What do YOU want from this life…

In my constant desire to grow and understand not only myself, but the way the world works, the way the heart keeps in your chest, the way your brain doesnt somehow just explode in your head, I started to think deeply about a personal quote i left on facebook the other day.

“Regardless of where you are in your life at this moment. Remember a few things. You are exactly where you are supposed to be. For better or for worse, these moments come and dissolve into one another and nothing is constant except change. That should give you excitement in knowing that change is coming and with change, new beautiful things to embrace.”

I forgot to mention one VERY important thing. There is ONE more constant. God’s love. When I wrote that originally I left it out even tho I was being told to say it and not by any means am I ashamed at my beliefs and values but in my infantile state of mind at writing it, i found myself trying to be “relatable” on a grander scale I guess, but what is more relatable than LOVE and more so GOD’s LOVE for us.

I have spent the last 15 years of my life trying to be “relatable” I would get on a stage and travel the world playing for an uncountable amount of kids that I desperately wanted to relate to. I wanted to understand them, and I wanted them to understand me and in that pursuit I have always felt, if you are going leave something behind, let it be something they can never destroy and you will live forever. Save that quote in your heart my friends. Spread the word.

My gift to this world up until this point that will never be destroyed is my music, my love, my empathy, my ability to speak from my core. These things they can never take and the more you perpetuate what it is in YOU that is un-burnable, un-returnable, that is un-mistakable, you will find yourself a little more lost and confused but further along in your growth than you are able to perceive.

I believe truly with all my heart we ALL, everyone of us, YOU you and YOU, are born F14 Tomcat Fighter planes in the good fight which is LIFE. Our jobs, our economical situations, our ethnicities, our genders, our faults and our set backs are not what DEFINE us. Those things never will. We easily end up placing value on the things that are killing us rather than growing us. We place precedence on what we don’t have rather than what we do.

I am guilty of this too. As you grow and go through the various stages of your life, you will find that your mind, body and soul require more than what you have been allowing yourself to have. The minute you stop choosing to grow spiritually, emotionally and mentally, is the minute you have already gave him. Most women and men die at 25 and are buried at 75. Great quote! When did we stop believing in ourselves? When did we stop dreaming? When did we stop having faith in Gods love and plan for us?

In a way to relate even more to you I have lately for the first time in my life started to think about children and a family. My hearts desire is now gearing my mind and soul to wrap around the concept of creating life and having a beautiful family. I am not married, in a relationship or planning it here anytime soon, but you heart never lies. As i see pictures of my friends happily married with their beautiful children it tweaks my heart a bit and makes me think “I cannot wait to be an amazing husband, and a great father”. I think it is very important to be able to understand when your feeling ADMIRATION verse DESPERATION and JEALOUSY for what someone else. I never allow myself to look at someone with more money, or more style, or a marriage and COVET what they have. God has blessed me with everything I need right now and because my life is still early on and I have many years to go, I always have to remind myself that “Danny, you are not a microwave, you cannot put a wish and desire into your heart and have it pop out in a minute and 30 seconds. It will come, when it is time”

Anyhow, These thoughts about family never entered my mind space until the last 2 years when I realized that my potential to be these things really excites me. I feel up till now, I have accomplished more than I personally ever dreamed I would do at such a young age, and I am not done just yet however the next phase / pinnacle of my life is coming upon me saying “Danny, I am excited! What is next for you, show me!” and my fear lately has been like many of you “I DONT KNOW!!! Where is this life taking me!?” Right now, I am just trying to wrap my head around the transitions taking place for me right now.

That leads me to this. Where are YOU taking this life?

With all the potential that you possess but are unaware of, what are you doing to access that potential and why are you allowing all this distractions from keeping you from being GREAT!?

We all have our reasons but our reasons become excuses after awhile and after while those excuses become your life trait and that life trait will become your destiny. Will your destiny that you leave behind be one that says “i could have, should have, would have, but i didnt”? If so my friends, they will burn and return that and your mark will be nothing more than actions and words on deaf ears and blind eyes.

Your better than this! You know it, You have always felt it somewhere inside of you. Stronger on some days, very little on others but you always knew that little ember glowing inside of you just needed some wind to spark and ignite.

When you sit back away from your distractions, what is that your heart really desires? Is it a thing, a person, a place, a job, a lifestyle, sobriety, security? What is it in the bottom of your heart that helps you still believe life is worth waking up. What drives you?

