Big life choices...

[chucklivesoninmyheart]

Well I'm leaving a big piece of a big life decisions influence to everyone on guitartricks...

My mother just got into a car accident(a guy flew down our hill and smashed into her while she was parked...).She will be getting a generous settlment.Thank god shes ok(she has whiplash and bruised insides e.c.t...shell live).My brother is also getting quite a chunk of money for some retro-active thing.
My family is now bent on moving to florida within the coming months and getting a house.

My band hasnt left the ground yet,but our material is amazing for the genre(hardcore/punk).I really dont want to leave my friends and band.I would have to start over,find new friends,a new band/jam buddys and start all over.
I love florida and want to go there,but my attachment to my friends and potential success with the band is paining me...

If I stay,I'll have to find a place(room with a friend most likley)but more so,I would be dissapointing my family(we are all very close).Like I said,going would mean arriving with scratch...

asking what 'should I do' would be ridiculous,so I'll just ask for your opinions/suggestions.If I ask my family,they will say to go with them.If I ask my friends/band,they will say stick around.

I'm asking you guys because it wont be biased.
Thanks in advance everyone...

[iiholly]

Blood is thinker than water as the old saying goes. I would go with your family. Your mom just got into a car accident, and who's to say the next time something like that happens to another family member.

[finger_cruncher]

Heh. I completely disagree with iiholly. It's your life. If you're old enough and mature enough, you should be able to make responsible decisions. I'd argue that you should do whatever you think is best. Personally, I'd stay. It's a great experience living on your own. Of course, it's also a huge responsibility. It depends if you're ready for that. I would stay and visit my family on holidays. To be honest, I think it's rather jerky of your family to put you in this predicament. You shouldn't feel guilted by them. It's a tough decision.

[SPL]

Can't really judge your situation on the little information you've given us, it takes quite a bit more than that to be able to give any valid advice...

First of all, how old are you? Would the move be an upgrade from where you're at now, purely judging from the kind of place/neighbourhood/city you'd be living at? Do you honestly think/believe your band will be succesful, or is that wishful thinking? Do you have a job that you love and/or has a promising future?

Friends come and go, but your TRUE friends you will never lose, no matter where you are on this globe...

[DreamRyche2112]

I would defiantley go with your family... Even if you guys do have really good material and all, they might be your best freinds.. but id still go and stay really tight with your family, especially since your mom was in an accident ( give my best wishes to her)... Family is more important than music also... even tho music my be a big part of your life. Anyways theres tons of musicians down in florida... i do not think ull have much trouble there.

If it was me i'd be goin to florida. (IMHO)

[chucklivesoninmyheart]

Well I'm 18 so yeah...

I hold my friends in the same regard as family...they are far from water.

Going to florida from any crappy new england state is an upgrade in terms of enviroment,but my enviroment consists of more than landscape e.c.t.

My band is much more than some pipe dream.We will be playing loco bazooka this year and lots of other dates before then.We should have a fully recorded album by late spring.I'm not expecting to rocket to 'the top' or any of that crap,but I would throw money on a decent following..yeah I'm being big headed with it,but I wouldnt be if the door wasnt wide open.

I guess this is the first time in my life that I felt I had something to lose by moving...It feels like my life isn't 'wrapped up' here yet and I still have lots of poeple to meet and good times to have.
My mother had the nerve to say 'just sell all your equipment and come with us'... what am I,following jesus!?

I love my family,but my life is at a point finally where I'm content and I really dont want to just drop it.
I stay if possible...

[SPL]

Then here's my advice...

You only live once, if you feel strongly about this, go for what you believe in...hopefully your family will understand and support your decision.

[DreamRyche2112]

Now i know your 18... id go for the career... as spl said... you only live once.

[Axl_Rose]

I think you already know what to do :) Go with the band, its probably the most important thing in your life. You family will always be there for you so they should let you have your shot at the band.

[Leedogg]

I'd suggest staying with your band. If you moved with your family you risk the possibility of always resenting them for "what could have been". You know what I mean? If things don't work out with your band, you can always move to where-ever your family is at the time. Don't live your life for other people.

[PonyOne]

When I was 13 my family moved from a shallow pit outside of Seattle called Auburn to Cambridge, MA, which is more or less a continuation of urban Boston. Being 13, I didn't have much of a choice, but I wanted to follow anyway. I had fallen on seriously bad times in Auburn, and to make a long story short, if we would have stayed and no one managed to kill me, I would have eventually killed myself, probably.

You can't transplant yourself from one area to another without encountering adversity; going from rough-and-tumble, red-blooded working class Washington State (think Alice & Chains/Nirvana) to touchy-feely, wealthy, blue-blooded Massachusetts was a particularly tough transition. I never really fit in, I had numerous horrible things happen to me, and to make another long story short, by the time I dropped out of high school I was ready to take a bus back to Seattle and go crash with some friends.

Fortunately I looked at the situation reasonably: I was 16, I was broke, and I had a grilfriend who loved me and supported me, as well as a small handful of friends who were the same way. What did I have back in the shadow of Seattle? Some people who would not have been so happy to see me, dead friends, and drugged-out rape-victim ex-girlfriends.

I stuck it out and worked my ass off for another two years, and saved up enough money to buy a car that would make the trip, and also enough for plane tickets to LA, which my girlfriend and her mom used to scout us an apartment, make a deposit, and also a few months of rent. I had a job set up when I moved, and I can tell you, it was an awesome experience. Not to sound like a totally cliche movie or anything, but I got to see the sun setting over the desert in Texas, and see it rising over red rock mesas in New Mexico. The sky was a million different crimson, purple, orange and pink hues... it was freaking amazing, it literally looked like someone had stroked a brush over the horizon. And knowing that it was my own volition that had taken me there, that was holding the wheel and operating the pedals and choosing the music, it was one of the most awesome things that I have ever done, and I wouldn't trade that experience for anything.

Though a somewhat less severe change (i.e., stay with what you know, or move somewhere else but with some degree of security) this is pretty much the same situation: you have a really big crossroad in your life, and you're now faced with being the one who decides what road to go down.

I ditched the band I was with when I moved. I told myself that we were going places but we weren't. We were playing in a triad of rooms in Boston, Cambridge and Billerica, MA, wowing our friends and stroking our egos but not actually moving forward. In a lot of ways I feel like mixing up my life:

a) put things in perspective
b) made me make decisions 100% totally for myself and
c) give me the confidence to confirm what people had always told me: that I was the kind of person that could get himself into any situation, no matter how tough, and get himself out of it scot free, and be all the more strong because of it.

I miss my family a lot. My sisters miss me and I miss them a lot. I am missing out, to a large degree, seeing my 7-year old sister Mary growing up, and I only realized how much my 16-year old sister Lydia looks up to me after I got out here and found out that she raided all the clothes, CD's, books and etc that I left behind.

But at the same time what would I be doing back in New England? Freezing my ass off, paying too much for a crappy little apartment, working in a boring job barely making ends meet, or living with my parents and having a little more cash but still having them peep on my girlfriend and I, bitching about how I should move to California.

That said, Florida sucks. Hicks who are too close minded for you, conservatives who are too morally upright for you, and gay latinos who think they're too cool for you. Oh and people who are convinced that their goth-industrial band is going to be the next Marilyn Manson.

The choice is well and truly yours. I'd ask you to ask yourself: do you have a job? Do you have a serious place to live? What do you want to be doing in a few years? And make sure all those things fall in line together. Whatever you do, try to see things for what they are; no sugarcoating, no rose-colored glasses, no excuses.

Blood is thicker than water, but you need water to live, and you also need oxygen. Your blood and your soul and who you are will go with you wherever you go, and you can always write back to your family no matter where they are. You can find water everywhere, whether it's from tap or from a river or lake; no matter where you go you'll find kindred spirits and people you can be friends with. You may find that certain places evoke things in you you didn't think were there; when I drove through the Southwest and to the California coast and into Oregon, I found parts of myself in places I'd never been.

And you can find air any place on the face of the earth. But you and only you can find the air that you want to breathe.

Yeah.

