THE DEATH OF WHAT YOU LOVE WILL SET YOU FREE

exercises in letting go / caring for houseplants

I am in a period of giving up the things I love.

A few nights ago, I played an open mic for what may be the last time. Then I released a YouTube video, which was fun, but won’t soon happen again. And last night, I produced a track in Ableton with strings and synth and bass and drums, and named it after a girl I’d been talking to, whom I seem to no longer be talking to. (So it goes.) Then I removed the app from my dashboard.

Why? A couple weeks ago, I posted an essay acknowledging my childish lack of responsibility. Afterward, my buddy Cuckfucius reached out — he’s a Substack writer with clear vision and great ideas. He’d also struggled to find his path and had an exercise for me:

Take 10 minutes and list every Potential Danny - every possible future you can envision. Then for each, embody it entirely; imagine yourself fully actualized in that potential.

Then kill it. Cross it out. Let each dream go. Until there’s only one left.

So I pictured myself as a chess grandmaster, an esteemed neurosurgeon, a millionaire crypto trader, and a G League hooper (not even in my wildest fantasies do I make the NBA). I killed each dream in turn. Then I exhaled my potential and shrank back down to size.

But I couldn’t eliminate three final possibilities - Musician, YouTuber, and Writer.

Then my buddy Dexter came over. He surprised me, actually — he called and said, Hey are you in NY? I’ll be over in 5. He’d left music to focus on a promising media marketing career. He saw that I was still spreading myself too thin. He gave me another exercise:

Write down 25 goals - tangible ones you can accomplish. Then circle your top five, and actively avoid the rest. Any energy not directed towards your priorities is wasted effort.

After all, you only have so many hours in a day. When a houseplant diverts nutrients toward sick leaves, it’s best to just cut them off.

Music didn’t make my Top 5. Neither did YouTube. Which means the hours I spend practicing songs and editing videos detract from my true priorities: financial security, physical fitness, and writing.

In other words, I’ve figured out which Potential Danny to actualize.

In hindsight, the choice was obvious — I hadn’t produced a song or video in over a year. Those leaves were long dead; I was hanging onto ghosts. They will return to the earth as hobbies rather than serious pursuits, meaning I’ll never actualize that potential — but I’m okay with it. Actually, I feel great.

Before I stored my guitar away, Eddie Dalton dropped by and we noodled through basic chord progressions, doing call and response, exploring melodies and harmonies in a deep meditative trance. He meant to leave at 9pm, but stayed well past midnight. It was the most fun I’ve had playing music in a long, long time.

Kind of ironic, isn’t it? Now that I’ve given them up, I can finally enjoy the things I love again.