I would like for you to leave in the comments below what it is that you want from this life. I would like to know a few things about you…

1. What do you feel, is your hearts desire at this moment in life?
2. What are you doing, or have you done to attain this desire?
3. What are you willing to sacrifice for this desire?
4. What are you not willing to sacrifice for this desire?
5. What do you feel you will attain by achieving this desire?

Really looking forward to your answers, would love to possibly help guide and steer some of you who need it, into the right directions. Until then… be well, be blessed xoxox

Tax Season – Getting the best refund on your soul

You guys know I never write a blog unless im compelled to. I dont think someone should be writing music or inspirational passages unless they have been compelled by god, the universe, an event or what have you that brings forth a natural organic feeling to share with the masses. Anything in life that is forced, just isn’t right in my opinion. Life is legit and it has already factored you in as an equation so why try to force the sum of all things to find the answer. LET IT BE.

That is what leads me to this blog actually. I have personally had a rough month. Along with all the many incredible blessings I have (traveling the world, not having a normal job, working for myself, building my little “empire” in life) I have many and let me emphasize MANY ups and downs. A lot of people tell me “Danny, you’re so lucky, your living the life I want, you’re doing this you’re doing that, your here, and then your there” To me… all I hear is “BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH”. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t wan’t that to sound arrogant or ungrateful, but hear me out.

I have no ego even though my confidence in who I am can appear as that to some, but those who know me genuinely know i am a very compassionate, empathetic modern hippy. So none of those “hand job” comments (genuine or not) cater to who or what I am. I appreciate them, but they serve no purpose to me. They serve more purpose to the person relaying and projecting that feeling on me. The more I began to sit back and think about it, especially in the month of march, with april coming around, meaning “TAX SEASON” it got me thinking…

Tax Season is when we go over our financial INS & OUTS of the year. We factor what came in as income and what went out as expenses. Some of us claim every penny and some of us don’t claim much at all so that we can keep more to ourselves, and not give as much to the IRS. That made me think a little deeper.

We spend only one month a year and truthfully, not even that, to go over our financial ins and outs, however not many of us, take even a moment to go over our emotional, spiritual, physical and mental ins and outs. So, in that thought, i decided to write an inspiration blog about your monthly SOUL TAX SEASON. Every month, should be SOUL TAX SEASON. What is this STS month? What does it mean to me?

It means that YOU aren’t f$^%&ing around any more with who YOU are and what YOUR self-worth is. It means that YOU arent negotiating any more with people who don’t benefit your life and make you a better person. It means that you only live 100 years (if your super stinking lucky) so lets just say 60 to be safe, and as your reading this your roughly already 1/4 of your way through your life and you’re sitting back going “WHY!?, why don’t I have the things I want, why don’t I have the things I deserve? Why are these things always happening to me!?!?” Or… maybe you do feel you have all the things you desire, and wanted. If so, you can stop reading right here, because you probably already figured it out. Congrats.

For the rest of you… this is why, and this is how. Were going to change all that right here, right now. No motivational speaking involved. Just straight up honesty from someone who has had absolutely nothing to start with, then everything in the middle, then everything taking away while I was at the finish line and now I believe I can have whatever I want to have, as long as I choose a path of honesty, integrity, i remain genuine to those around me, I calculate and make revisions monthly with who I am, who is in my life, and who is contributing to me becoming a better person and who is not.

Don’t think for one moment, that just because your calculating yourself, that others aren’t also calculating YOU within THEIR lives. It’s YOUR job as well, to make the people around you become better more efficient, loving and giving human beings.

We need to look at our lives daily but I understand that daily is much to consuming for most and so monthly SOUL MAINTENANCE is what I would recommend for those of you who are feeling like “I am constantly putting this out, and constantly getting these results”

If you choose to invest your time, money and soul efforts into ONE particular way of being, you will always get the same result. Make no mistake that the definition of repeating the same action while getting the same result and hoping for something different to happen because of the same action = CRAZY. Stop being crazy. You are not crazy, your just confused because you keep running in circles and they take you no where.

Have you ever thought that all you had to truly do was lift your head up, stop looking at your feet and tell yourself to just STOP WALKING IN CIRCLES. Did you ever think that maybe this whole time you have been following your FEET and not your HEART & MIND. Do you feel betrayed by your feet and where the have led you. Look deeper. This isn’t about your feet. Your feet are simply metaphors.

The point is that you will never get to where you want to be by following the wrong path. The people who are along for your ride can be either your greatest assets or your biggest downfall and you play that same role within their lives. Harmony is not the same as unity. You can tie the tails of a dog and cat to one another and you have created UNITY but I can assure you, HARMONY is not present during that moment.

