Certainty

**The following said experience was first drafted 01/21/11, published 10/4/11**

I was made by parents who kept me under their wing as they nudged me into employment. I most certainly am not complaining. Working for my parents has been a prime way to get my feet wet before I make the big plunge.

It was today that I felt my presence becoming unwanted and my parent's work offers seeming much more forced than genuine. In a dark way, I addressed the fathomless issues of my life smashing into a wedge. My employment status suddenly seemed minute to the vast hole of problems inflicting my progress. There was little I could do to swallow it, so I burst into tears.

The thoughts running through my head were my typical post-graduation mumbo-jumbo. Questions of my competence and adequacy for journalism, my weak levels of passion and drive for improvement, spiritual progression, and of course, the harrowing issue of unemployment.

Later at the commercial shoot, of which I had already composed myself and pasted on a happy mask, the Director of the company came up to me for the usual brief chat. Eventually, after lightly picking up on my conundrum, he stressed on the importance of this one fabulous line of advice: Everybody is trying to figure themselves out just as much as the next guy.

I'm sure you have caught wind of this idea, that we are all humans in the same struggling world who each have problems to overcome. However coming from an accomplished man who seems to have really figured it out gave the idea a totally new meaning. Perhaps this isn't a typical issue, but I have spent way too much time holding back because I felt someone else could do a better job. I've felt inadequate and uncertain, visioning everyone around me to have so much drive and talent that they are untouchable.

I'd like to say I went on that day as a new woman, but that of course disrupts the point I am attempting to make. Instead I went throughout the day working, sometimes effectively, sometimes not so much. Reality is a constant struggle, and all I have left to say is, my certainty will only ever feel true if 1. I work hard and 2. I accept my effort to be enough. And of course, as a bonus I now take the extra time to feel bubbly, frothing over a cup of adventure and commitment to ultimate confidance.

Be Free

Steven Georgiou, also known as Cat Stevens, was an American singer/songwriter on a stalwart journey for peace. His songs have been an inspiration to people all over the world.

I remember my mother playing his music at our old home. It was crooning when I'd return, disheveled and out of breath, from the backyard swing set. It was humming when I blew out the candles on my seventh birthday homemade chocolate cake. Cat Stevens was the voice of my childhood.

Never though, could I identify the name for this roughly sweet voice of rejoice. Last year, nearly ten years absent of Cat, I heard the soft echoes of Moon Shadow, and was struck entirely with the familiar brilliance of my childhood soundtrack. Since maturing over the last decade, I began to take note of his lyrics, and was immediately taken back by it's sweet persuasion of peace.

Listen. Listen to his words. Listen to his captivating voice, and be inspired!