[Joseph]

Originally posted by chucklivesoninmyheart

If I stay,I'll have to find a place(room with a friend most likley)but more so,I would be dissapointing my family(we are all very close).Like I said,going would mean arriving with scratch...

asking what 'should I do' would be ridiculous,so I'll just ask for your opinions/suggestions.If I ask my family,they will say to go with them.If I ask my friends/band,they will say stick around.

I'm asking you guys because it wont be biased.
Thanks in advance everyone... [/B]

I've found that there are a lot of opportunities for aspriring musicians down here in Fl, I've been living here permanantly for about 4 years now, and the local music scene is very impressive. I think you should take a chance, head down South, if you don't like it you can always relocate. But if i've learned anything these past few years it's that everything happens for a reason.

[ketsueki15]

id say go with your family to florida, your friends will eventually move on too..the music scene there is growing..you said your in a hardcore like punk band...with todays punk unless your like Blink 182 or Good Charolete (how ever the hell you spell their name) then you probably wont do to good with sells and stuff..thats just my opinion on things

[hairbndrckr]

Bro....
Where you moving to when you get to Florida...
If it's in the central FLA area drop me a line.
If you are moving to the central florida area, drop me a line. We will put a band together that will....

Rule the world, (or at least the bar scene!)

[the fool]

i've had the same problem too. the only difference is, i felt that all my life i felt that i'm always moving (and i dont just mean it philosophically but literally).

There is a saying that you can never be prosperous by staying in one place. In order to prosper, my family always had to move- and not just from city to city but also from country to country. And I can't blame them for it because they've given me a very good life so far.

The only downshot is, I have to sacrifice something for it. As a kid growing up, I hated moving. I felt that I never truely had childhood friends because I was always leaving from one place to another. I also hated the fact of having to start over and adjust/ adapt again to the new surroundings, meet new friends etc. etc. How many times have i left gfs behind, bands behind, possible contracts/ gigs behind, best friends behind... so many memories- i still get sad thinking of it. But if there's anything that consoles me, it's the fact that i think i made the right decision to stick with my parents.

Looking back, its not such a bad idea after all. The bands that I left behind continued on without me, some of them got recording contracts, some of them didn't but none of them made it big time. And now, looking at my life I can say I'm more successful than they are because I have not as much bills to pay, things to worry about, and I go to university too those things with the added benefit of having a better band, offers to play overseas, and the most important of all- a family that is "intact".

You see, the future didn't turn out so bad after all when it did come. So my advice is, if the reason why you dont want to move with your parents is the possibility of missing out on your band's potential success, I say don't worry about it. Move on and go with your family. If you're really good, you'll get there- whether you find a band in your new neighborhood or not.

I used to be so independent in having a band because I am more of a vocalist. But since I was always moving, I learned to live with it. I became a better musician too- I forced myself to learn how to play the bass, keyboard, and drums and I also got better with my solo act because you never know if you're going to have a band or not and when you have a show, you have to do your best whether alone or with other people, you just have to find a way.

Sometimes I have a band, sometimes it doesnt last and I find myself going solo and although everything keeps on changing- i can honestly say that my music career has never been better- infact it's better than my old bands'. Sometimes going solo has its own benefits- I get paid more (I dont have to divide the money to anyone but myself), and I don't have to go through the process of arguing with band mates and issues with artistic freedom and stuff, and I don't have to worry about compromising with someone etc etc.

The main point is: things are not as bad as you think it is. Just go with your family, man. They need you the most. The band and stardom will come. If it is for you, then it will come in due time. No sense rushing into these things. Nothing's more better than having a complete family. Besides, its not like you wont be seeing your friends anymore. In my growing days, there's no such thing as cell phones and computers, internet, emails- phone numbers have 6 digits and area codes were way different so even if I did kept their home numbers and home addresses, it was of no use when they started changing the area codes and the phone numbers. At least you have all this new technology to reach out to them.

Please consider a lot of things carefully before making this decision and I hope that whatever path you choose to yourself, i hope it would lead to the right decision. good luck.


Hey, just paragraphed your reply so that people would actually take the time to read your good advice. Also, it's not necessary to add a bunch of spaces at the end of your posts. (iamthe_eggman)

[Edited by iamthe_eggman on 12-30-2003 at 09:00 AM]