We often keep people in our lives for various reasons but the biggest reason we are afraid to let people go when they are bad for us is our comfort zone. Human being have a major character flaw in which we place the word and feeling of FEAR in front of anything that means CHANGE, when instead the word and feeling EXCITEMENT should be there. Change is very good when calculated and planned out properly. Change is NOT good however when your firing from the hip and making emotional decisions based solely on feeling and not much thought. That is where you start chasing your feet again. How do you create HARMONY within the balance of your soul and get your feet following your heart and mind?

That is where I feel you must become the CSA of your life before you can become a CPA of the world. (CSA = certified self accountant, CPA = certified public accountant). I know I am corny with my little phrases and made up analogies but I truly know they apply. You must be able to look at your life and stop questions why, and starting doing NOW.

WISHERS ARE WAITERS. Stop wishing your life away. Stop waiting for results. START NOW, turning your dreams into reality. Remove the people who are cancerous to your production and to your well-being, even if they are your blood. Your true blue people in the world will understand and come back to you changed.

I had to walk away from my mother when I was 20 years old. We had a very bad relationship. It wasnt healthy and it was extremely toxic to my development and it really hurts to write this because I know she will read this, but my mother NOW is one of my closest and best friends I could ever have. I am so blessed to have in my life but I will never forget the day I jumped out of the car and told her to her face that I would cut her out of my life if she could not give me the love and support I needed to grow and become the man I believe I was meant to be. It’s a very powerful and earth-shaking action to do that to someone who gave you life on this earth but in my spiritual belief, my mother was just the bearer of my body on this earth much like a plant bearing a beautiful flower, and my belief is that GOD is my ultimate creator.

I am not going to get all religious on you but you must know where I am coming from when I am saying the rest of this.

To exact a dramatic change in your life, you must be willing to take extreme and drastic measures for YOUR life. No human being has the ability to control or own you. If you feel controlled or owned and powerless, it is not their fault. You are the only one responsible for that. You have ALLOWED yourself to be subject to someone elses control.

Let me clarify this further more. People come to me all the time for advice on their relationships, career choices, life choices and so on, (I really should have went to school to become a therapist ha!) and I hear the same things over and over about feeling controlled, helpless, powerless, un-able to make a decision that betters that person’s life. WHY!? Why are you so afraid to do what is best for YOU! Don’t you get it! In this life, we will encounter MANY people, good and bad. Many lovers, many heart breaks, many exciting moments, many hard to breath moments and they all make up the tapestry of your life. There is never a moment in YOUR life in which you have no say. YOU ALWAYS HAVE A SAY IN YOUR LIFE. That is power. Hold that and feel it in your “plums” as Will Ferrel said in East Bound & Down. Grab your nuts boys and girls. Your beautiful, your powerful, you have the ability to change not only YOUR world, but THE world as it is surely rotating and changing with or without you.

We are all the framework of a much bigger picture. A machine with many nuts and bolts. Our job in this life is not a self-serving mission. Sure, we all want nice things, the home, the car the husband/wife, some money in the bank and guess what…. get your paper boo boo (Katt Williams) but do not forget that in this life. The more you help others, the more you help yourself. The machine does not work if the oil is not in it. The pistons will over heat and shoot through the engine block and BAM! No one wins, nothing runs right. HARMONY comes into play here and leading by example. When your able to walk in harmony with yourself and others around you it is infectious. It inspires others to live a life more like yours. It makes people want to help you walk longer in harmony and you will find more and more people laying down the harmony carpet at your feet. You will realize that a lot of these things we deem and call important are really not important at all. I have spent some serious time in the jungle and I have learned that your car, your money, and your ego no longer exist when you are stripped of even simple things like being able to look at yourself in a mirror and reflect on how you look or feel that day. I know what its like to be alone with your thoughts when there isn’t a computer to eat up 6 hours of my day on Facebook or an iPod to play music and create any sound diversion to what is really going on in my mind. Your mind is damn powerful and when you can shut everything down and eliminate all the sounds that are distracting your eternal clarity of YOU and what you need to get to the next place as a person, you will come to a higher realization that CHANGE is ok and your mind sometimes needs you as a buddy to go over things and re-evaluate who you are in correlation with your body. WHO AM I? Am I Danny? Is that all I am? Am I a sum of all parts or am I a part of a much bigger sum?

I can keep going but I will save that for the book. I encourage you all to sit back and find some quiet time to reflect on your life. Think about what has been coming IN & OUT of your emotional, mental, physical and even financial sphere the last month or last 6 months. Ask yourself… How do I feel about the last 6 months of my life? Am I proud of what I have accomplished or done? Can I better myself on all those fronts? Can I better others around me by living as a quality example? How can I become a quality example for people to reflect their own lives upon? How can I create harmony within my life and others around me? Are there people who I need to re-evaluate their presence in my life?

That is a good start to breaking the traditions you have come to accept out of comfort. I promise you, nothing happens overnight but with pure dedication to your soul and mind, you will notice not only a difference in your outlook, but you will be blown away by the new types of people you attract into your life. Never forget who you are, and your value, always remember that time is short, and at any moment your cards could be up. Make the most of life, make the most of YOU.

*if this was helpful to you, please leave me a comment and let me know your thoughts and if you wouldn’t mind, please SHARE this on your social media sites (Facebook, twitter etc) by clicking the link below…thanks guys*

This Music Thang…

So I have had a crazy year. For those of you who know me and follow me on Twitter & Facebook you have been with me every step of the way. For those of you who dont know me that well, or your curious about where I have been in the last year, Ill take you back a few years to just understand the foundation of this all.

I got on a plane this morning very early heading to Seattle where I am writing you all from. The reason Im writing is because in my heart, I have been blessed to be a musician and do this passion as a career since 2004 and I havent “worked” a normal job since. I remember how it felt when I signed our record deal, set out on our first tour, got the first real opportunity to sit in a real studio with a real producer.

Alot went down from the time of 2004-2009. The rough break down of it all. We all quit our jobs and began to do National Product as a full career. Touring 9 months out of the year, working towards a record deal, a manager, an agent, a lawyer. Many events unfolded for me that really affected me as a person. My grandparents were passing away right before my eyes while I was on tour, and it was heartbreaking. My brother was in a suicide bombing in Iraq that left our family in a limbo of whether he would live or not. I left and sat in a hospital for a week in Washington DC with amputees and victims of war all around me. Waiting for the medical plane to bring my brother. It never did. I left back to California and my brother was instead flown to Louisiana for the brain trauma unit out there.

I felt like this thing that I loved sooooo much, was taking me away from the people I love so much. It was making it impossible for me to have a real relationship with a girl. A real relationship with my family. I was unable to be the uncle, brother, son, grandson I was born to be.

In that time, our band was building fast, things were growing rapidly. We were the first unsigned band on myspace with over 1,000,000 plays and that was a big deal back then. We were getting tours all over from Mexico to Alaska and labels were paying attention. We went thru a bass player change right as our record deal was being put in our face and it was confusing. How do good things keep happening and then devastating things follow.

Well, here we were. We had a lawyer, a manager, a record deal, a check waiting for us to cash, and we were ready to take on the world, and take on the world we did. Our song LOVE ME went to #1 on the radio. Our video was on Fuse & MTV2 and we had press everywhere from dept stores to radio, to tv and magazines. We were traveling the world with reckless abandon. Japan was a histeria hit for us. We sold alot of records, life was good.

All of these amazing things happening but all at the wrong time. We had been touring non stop and our hearts were heavy, our minds were worn and our spirits drained.

We planned to take 6 months off and get back to things. Then, as we were planning to get back to things, I got a call from our drummer Robby. He had something urgent to tell me. I pulled off the side of the road to find out that one of my best friends, my bandmate and a guy I look up to was diagnosed with a brain tumor. It broke my heart and I started crying because I couldnt understand how this could happen to such a great guy.

It changed the dynamic of our band forever. Touring was something that just wouldnt make sense anymore. Robby NEEDED to be with his family and fight this. We needed to support him and be normal dudes.

I couldnt handle all the pressures and I left the country to help others. I went to Guatemala and hiked into the jungle with a missionary group and loved on people out there. Then I flew to Ukraine with Faceless Int to help out with orphans and I was trying to grasp where I was going, why I felt I needed to help everyone else but me, and what God was calling on my heart to do.

I went home to Hawaii for 2 months because its the one place I can capture my thoughts and really process them. I am humbled there, i am refilled, I am focused.

I then left there and moved to a remote island near Belize & Honduras. This was an INSANE trip, thats another story Ill tell soon.

I realized I needed to come back to California.

I was confused… and I still am.

So I got on this plane this morning and Im sitting in a cute little beach front studio in Seattle. I can see the night lights of the city and I am sitting here processing everything thats happened to me, to you all, to our lives over this last year. The economy, the world, the relationships, the music… everything.

