California.

If you had the chance to read my last post, you know that I'm flying out to California at the end of this week to interview for a job!  It's been a whirlwind and I find myself still very overwhelmed with anxiety, stress, awe, and excitement.  It's still hard for me to believe that I'm actually flying out there to take a chance on this job. 

As you know, music has always been a huge part of my life, and I am so thankful that music is something you can do quite literally from anywhere.  I might not be able to make a career out of music living anywhere, but I can always put the guitar over my shoulder and start strumming a familiar tune and I instantly feel more at home wherever I am.  Yesterday was a particularly rough day for me -- I haven't been sleeping well with all the various thoughts and emotions I'm dealing with, and so I was completely exhausted.  I had hoped to spend the whole, around 10-12 hours, working on my portfolio.  After a mere 4 hours of working on it, I was overwhelmed with exhaustion and collapsed on my bed for a 2-hour nap that I don't think anyone could've waken me from if they had tried!  I felt discouraged... How am I going to be able to prepare for this interview and journey out to California if I can't even keep myself focused and energized to do 4 hours of work?!  I knew I needed some form of encouragement... and I knew music would probably be able to cheer me up! 

I decided to peruse the Itunes store and search for songs having to do with California, Los Angeles, or San Diego... where I will be spending 2 weeks for this job interview and visiting friends & family.  I found a much larger selection of songs I actually like than I had anticipated finding!  One song in particular really caught my attention when I heard it, because it describes exactly where I am right now with this whole California thing, and just with life in general.  The song is "California" by Avalon (a band I don't actually typically like haha), and it talks about wanting to follow where God leads and to rebel against living a comfortable, stagnant life.... but instead to be the hands and feet of Christ, living outside of my comfort zone and to ask God to use me wherever I am.... whether that be here at home, in California, or somewhere else.  I definitely like the words better than the song as a whole, but either way it's a really great reminder to surrender everything to God and to His will.

I'm going to post the list of songs about California that I've been listening to that have helped me hold on to the excitement of this experience, and to maybe help relieve some of the stress I've been facing!  I've also posted a YouTube video below so you can hear the song by Avalon that has really encouraged me!  Here goes:

And here's the YouTube video of "California" by Avalon: