My Week Of Thoughts - Day 3 - What is success? Do we really ''arrive'' some day?

This is a series of automated posts since I'm out of town for a week , I'll be catching up with comments whenever I can get my hands on some WI-FI but my interaction will be limited

All of the liquid earnings of the week of thoughts will be donated to @adollaraday.

This has been running on my mind lately, I already believe the answer is ''no'', we never arrive and we must learn how to enjoy the path , success is not a place you get at some point and also being successful can mean completely different things to different people BUT sometimes we get caught in the craziness of daily life and we forget . Life gives us reminders all the time , we just don't listen.

One of my ''many jobs'' ( I'm basically a freelance musician and producer so .. I'm all over the place ) is to direct an ensemble of music enthusiasts . Doctors , lawyers, engineers , businessmen that just want to have a moment of release playing.. since they need guidance in order to get a repertoire going that's where I come to the picture , trying to put the band together working with the level of playing they have , which is on an amateur level. I'm also playing with them to ''cover'' whatever element is missing. It's a ''relaxed'' gig , they play VERY LOUD and most of the time they are just venting over their instrument but on the other side they are very chill and the pay works for me.. so , I've been doing that for a while now.

Last Thursday a ''new student'' came in , a quite small and private man who was wearing a suit , like if he just got out of the office . I said hello and he very politely said ''Hello , I'm Silvio , nice to meet you'' ... a couple seconds later he grabbed a guitar and said ''mind if I joined in today?'' . ''Sure , why not ? Plug your guitar in and join us''.

He grabbed a Telecaster that was around the room and started playing... I was immediately blown away .. this guy had tone , criteria , language , good taste... this guy was no amateur , he was on a complete other level that the rest of the ''class'' . Since I had my guitar in hand we traded off a little and he ended up liking my playing , we just kept having some fun during the 2 hours we usually rehearse with the rest.

After the ''class'' was over I headed over to him to chat , I had a couple questions .. why was he there in the first place??.. He doesn't need ensemble classes ..

He seemed very private but ended telling me he had been playing for quite a while and that he had played with ''some people'' .. after a little more chat he told me he had played in a couple albums from Coti , Miguel Mateos , David Lebon , toured Ecuador too... he kept dropping big names ! ... So .. now it made sense ! this guy was in the ''big leagues''.

So, I had to ask him .. ''What project are you in now? Where are you playing in?'' , He stopped for a second and answered ''I'm a little retired now.. I'm not playing much anymore''.. shortly after he added ..''I'm going through some tough moments.. and I am not sure if I want to continue playing.. I've done it for so long .. I'm quite burnt out..''

My immediate answer was: ''Oh yeah , I know the feeling , I also retired for a while... In fact I'm just recently coming back to playing .. having a little tour this week after a while .. depression can be a bitch sometimes.. but , it's ok .. we all end up coming back to the music at some point I think.''

He looked at me and told me: ''How did you get out of that depression?''

I shared a bit of my previous years experiences and my struggle with anxiety and depression and how I think I am slowly overcoming it , we could only chat for about 10 minutes though as we both had to go.. but he did give me his number and told me he would like to have a longer chat with me when I came back from the tour.

This person is someone who I believe ''made it'' already , he's already done so many of the things I would love to experience someday .. yet there he is , with the same struggles we all deal with as regular people and with the same doubts that sometimes visit all of us.

I am really expecting for that conversation to happen.. I really want to listen to his story and perspective.. I think it is going to be an enlightening one .. I'm in for some very interesting coffee talk...

Oh , the person I'm talking about is Silvio Furmanski.. I googled him .. and .. he's the real deal :) .. Maybe i'm making a new good friend shortly :D

Thanks for reading!

Pechi