I know I am out here because I started a new project. I needed to rescue myself. I felt and I still feel like I need to rescue the hurting souls out in the world and my music is the only way I know how, besides talking to you all and listening to you. Then there are those of you who dont need to be rescued, you just need another record and I feel its not only my obligation to you all, but its my obligation to God since he blessed me with this ability to make music and in that, I am honored you guys took a liking to what I did and what Im about to do. ITS ALOT OF PRESSURE for me to live up to what you guys deserve from me. Sometimes so much, I get anxiety, i break down and start crying. I am not afraid to admit that these process’ in my life have been so trying on my soul, I have been unable to even cry and say what I truly felt because when your in a whirlwind of publicity, touring, trying to be something, you forget who you were, are and who your supposed to become. It almost puts your life on PAUSE and your stuck in this hurricane that moves everything around you, but YOU.

So… April of 09. I flew to Hawaii with some close friends. We wrote 3 songs. There are only 3 of us doing this right now. We had some labels and producers tell us, that our demos “had it” and had “hits”. I think all that is such BS. I dont write music for that reason, and when people tell me that, i realize that they arent looking at the actual substance of the song, just the potential it has for making money. Money is nice, im not gonna tell you Im not pumped for the potential to make money, but that is and will always be secondary to creating something that you will listen to for the rest of your life and get something from.

So, we pushed over the process of this year to write more. We wrote 18 songs. We flew to Chicago and started writing and demoing material with my very close friend and amazing producer Carlos Villalobos.

I had a dream with this. I want to incorporate all the producers whom I love, who love the art of music and arent jaded. I want to do it all over the US and I want to do a 6-7 song EP and I want to do it right. Im saying this because this may be the last thing I ever do.

I got on a plane this morning knowing that. Its a hard feeling to know you loved something so much with all your heart, and I still do. I just dont know how much longer I can give all of myself to everyone but myself and my close family and loved ones. I honestly dont know what any of this means. I think this record will be put out by God grace and he will determine, and you will help determine whether more comes after this.

I am excited to lay these songs down. They mean so much to me and my soul. I have a few that wont make this record that I need to record somehow, someday because it just needs to be done. Maybe that will be my last deal? I dont know.

I know that for once in my life. I am unprepared. Im scared. Im not sure what will come of all this. I am at step 1 all over again and im humbled. Most of all im blessed. I realize more than ever, if anything were to happen with this new record in a big way, im more ready in my unpreparedness then I have ever been. I wasnt ready with NP. I was immature, i was forcing things, I was confused more than I am now.

I know this all sounds hypocritical but in all of my confusion, I am clear. I know what I dont want, and that I think, is the first steps into knowing what I will accept when it comes.

Thank all of you for everything.

Let It Be….

A woman came into my life. She was not typical. She was not average. She wasn’t even in the same demographic.

 

She came into me vibrant and full of life teaching me wisdoms and showing me compassion. Understanding me more than any woman ever has. She gets me, she sees through me, and without fully knowing me, she knew me. 

 

A profound thing happened to me yesterday. One of the most powerful moments of my life and it is something I will never forget until the day that I am dead. This is my story about Catherine. A few years back, our drummer Robby met a girl. He moved in with her and started working with her at a place in Corona Del Mar California. While working there he met a woman named Catherine and they became very close. Robby’s relationship with the girlfriend dissolved and Robby moved in with Catherine. You may think you know where this is going, but this is going to throw you for a loop. Catherine is in her 50’s. She’s a demanding woman, she is full of knowledge and she is beautiful with the soul of a 5 year old and the grace of Catherine Hepburn ironically. She came into every member of the bands life in one way and this is how she impacted mine.

 

………………… 

 

Over the course of the last few years of knowing Catherine, she became a mom to our band and a best friend to us. She was at every show and if you saw us on our tour with Kaddisfly and Bedlight For Blue Eyes, you saw Catherine.  

 

She was a woman who has had millions of dollars and after her divorce, nothing. Shes seen the world, experienced things you and I will one day wish we get to experience.  

 

While knowing and loving Catherine, we came to expect nothing but love and support from her however she was always surprising us in the most selfless of ways. Catherine WAS wealthy. When her husband divorced her, he took everything and left her with nothing, not even a phone call. However, Catherine always managed to give us all money before tour as gifts and has loaned us, which now we will never be able to repay, and knowing her she wouldnt let us anyway, but she gave us a few thousand dollars when we broke down on tour, to make repairs. She never asked us for anything in return until the Kaddisfly tour. She asked us if we could take her with us on tour and im going to get back to this tour in a second. When we got signed and were heading to record our album LUNA, she was right there supporting the band with everything she had.  

