What We Can Learn from Icebergs

There's much, much more to everything than just the things we see immediately in front of us. 

Join Emily Brunner as she talks about how the phrase "it's just the tip of the iceberg" helps us see how we can enjoy the whole journey as we work towards our goals.

Music: "On Brevity" by Josh Woodward

Transcript

: 0:02

Hello and welcome to Philly dances where we talk about thoughts and local happenings that give us all inspiration as a part of Philadelphia's awesome dance community. I'm Emily and today I want to talk to you about icebergs. Have any of you, have you ever seen an iceberg in person? I have not. I've never been close to an iceberg. I've seen them on TV a lot and in magazines and books, but never in person. I hope that maybe some of you have, maybe you've been on an awesome vacation where you got to ride on a boat and see some amazing things up close like icebergs. The thing about icebergs that is pretty cool, although I'm sure there's a lot of cool things about icebergs, but the thing I want to talk about, is the fact that about 90% of the volume and mass of an iceberg is under water. So that means what we see above the water is just a little portion of the entire thing. We get to see the top, the little tiny top, but we don't want to ignore everything else that's underneath the water. That would be dangerous if we were driving around in a ship. The rest of the iceberg that's underwater, the 90% is really, really important. You know, you've heard the phrase"the tip of the iceberg" and that phrase applies to a lot more than just oceanography. You might wonder, what does this have to do with dance? Well, the thing is, I know that you guys are all working hard towards a goal. Maybe it's an audition, maybe it's performance. Maybe you're leading a team of dancers towards an important competition. You think about all the time that you spend preparing to reach your goals. You go to all of your classes, rehearsals, even your time spent doing hair and makeup before the performance or the competition. That's all a lot of time and how much time are you spending on stage dancing? It's a much smaller part of the whole picture. All of your time that you've spent getting ready is a much, much larger part. Your goals are about much more than just the achievement. They're about much more than just being on stage for those moments. Now, that time on stage all the time performing, that's great and fun and important but so is everything else. So is everything that comes before. Almost 20 years ago in 2001 I was about to graduate with a degree in music performance from DePaul University in Chicago. I had spent the last years prior to that practicing clarinet and I was at a point in my studies where it was time to decide what I was going to do next. I needed to decide if I was going to continue working towards becoming a professional musician or if I was going to try to take my career in another direction. So I was in a place where I was looking for a job. One of my clarinet professors came up to me one day and said, I have something for you. I was super excited and to be honest, I was kind of thinking that he was going to compliment my performance that I had done in the masterclass that day. I thought I had done a pretty good job and I thought maybe he had something good to say about that, so I was a little bit surprised when instead of complimenting my performance, he said, I have a job opportunity for you. One of the chamber organizations with which he performed was in need of a new manager, somebody to do the administrative work for their touring and for their performances. He thought that it would be something that would be a great fit for me even though I was hoping his comment was going to be about my clarinet playing, I was still honored and flattered that he approached me about the job. He gave me an opportunity and I wanted to take it, but at the same time it wasn't a performance opportunity, so it wasn't exactly the thing that I had had my heart set on for all these years. I wasn't for sure what I was going to do. I was nervous. I realized that in order to take the interview for this job position that I would need to prepare, I would need to put together a resume. I would need to think about the kind of questions that they would ask me and think about some answers. I would also need to find an outfit, something to wear that would be appropriate for the interview. I would need to find the office. It was located in a building in downtown Chicago that I hadn't been to before and, and that might seem like a small thing, but it made me a little bit nervous. And the really big question, the, the really big thing that I was afraid of was what if I failed? What if I took this interview for the job and I didn't get it? I thought that that would be kind of embarrassing. My professor had suggested that I take the interview, he would know who got the job position in the end. And what if it wasn't me? So I had some choices. I could not go at all. I could say, no thank you and move on. I could take the opportunity to do the interview and feel nervous and sick to my stomach about it the whole time, worrying about what's going to happen. Or I could go for it. I could go for it and make the most out of it. I realized that if I didn't try and I didn't do the interview, I definitely wouldn't get the job, so why not? Why not try? My new goal was to do the interview and to try to enjoy it, so I decided to go for it and make the most of it at the same time, I actually got excited thinking about how I would do the job. I was imagining the types of responsibilities that would come along with it and thinking about how I would do it. Well, during the interview I got to talk about how my performance training as a musician would translate into an administrative job and thinking about that was actually really exciting. Thinking about the types of experiences that I could have in this job was also super exciting and I also got to enjoy meeting a new person in the Chicago music community, the person who interviewed me. So I went to the interview, I found an outfit to wear, I found the office building and I thought I did pretty good. It was a good experience. After the interview, I went home and and thought, you know, this would be really exciting if I got to do this job and I waited a few weeks and I eventually found out that I did not get the job. I did not get hired. It was offered to somebody else. I unfortunately did not reach my goal and to be honest, that was a little bit disappointing, but because of the way that I approached the entire process, because I decided to make the most out of all of it, not just the outcome, it ended up being a win for me. The interview itself really would have been the tip of the iceberg either way. Even if I had gotten the job, the interview would have been such a small part of the whole journey with not getting the job. I actually still came out ahead. I had the experience of going to a real interview. I got to think about the kind of job that I really wanted and the fact that there were a lot of possibilities out there beyond just performing, and I learned a life lesson that I'm sharing with you guys. All right now, friends, I want you to enjoy the journey. I want you to enjoy the dreaming. I want you to enjoy the planning. I want you to even enjoy the hours and hours spent learning and practicing and rehearsing. As monumental as achieving can be and as amazing that can feel when we reach our goals. I really, really believe that there's even more joy and fun and inspiration to be found in the journey.