This month I’ve been singing songs from different musicals, volume on high, with my best Broadway bravado. I love a good musical! With every song I sing, I think about the talent of composers, lyricists, and playwrights and I marvel at how they put music and words together so flawlessly into a storyline. Their songs express so many emotions ranging from deep pain to utter despair, enduring love to pure happiness, and everything in between.
Sometimes a perfectly placed song in a musical can say more than dialogue ever could, AND the best part? In musicals, you get to stop in the middle of a conversation and sing and dance! Who could ask for anything more? * (Yes, this is a direct reference to “I Got Rhythm” by George Gershwin.)
The reason I’m bringing up musicals in this newsletter is that I recently saw a wonderful movie musical called Tick, Tick…BOOM! which got me thinking about the interplay of time, purpose, and passion. Specifically how we choose to spend our time, the importance of purpose, and the costs of deciding whether or not to follow our passion.
Tick, Tick…BOOM! is a semi-autobiographical musical based on Jonathan Larson, an aspiring playwright and composer living in New York City in the ’90s. In the film, Jonathan is about to turn 30 and is at a crossroads. He is thinking about getting older as well as his lack of professional achievement. He worries that he is running out of time to find success as a Broadway composer because all he’s had so far in response to his music is rejection.
Jonathan works at a diner to make ends meet and lives in a run-down, disheveled studio. He is frenetic, spending time between working to pay the bills and focusing on his writing and composing. Some people are supportive of his dreams, others are not. He is questioning himself and his talents because he hasn’t had any mainstream success.
This is where I’ll leave the movie and fast forward five years later in real life. Jonathan is finally on the cusp of his dreams. He has a show that is going to Broadway, a show called RENT.
RENT would go on to be the 11th longest-running show in Broadway history. It won a Pulitzer Prize and the Tony Award for Best Musical. It fundamentally changed musical theater by bringing current topics like AIDS, poverty, addiction, sexual identity, and materialism to the stage as well as a new style of music called a “rock opera.”
RENT was undoubtedly a huge success. The tragedy is that Jonathan never got to see RENT performed. He died of an aortic aneurysm on the morning of the show’s Off-Broadway preview, on January 25th, 1996. He was only 35 years old.
Every time I think about Jonathan’s death, I feel heartbroken. How would it feel to chase a dream and get so close but never see it fully realized? I wonder how he would have felt if he could have finally seen all of his unrelenting work come together in such a powerful and important way. Relieved? Excited? Vindicated?
On one hand, his early death is such a tragedy, and on the other, look at what he achieved. He lived on purpose. He followed his passion and despite all the hardships, he kept trying. Although he didn’t live to see his goal realized, he lives on in what he created and in everyone who is touched by his music. It is precisely because he didn’t stop writing, creating, and composing, even in the face of rejection and failure, that he is seen as a success today. It’s not the breadth of his work, it’s the depth of it. His one show was enough to change Broadway forever.
Juxtapose this with Stephen Sondheim, also a composer and lyricist, who died just last month on November 26th at the age of 91. Called “The Titan of the American Musical” by the New York Times. Revered, influential, and beloved. So many people were impacted by his music.
Stephen wrote the music and lyrics for numerous successful shows including West Side Story, Gypsy, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Sweeney Todd, Follies, A Little Night Music, and Into the Woods, just to name a few. He won eight Tony Awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Tony, an Academy Award, eight Grammy awards, a Pulitzer Prize, a Laurence Olivier award, and a 2015 Presidential Medal of Freedom. He has a theater named for him both on Broadway and in the West End of London. By all accounts, Stephen Sondheim had a long and successful career.
Even after all the successes and laudable achievements, Stephen continued to write new music. He didn’t see his accomplishments as an endpoint. He didn’t stop because he was worried he couldn’t replicate his prior success. He didn’t think, “How can I possibly top what I’ve done?” He lived on purpose. He followed his passion and despite all the successes, he kept trying.
Thank goodness Jonathan Larson didn’t stop writing just because he never had success on Broadway. Thank goodness Stephen Sondheim kept writing even when he had enormous success on Broadway. One didn’t live long enough to see that he was a commercial success, while the other did, but they were both pursuing their passion for writing music regardless.
There is a performative nature to so many things we do in our society including being “successful.” We want to get noticed, have approval, and be affirmed by likes or followers. Many of us are basing our worth on the outcomes we achieve, rather than the effort we put into doing the work. We wait for others to say if it’s good or not. We want our success to happen quickly and we are afraid of failure. If our work is rejected or criticized we take it personally. If our goals/dreams are taking too long, instead of recommitting, we give up. These are the kinds of barriers that keep many people from trying anything in the first place. We get scared into complacency, comfort, and the illusion of safety.
When we create something and put it out into the world it can cause us to be fearful of judgment, rejection, or embarrassment. We can worry ourselves into not trying anything new, not taking risks, and not expressing ourselves. Living on purpose is not only having a passion for something, but it is also having the courage to pursue it. To keep going when we fail and to keep going when we succeed.
In your own life, I hope you think about the things you are not trying and ask yourself, why? You might be tempted to say things like, “I have no time,” “I am so busy,” but think past that. We are all busy and yet, we still find time for things that matter. What matters to you? How can you work on releasing the fear of judgment or the pain of rejection so that you can live your life on purpose? Your own unique purpose.
I will be talking about time, purpose, passion, AND of course musicals in the next episode of Get Big Out Loud. I hope you’ll join me Monday, December 13th at 11:00 a.m. Mountain Time at TransformationTalkRadio.com or watch it on my Facebook page at Facebook.com/knutsonspeaks/. Previous episodes can be found by searching Get Big Out Loud anywhere you listen to podcasts.
Here’s what Jonathan Larson said about living on purpose in a song called No Day But Today from RENT:
There’s only us, there’s only this
Forget regret, or life is yours to miss
No other path, no other way
No day but today
I can’t control my destiny
I trust my soul, my only goal
Is just to be
There’s only now, there’s only here
Give in to love or live in fear
No other path, No other way
No day but today
You can listen to the full song here: https://youtu.be/Te7DR4iuJj8
Even if you are not a fan of musicals, you can still be a fan of living on purpose.