 

We found out that Catherine was diagnosed with Cancer. We werent sure exactly how bad it was but Cancer is never good. My mother has it, my grandmother passed away from it and over the course of my young short life, I have lost alot of people to alot of things from suicide, drug overdose to cancer. None of them fair, none of them right. When my grandmothers passed away I didnt cry. I dont know if it was because I was numb from my experience with my brother in Irag (suicide bombing). Thats another story coming soon. We didnt know how serious her condition was, so when we got back from making the album, Robby started taking her to the doctor for check ups. Check ups turned into chemo and chemo turned into getting injections that cost around $10,000k each. This was over the course of a year that things just progressively got worse. I remember scrambling all my contacts to find a doctor who could help her. She would tell us she was fine, and they found something for her even the story I was getting from Robby was that she was terminal. She lost all her hair and her weight was bouncing back and forth but she looked really healthy.  

 

That was probably because the cancer was inside her lungs. Her fear was dying without being able to breath. They removed part of the tumor in her lungs and that removed some of her ability to breath. She refused to remove anymore tumors from her lungs out of fear. Her skin was soft, her hair was a nice shiny silver that accompanied her age respectfully. She looked really good from the outside, but on the inside, this cancer was destroying her. Its truly amazing how fast someone can deteriorate and it reminds me how fragile we are as people.  

 

She was told she had a few weeks to live and nothing made her lose her pep. Not even the news of the inevitable. It was seriously one of the most inspiring things I have ever experienced in my life. To know that your going to die, and nothing can phase you. To protect us, she would tell us she wasnt in pain at all, she would tell us she was going to make it and that they kept finding all these positive treatments for her and because maybe I was gullible and I believed her hook line and sinker. I took it all. She wanted to tour with us.  

 

We told her that we were going to make her experience what we go through. Your label will never know what its like to be on the road in the van because each experience is unique. Your fans dont really know, your parents dont know. Only YOU know because your living in that van, sleeping on the floor, you setting up and tearing down each night. Your the one wondering how your bills are going to get paid all because you just love something so much to continue doing it every night. For us, thats making music for the kids who still believe in true sincere music from honest genuine people. Maybe thats why Catherine came into our lives? She is one of the most pure honest and genuine people I have ever met. Maybe thats why it was so fitting. So she came out on tour and got everything we told her she would. The floors, the smelly boys, the long drives, the high fives, the whole nine. She fell in love with the bands we were on tour with and shared her wisdom and love with them. Everyone who met Catherine fell in love with her. How could you not. Something so pure only comes along very rarely in our lives and when you find it, embrace it, it never lasts. Its much like a shooting star.  

 

After the tour she continued on with good health and we hit the road once again, but this time without her. When we came home, we found out that Catherine was more terminal then ever and Robby was making plans for her. She was to go to a hospice, and she would pass slowly.  

 

Robby and Catherine moved out of their place and we had just finished our tour in Japan and Hawaii and she was on my mind and heart so heavy.  

 

I arrived back from Hawaii and we prepared for the tour we are on now and by fate she was in Portland in a hospice. We packed our stuff to fulfill our first 2 tour dates and then drove straight to Portland to see her before having to rush to Seattle that night for our show. We showed up and completely surprised her and trust me, if you know Catherine, you know this is not easy. She is almost all knowing… very much omnipresent ha.  

 

Catherine wasnt breathing well, and there were moments, like when we all stood to take a picture that she was gasping needing her machine that provided her with pure oxygen. She was incredibly excited to see us and the look of her happiness was like a little girl during christmas. My heart felt this strange conflict of pain and happiness for her. I welled up heavily and had to leave several times. I have been her before in this moment with someone but something about this experience was new to me. I sat with her for most of the time and looked at her, a much more frail person than the one I saw just a month ago. The cancer was changing her appearance and destroying her. We sat at the table and something very profound happened to me internally, much the same, is why I make music. LET IT BE came on the radio right as she was telling us that she is refusing resuscitation, refusing adrenaline and anything to keep her alive. She has waved all of that to just die. As the song played I could not hear anything more because my fears were more confirmed now than ever. Catherine is going to die very very soon and I am crushed beyond all belief. She spoke about passing as if she was going to the grocery store, with the same casual manner.  

 

I ran outside and completely released in front of their neighbor who probably had no idea what was wrong with me and I battled my emotions and feelings. I remember once my grandmother telling me, as we spread my grandfathers ashes that “we cry for ourselves. We cry because in nature, humans are selfish, and we dont know how to let people go. We want them to be around forever” That is why I never cried for her, or my other grandmother. Not because I wasnt hurt, but because she spoke truth and I adapted to learn how to let go. This is a really unique quality that very few people have and I was blessed with it. I have a defense system that allows me to not feel jealousy, or much pain in almost any situation.  

