I benefited from it, but only to a point. 

Fast forward to the end of my degree, when I was walking across the stage and being handed my diploma while being encouraged to continue on and chase my dream as my career. The next day, I woke up and got ready for my full-time waitressing job that had helped me pay my bills through school. The next year blended into day after day of the same waitressing job, commuting from the Upper East Side to Williamsburg by train, hoping that they would be on time (they very rarely are). I also taught two students in the Upper West Side twice a week after my 9- or 10-hour work days. The same monotony and the days blended together. Feeling overworked and completely run down emotionally and physically, I knew I had to make a change. I had to leave the city of dreams.  

Asheville, North Carolina was calling my name. I had grown up in North Carolina and simply felt a pull to be somewhere that would provide a slower, less expensive pace of life. I  could not keep up with New York day to day life. The good times were very good, but the bad times hit even harder.  

I came to a point where I began reevaluating my music as a career. After dedicating seven years to pursuing the thing that I love most and willing it to be my full-time job, I figured out that I needed to find space to pursue it as my passion and find another career that would allow me the space to redefine my relationship with music. 

Here I am in North Carolina now, working as a manager in Hospitality and auditioning for local professional and church choirs to keep my passion aflame. It’s working. I implore you: Do not be afraid to take a leap of faith for yourself. Always put your happiness and your wants and needs first. Each of us only gets one life, and there is no use in regretting a decision. Take the audition. Take a different job that is totally unaffiliated with your current career path. Do what is going to fill your soul with the most joy.