"I am enough", an open letter by Alessia Balasbas (from A is for Arrows)
Photo credit: Kelsi Gayda, Lux Media Group
I’ve always found it difficult to communicate my deepest thoughts, which is ironic considering I’m a songwriter. I often feel as though my experiences aren't impactful in any way, and that my story is not unique. I also feel immense fear, often, causing anxiety attacks and sleepless nights. What if I try something and I fail again? What if nobody cares? So to that, I must admit, writing into the abyss about my personal life feels a bit unordinary.
But, I recognize that sometimes, I'm so crippled with fear and anxiety that I don’t attempt what I know in my gut that I can do. So FUCK IT, I’m just going to write a stream of consciousness, to paint a picture of who I am as a result of where I came from.
I started singing when I was 6 or 7 - my mom put me in lessons and I'm not sure why. I didn’t really express a particular interest in it, but I did enjoy listening to records with my dad. Most days, you could hear Motown and Sade beaming from our house.
When I started singing lessons, I actually HATED it! It felt so tedious and boring. I was always learning a song from long before I was born and felt no emotional attachment to these songs or the emotions that came with them.
When I was about 12 my mom bought me my first guitar, and I enjoyed this much more than singing. I was learning music from bands I haven't discovered yet; The Red Hot Chilli Peppers and Incubus. When I nailed a riff, I felt accomplished, confident, and powerful. But, for some reason, I wasn’t committed. For years after, I again felt like a failure.
Maybe it was my age, but I just didn’t appreciate what I was learning. I know my lack of commitment might make me sound ungrateful, but I was simply suffering from undiagnosed ADHD. This meant if I was not being over stimulated, I was not focused on what I was doing which always amounted to not enough interest. Feeling like a failure was inevitable. A feeling I soon became familiar with as a result of my mental and emotional instability.
Now, ADHD and anxiety are much more common household names than they were before. Therefore, rather than recognizing my patterns, my dad always discouraged me. Reminding me when I failed and would say things like “what’s the point of all these lessons. It’s not like she’s going to make music for a living.”
My dad.
Well, he was a good enough dad, I guess? I mean, he did those things that “dads” do, like take me to the arcade and movies all the time, and showered me with expensive gifts while my mom was doing the real work. In my head, he was a great dad. He was showing me love in the form of gifts. A love language that now makes me feel uncomfortable and cautious.
At 14 he left my mom and I to move to another country, and I haven’t seen him since. I haven’t fully explored or accepted the pain that came with my father leaving. I’ve reached a point in my life where I feel like to miss him would be like missing something I never had. He has become a distant memory, fading further the older I get and the more I experience true love and life.
When I was a kid, he once said to me, “It doesn’t matter how good you are at something, someone will always be better at it than you.” I’ll never understand his backwards way of motivating, if that was even what he was trying to do. But what I do understand, now, is that humans will always project their insecurities. Perhaps he too felt inferior in his life and his accomplishments and I was being held accountable for his failures. Wow is that what was going on?! Hello? Any therapists out there want to confirm that? haha
Right after my dad left, I put my guitar down and I started doing horribly in school. I didn’t see a point in trying anymore. I used to be an A student, I turned into a D- student all within a year. I skipped 70% of my school year and barely graduated. What’s hilarious to me is that I would skip school to go to Chapters, a book store near my school, and read. I left the place that was supposed to offer me education, comfort and growth to go find my own source of knowledge, independence and comfort. I traded books for...other books.
I was always defiant in wanting to choose my own path. Maybe that’s why I didn’t like singing lessons or guitar lessons. Someone was forcing me to do it on their schedule and the way they wanted to...It's a bit confusing...okay, I need therapy for sure haha
Photo credit: Kelsi Gayda, Lux Media Group
SO! ...
Fast forward to my year off after highschool ended - I had no direction. I worked as a server at lucky strike. (I actually served Drake a couple times there. He loves bowling. Good stories for another time). While it was some of the most fun and memorable times of my life, I didn’t feel like I had a purpose. I was making a ton of money, smoking weed with all of the amazing friends I had, getting drunk every weekend… but still, something was missing.
I woke up one afternoon, looked over at the guitar collecting dust in the corner of our condo - which I hadn’t touched in about 4 years - and picked it up. As soon as I started attempting to play something, I was hooked. Something came over me that never had before when I was taking lessons. It was freedom, It was bliss. I started learning covers and slowly realized that I wanted to sing to accompany the guitar which I never expected because I thought I hated singing. From then on, I was absolutely obsessed with music. I had found my purpose, I’d found my calling. I chose it on my own merit.
This was definitely one of the most important turning points in my life.
AND THEN I came out of the closet. Wow, this is a roller coaster. You still reading this shit?
Coming out carried similar fears as picking up that guitar. Same type of realization, same jumping in with both feet type of thing.
Fast forward through the toxic, codependent relationships that furthered my anxieties, lack of self worth, and independence… I eventually was forced to see my own value when my relationship of 3 years ended over the phone. She called me one night and just ended it. I think what pissed me off the most about that experience is that I knew for so long that I was undervalued and I allowed this person to continue to mistreat me because I feared abandonment.
While I was in that relationship, I moved to Vancouver to go to film school. A major switch-up in creative direction. I was drawn to photography and film, which I now practice as a hobby, and was so excited to move and learn something in a new environment.
In retrospect, I’m not sure why I made that decision knowing full well I wanted to make music, but sure… go to film school so that you can have a piece of paper that says to people that you’re someone worth being around because you had a very expensive schooling experience. Gross. What does that piece of paper even mean? Who cares?
Is it at all surprising that my partner is a teacher?
Vancouver was awesome, I made friends, I lived on my own for the first time in my life BUT then, in the middle of the school year, I got an opportunity to go on tour. I had met a rapper over facebook and he invited me to play with him at the Junos that year, after we did that, we got an opportunity to go on tour with The Digable Planets. Even though a part of me knew joining this hip hop/ pop band that would go on tour didn't feel right, I decided to go on tour with them, I went because I knew It would be an experience that would feed my musical goals and potentially introduce me to other like minded people.
I dropped out of film school to pursue music officially. It was a blur. I got to play in front of massive crowds in a different city every night, I was living my dream and it all happened so fast, but somehow it never felt right, It never felt like me. It taught me what I don’t want, and I think that might be one of THE most important life lessons.
I was allowing other people to steer the direction of my musical interests and again, I avoided authority and decided to work on my own path.
I had to learn that while I do want a successful career, I don’t want it at the expense of losing who I am, I don’t want to hurt people to get there. I don’t want to dive into something and it to burn bright and fast at the beginning, only to plummet into the ether as quickly as it got off the ground. Fear of abandonment. Fear of failure. Fear of loss. Fear of being inadequate.
These fears are forever looming and every day I feel like I am making progress to better my mental health.
I am now with the love of my life who validates and values all the qualities that I have labeled as flaws. She sees my flaws as my strengths and empowers me every day to pursue my passions. I am now making the music that I want to make, creating content that catches my attention and silences my ADHD.
If there is one thing I hope you can take away from this, it is to trust your instincts and to trust your EXPERIENCE. You are exactly where you need to be and have the tools to get through it. You’ve been through it before, and you can get through it again.
I now recognize that I always have a choice. I can choose to see an obstacle as a mountain, or see it as a lesson that I can learn on my own terms. I can’t control the outcome, but I can trust the process and myself.
I’m only human, I’m doing the best I can day to day, and although my daddy issues might sometimes tell me otherwise, it's enough.
I am enough.
- Alessia
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