 

Like i said before tho, there are very few pure moments in life, and this was one, and it cut deep. I collected myself as Robby came out and held me while I cried, he was strong because he has already cried his heart out and this time was my moment. To feel that this is bullshit, and this is unfair, its wrong. How can there be no cure, how can this be ok. How can this be right.  

 

My faith in God will never waver, and it has never. That is the special thing about real faith. I dont need a church to know faith. For people who base their life only on things like a rock is a rock, its scientific fact, they will never understand the true essence of faith and God Bless them for that. Nothing wrong with that, but there is something that is special about believing with your eyes closed because you feel and know it in your heart to be true. Its not something your taught, its not something you should be forced to feel, its something that you find… on your own with your heart.  

 

We came inside and played acoustically for her and she cried out the last tears she had in her dehydrated body. It broke me incredibly. Like I have never been broke before. This was the last time I would ever sing to Catherine, and I could not look her in the eyes or else my already breaking up voice would become inaudible.  

 

I couldnt eat even though her family provided an incredible spread of food for us. My stomach was in knots. I knew this would be my personal last moments with Catherine and I was not ok with that.  

 

I held her for a very long time crying on her shoulder thanking her for coming into my life. It hurt tremendously and hurts more as I type this from the back of the van, driving, further and further away from her, feeling like I would give anything to be with her but I know that my heart could not handle that or maybe I dont want to be that vulnerable. Maybe im really afraid of completely feeling it take me over. Much like I have always questioned people, when i did go to church. They throw their hands up and sing eyes closed with all their soul and I always felt weird that I never felt compelled to do that. I thought it was fake. Now, I realize that for some people its very real. They are compelled because they have allowed their faith to take them completely, however I dont know if I have ever let anything take me completely but this moment came close.  

 

She cried as we drove away and it broke me a little more. We were told we probably wouldnt make our show and by the grace of god we got to the venue right as 1997 finished and there was a good amount of kids with a puzzled look on their faces wondering if we would even make it and when they saw us, some started screaming and yelling for us. We were rushed and set up and during that set up. Jimmy Eat Worlds “CLARITY” album was playing. I was just given the vinyl album 3 days prior however that album changed my life when I first heard it in 1999. Its my all time favorite record and to have it playing was more than a coincidence for me.  

 

It was once again a moment of feeling like there was a hand on me, comforting me and letting me know that things are going to be ok. The crowd was phenomenal and at one point crying during Where Do You Go that we played acoustically. It was a very powerful moment for me and I am sure for them. I will never see Catherine again, and during this tour, there is going to be a moment when she passes, and its inevitable now. There are no more miracles, or medications that will remove the cancer. Only ones to dull the pain.  

 

I have often felt like I could die tomorrow and I would be ok with it. I have learned to let go of all of my fears in that however I am very vulnerable when it comes to people who are as pure as Catherine and especially children. We dont really feel bad for people who lead shitty lives. Its almost like, they deserve it? Altho, no one really deserves death in a sense, its more like, you just dont feel as bad.  

 

I guess i really dont know how I was planning to end this. I dont even think there is a right ending to this. I hope this story touched you and maybe inspired some feelings from personal experiences you have gone through. When you get a chance, listen to the song Let It Be for Catherine, as she is in a sense, Letting It Be.

 

With love… Danny

PASSION of the…

This is a blog entry about passion. Its a nice little story to brighten your day and remind you of how good it feels to do what you love or encourage you to get out there and get yours.

 

Have you ever ran into someone you haven’t seen in year that had a major impact in your life, or turned down a street that brought back powerful memories of your struggle in life.

That happened to me today. I was driving around checking out all the fish stores in the areas since my tank was acting funny. I was tired as hell. I had run errands all day and sat in the worst southern california traffic ever and I just wanted to go back to my house and lay down in bed and go back to sleep.

I turned down a road that had major significance in my being in California still, as well as my career in music.

This place was called The Executive Suites however, it was far and away from being “Executive”.

