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Health & Fitness

Steely Dan Concert

Last week, I saw a lifetime favorite band called Steely Dan in New York's Beacon Theatre.  The lush, velvety sounds and guitar chords washed over me with an intensity that opened my heart and made me smile. A lot! Being in the presence of brilliantly accomplished artists, letting it all out to their edges, witnessing the energetic connections between each of them and all of us is inspiring and powerful stuff.

Not being a machine, my current life path of finding my place and feeling a deep scale of emotions anyway, made the experience of strolling up 5th Avenue with my girlfriend Jen (also a huge Dan fan from way back), slicing thru the unseasonably warm October breezes, feeling the cool stone air of St Patrick's cathedral, exotic New Yorkers passing by, the shimmering lights of Lincoln Center just below 74th and Broadway where the Beacon is, then afterwards, taking the subway back to Times Square and walking back up Park Avenue to Grand Central near where I used to work stirred me up. Grateful for the times and the rich life of those marketing years with MLB and Mattel. Thinking too, of the thousands of massages I've given these last eight years and deep sense of honor felt from the people I practiced with. 

I am full of angst and anger, upset I do not know where to take my career.  Combining my health and wellbeing, writing, communications skills with my sales and branding experiences makes sense to me but no opportunities are showing themselves. I have interviewed, networked and tried to maintain a good attitude. Nothing is coming so I get up each day and do the best I can.  Don't know what else to do.  Making me crazy.

I want my niche like Steely Dan founders Donald Fagan and Walter Becker found at Bard 30+ years ago. I feel things deeply, have unique connection skills and want to give what I have.  Maybe I will have to move to find my place, I imagine I will know it when I am there.  It's hard to exist with uncomfortable feelings.   New growth comes from the "unsettled"; being with these feelings is more courageous than weak. Even the anger helps push me in directions to get me over my emotional humps.  Still, I feel lost and that I do not fit in.

I saw a woman in the gym today that I had massaged once. She was on the floor, trying to stretch and she told me she had found out her back pain came from extensive arthritis and she had had shots and was frustrated by all of it. I knelt by her, not telling her of my churned up state but told her gently she would act like a river and flow around all of this, to not create resistance to the inner tensions she feels, that she would find new paths and be better than ever.  She smiled and it felt good to be able to connect with her and offer some comfort and support to another.  I knew what I had said to her was meant for me too and life's wisdom had us cross paths exactly then to provide what we each needed.  Things WILL be alright.:) They really are alright. Onward!

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