You don’t need to know my face
Written by Emily-Rose Sarkova on Dharawal country
I am a 33-year-old musician, creator, composer, producer, and enthusiastic veggie gardener, who has been asked to write something about women's empowerment within music - perhaps something about being a frontwoman in a band since my latest project is releasing new music with a band called Emily-Rose and the Wild Things. I thought about this subject for a while and decided that out of the myriad of things I could write about, I needed to talk about my relationship with the notion of success. Success, because just the word places a certain pressure and obligation on the one striving for it.
I try my best to fully acknowledge the privilege I have been born with, the fact that I create and live on stolen land and that our time on this earth is dangerously fragile and that of course my story and position in the world is so different to many. With all that in mind, here is an offering for you, dear reader.
I am successful, although you don’t know my face.
I am successful, despite you not knowing my name.
I am successful, regardless of the fact that I have not topped the charts, won prestigious awards or am managing a large bank balance.
So perhaps I measure success differently to some.
My neighbors know my face because we take the time to know one another. One of my neighbors keeps bees on my property, another taught me how to use power tools and the others sometimes plant sit and are our number one fans of our weekly music live-stream.
Our weekly live stream features me and my partner, Nick, with contributions from my other dear musician friends - often from my bands Emily-Rose and the Wild Things or world music group Chaika. They know my face because we support one another, we create together, we laugh and we talk deeply. Of course relationship cycles have multiple complexities, but feeling alone is not an option when you surround yourself with the kind of people who truly will drop everything to be next to you in tough times and equally to wildy celebrate the great times.
Great times like - the end of a glorious recording session, ecstatic live concert, or satisfying gardening day. The kind of events you might find in my email out, Patreon post, or website blog. Chances are the good folk finding themselves as a recipient of said emails and posts know my face - and at some point perhaps I’ve known theirs. Watching amongst an eager audience, in a dance class, a music workshop, festival store or permaculture meetup. Chances are we are more than a face or name to one another, and they each weave a very important thread in my happiness tapestry, however fleeting or long they are there.
It is a rich tapestry of people, places, and experience - some threads are woven tight through the entire, ever-changing landscape. My mother is one of them - a woman who is always backing me, standing strong beside me - noticing when parts of the tapestry are becoming unspun. She has truly had a leading role in my success. Because to me - being successful is being happy. This is, however, a recent decision of mine to redefine what this word means and how it resonates throughout life.
This past year of the Covid-19 pandemic has suddenly and drastically stripped away layers of my life that I had painstakingly built, believing that they were necessary to pave a successful path. I have, for years, questioned feelings of discontentment, stress, disconnection, and an intense sense of under-achievement - despite how those around me insist that I tend to, shall we say - ‘slay’. I find the very language we use to describe success disconcerting - the need to pave it, carve out a path, have an end goal, reach the summit. It expresses images of mechanistic, linear thought - something which our society is rife with (here is capitalized, colonized Sydney, Australia). The school system teaches us that success is the passing of exams, the winning of awards, the endless battle with our peers. So deeply ingrained is the habit to compete, comparing, to think only of a line with an endpoint, and we, the sole human who has the responsibility to pave it. This continues into university education - for me it was the classical piano soloist - repeating the same notes, again and again, thinking only to be better than the rest, terrified of taking a wrong turn.
What a lonely life, like a path in the bushland, walked over, again and again, allowing nothing to grow underfoot - all by those seeking the endpoint.
Over the year 2020, I spent the most time I ever have in my growing garden. Spending that time began to teach me more and more about my place in the world. Watching, observing, and experiencing how a lifeless patch of synthetically fertilized grass can transform into a hub for insects, birds, plants, fungi, and wildlife showed me how interconnected everything and every moment is. Conversations with my loved ones have been taking on new meaning, exploring the different territory, my music writing is becoming both more reflective and more adventurous. I worry less about what the outside world thinks of my art and slowly, slowly, the pressures and frustrations of social media reach are negated. If I’m making just one other person happier, healthier, and more connected to the world with a song or action - that is a success, that adds to the happiness tapestry.
When one considers all of this and more (which I couldn’t possibly fit in this short article) - it comes as a sigh of relief for me that you do not need to know my face or name, and I do not need to be given special accolades for my work for it to be successful.
So as a reminder to myself - first know yourself and those close to you. Take time to learn. Remind those close by that what they do matters and brings meaning to the world. If you have the chance to change your surroundings and experiences in more positive ways then do. Plant something in the ground, join a local community group, take a walk somewhere different - off the path - make your art in a new way, listen to new stories from old friends and old stories from new friends and continue to watch and wonder at how nature has it so right.
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