When I first moved to California, I was living on the floor of my friend Josh’s house. He was a vegan straight edge friend of mine, very awesome guy. I was not vegan, nor straight edge but I totally respected his lifestyle and his home. I had nothing but clothing and was waiting for my car to be shipped to California from Hawaii. Josh had a small refrigerator and it was filled with everything vegan. I remember telling him that even tho he did not ask me, I would never bring meat into tho house but if it were cool, I would like to put cheese in the fridge. Of course he was cool with it, he didnt want me to be inconvenienced and I didnt wanna do the same to him. My diet consisted of top ramen and cheese mustard sandwiches and not because it was the only thing allowed, but it was seriously all i could afford. After 6 months on a floor, the guys (my band) were slowly trickling in from Hawaii (where we are from). We were finally on our own, and since our families were/are poor, we didnt have anything like a nest egg, or renters history or anything to help us out. We had no families in Souther California, and that meant we had no where to stay. All we had was our guitars, our clothing, a bunch of Hawaiian candies and top ramen.

We spent every day looking for someone to give us a chance to rent but we kept getting turned away every time and what sucked more was spending $25 bucks every time for your credit checks. None of the people renting would allow you to use the last one you took, so they continuously took your money and ran. Lame.

Well, we soon figured that we had run out of options. We saw this place in Westminster called “The Executive Suites”

It was owned by a really sketchy vietnamese dude who said we could live there weekly for like $150.00. It was a little over $20 a day which for us was like $4 per person. Super good deal right. Well, we started to notice why it was $20 per day.

At night, we had crack heads and dealer below us on the 1st floor doing deals. It was an enclosed 2 story motel and obviously, there was no pool or amenities, so there really was no reason to go outside unless you need some crack.

Our bedroom was a tiny small hotel room equipped with an executive 22 inch tv with channels 1-13, an executive couch that folds out to a bed, an executive bed that later was discovered to have blood soaked into its mattress (yeah, im serious) and an executive shower tub thing that rarely had hot water. 5 people lives in this room. It was our home for quite some time. We still went out attacking the apartment complexes to rent to us, because every night we had new crazy stories about living there. It honestly got to a point where we got so stir crazy that we would drink to get drunk and myself as well as another guy in the band started sniffing vicodin and getting into stuff because we felt like we were going crazy.

We werent eating right, we didnt know anyone in this new world we had just entered. No one would give our band shows unless we would sell 100 tickets. We didnt know 5 people so how were we going to sell 100 tickets. We had entered a world that we were not prepared for.

We went from being BIG FISH in our hometown to crossing an ocean and finding ourselves a microscopic organism in the grand scheme of things.

We knew we had to hustle because we loved music, we loved each other and our dream. We stopped messing around with sniffing and smoking things and started focusing more on getting jobs, going to shows to meet people and setting up our base so that we could start pursuing this full time.

That one turn down that street brought up so many memories and trust me, some i shouldnt write about and some too long to write in this one particular blog but it reminded me of the things that we all go through in life some very good and some very bad to get to where we are going and how those experiences are actually very fundamental to the process.

If it werent for the experiences like The Executive Suites (and the many more im soon to start writing about) and the passion that it took to keep going rather than throw in the towel and go home, it wouldnt feel as good as it does now.

I can proudly say that I have played music that I make with my best friends for an insane amount of people all over the world from the bottom of Mexico to the top of Alaska, from the farthest coast east all the way to the west, from Japan to Canada and more.

All of this made possible by faith in what we set out to do, passion in the music we were creating, loyalty to one another and integrity to always remember that we make music because we love it and we love the people who love music. Never because of money, never because of the hopes of fame, never for the wrong reasons, always for the right ones.

If my band ended tomorrow, I have absolutely no regrets, I would have not 1 single bad feeling that we didnt accomplish what we set out for and more than what we ever intended. I would sit back and look at things like the executive suites, the bloody mattress, the crack heads and more and once again, this is one incident in the MANY crazy stories i have, but I would sit back and smile and be like… “man, we did it. We did it together as friends. Everything 100% organic. No fake hype, no flash in the pan fans. We made incredible bonds with people along the way, we got to see the world and we can walk away without saying things like “we quit, or were calling it a day, or we broke up”. We can walk away knowing we did what we set out to do and music will never end in us just because we no longer creating it on the same platform we once used to”

I guess what I am saying is:

Live your life with complete and extreme passion. Love without fear, move forward without hesitation. Never chase money, money was never intended to be caught. When you do what you love, the money will come to you, because your not requiring it to continue. Its really strange that the things in life you think you need are the things you actually need less of. The things you want are generally never what you end up feeling fulfilled by in the end. Also, and I quote. “To Thyne Own Self Be True” If you are true to your passion it will ALWAYS be true to you. Now to end this with some lyrics my dad used to sing to me that will ring forever true…

“You can’t always get what you want, But if you try sometimes you might find, You get what you need” – The Rolling Stones… and boy… or girl… aint that the truth!