The Greatest Lesson From My Nashville Dream
No journal of mine would be complete without many mentions of Nashville, Tennessee. Success on the Nashville country music scene was my dream. I lived part of it (the fact that I made the leap is a success in my own eyes), and now it’s over. Does it have to be? Well, no. But I finally accepted that I should stop struggling to hold on, and let it be. I’ve learned that dreams hide. Dreams get put on hold. Sometimes they arrive, evolve, and sometimes they go. I’ve learned to quiet my mind and listen to my soul because, while ideas and direction originate in the mind, the actions making it all possible are fueled by the soul. To accomplish a dream, you must know in your soul, without a doubt, exactly and unequivocally where you want to go because without the push of the soul, you won’t make it there.
My Nashville dream taught me that you can only become whoever you want to be if it’s etched in your soul. Otherwise you won’t. Without a mission from your soul, you will attempt to leverage your intellect, but your intellect will surely fail. And when it does, it will lead you to invent clever alternatives. These alternate possibilities lead you away from the dream you had planned to an array options. You’ll then take those options because who you thought you wanted to be was never etched into your soul. The soul’s demand is inescapable. It produces resolve, feelings of absoluteness, accompanied by a stirring belief that you know what you know. When it comes from the soul, you know you must pursue it. You must above all else, go.
Shai in her first talent show at her elementary school.
I held tight to the dream of making music ever since I was in the 4th grade. I developed a love of singing around that time and a penchant for creating melodies and recalling lyrics. My ears have always been sensitive to sound. Songs that I sang in grade school have never left my head. By the age of 13, I had begun singing in the gospel choir at my baptist church learning contemporary and traditional gospel music, hymns, and negro spirituals. I sang my first solo ever, “Thank You Lord for All You’ve Done for Me” written by Edwin Hawkins, when I was about 13 years old. By my freshman year, I had helped to start the first gospel choir at my catholic high school and an a capella ensemble singing Take 6 tunes around my hometown. Soon after graduating from law school, I joined another gospel choir where I sang multiple times per week and around the country with some of the most talented musicians in the industry. I did that for about ten years. Though I was well into my law career by that time, I still held a longing in my soul for making my own music.
And so I did. After my mother’s diagnosis with glioblastoma, I set off for Berklee College of Music in Boston. My mom died two years after I enrolled in Berklee. I moved to Nashville three months after her death. Ultimately, I lived my dream of making music, but it wasn’t like I expected. In some ways it was disappointing. I didn’t accomplish everything that I set out to do. I had begun to lose steam, even before the pandemic had brought every music venue to a close. In others ways, my life turned out better than I could’ve ever hoped.
I learned to acknowledge that my soul was in the singing but not in the commercial and competitive music business. My soul wasn’t driving me to tour on a bus to hundreds of venues per year. My soul wasn’t telling me to write songs that I didn’t even care to sing simply to attempt to write “a hit.” I didn’t have to pursue those things because I wasn’t compelled by my soul. And so, I gave myself options. I immersed myself into an adventurous new family life at home. I returned to the full time practice of law. Without knowing it, I had gradually evolved into a new state of consciousness and gently allowed the remainder of my Nashville dream to go.
When it comes to singing, I’ll never stop because the desire to sing continues to be fueled by my soul. Do I still have music dreams? Maybe. But I don’t worry about them. I go where the water flows.
In my writings, I plan to share everything that I’ve learned about chasing your dreams in the hopes that I can help others live theirs. I believe that this one lesson is fundamental: the mind will concoct clever strategies, the ego will overflow with possibilities, but the truth about who you are and what you want and need comes from your soul. Listen to the wisdom of your soul.
Shai singing on tour at Hill Country Restaurant and Bar in Washington DC.