"Ambition is like love, impatient both of delays and rivals."
--Buddha
The reason I have not written in the past few months is that we have been busy creating a wonderful project born out of Carl's creatively funny (I mean humorous) mind and his strong sense of ambition.
Ambition is a word that gets misunderstood a lot. It is often equated with something cold and calculating in human behavior. But ambition can be soulful.
Carl is an entertainer at heart. He likes to perform before an audience. It is a trip to watch him at Karaoke where in spite of the poor sound equipment and the din of a bar underneath the music, he manages to shine.
"Secret Agent Man" was one of my favorites of the ones he does until he gave a performance at the local Alley Cats I watch the back up singers dance with him. Jealousy is a cruel mistress.
Lately, he's gotten more into bad jazz and the Rat Pack, so he's been doing "New York, New York." One performance at Alley Cats got huge applause.
But I digress.
Carl has many ambitions. Most of them involve some form of performance. It is fun to watch him play, well work, well play, uh...
The fact is when you do what you want to do work is play and play is work. The dichotomy melts away and what emerges is a life that when one is able to live it becomes joyful. I've addressed this question earlier, but it is important in understanding ambition.
Ambition, at its heart, is about love. It is about loving what you do and doing what you love. It is a hard choice to make in life. Most people will tell you that to do what you love is a luxury. Most people will tell you that to do what you love is self-indulgent.
Life is too short to listen to those people.
I, for one, am glad that Carl has dared to be ambitions and I look forward to seeing his ambitions flourish. Stick around. It is going to be fun.
