currently listening to an Ella Fitzgerald channel on Pandora, and thinking about how every time someone encountered her, throughout her whole life, they probably asked her to sing at least a bar or two from her most famous songs. She was known as a singer, as a bringer of beautiful and enduring music to the world.
I wonder if she hated it. But even if she did despise being known for her music, rather than something more nebulous and “spiritual” (like her “true self” – although one can make the argument that something created is a piece of one’s true self), she kept at it. She pressed on, knowing that she was imparting to her fans and casual listeners alike a chance to escape for just a moment into the worlds of her songs.
I have a few driven friends, people who are pushing to carve out their niche in the world, not because they are desperate to be remembered but because they can’t do otherwise. I am the same: I can’t not write, or create, or come up with new ways to inspire people with my words. I’ve known that’s what I was meant to do since I penned “The Hoppers Go on Vacation” at age five. Among my friends who will be known and remembered long after they are gone are programmers, writers, musicians, artists, engineers, nurses, homemakers, parents, scientists, athletes, salespeople, and crafters.
But I see so many directionless people around me, too. These are people who completed college because they could or because it was expected, not because they were chasing a passion. These are people who have no dream job. These are people whose biggest visions of the future include a night out with friends and a cup of coffee before work the next day.
Is there anything wrong with that? Morally, of course not. Psychologically, I see many of them atrophying, desperately clawing at the last shreds of what their family or their friend circle knew or knows them for. I wonder if it’s a question they’ve ever stopped to ask themselves: what am I known for? And I wonder if they would even be able to find an answer to that question. I suppose there’s only so much room in the world for the driven people, or else we would have been extinct long ago, but it still saddens me to see individuals who have no sense of belonging or legacy.
What are you known for? What would you like to be known for? How can you take your passions and beliefs and obsessions and transform them into a long-lasting impression on the world?
Just a thought.