Tag: relationships

Why Anchors?

It’s a question I get asked a lot, especially during sandal season, when my little anchor tattoo is clearly visible on my left foot. It’s the symbol I chose to represent my blog, my business, and my spirituality as a whole. But where did my obsession with anchors originate, and why are they so special — dare I say, sacred — to me?

It helps to know a little about the traditional symbolism. In sailor culture, tattoos were popular long before they made their way onto the lower backs of even the most demure housewife. To these seafarers, the anchor represented stability. A sailor often got an anchor tattoo for a special lady, typically a lover or his mother, to remind him of the love and security he has waiting for him back home.

Additionally, the anchor is associated with bodies of water, to which I’ve always felt a connection to. I’ve lived near the same river for a majority of my life, and being a Pisces, the element holds a spiritual importance to me. The shape of the anchor resembles a cross, which is significant to me as well, as my Christian-rooted beliefs play no small part in my personal spiritual practices.

But believe it or not, it goes even deeper than that.

I remember briefly dating a fellow musician my freshman year of college. He was someone I admired greatly, and still do, for his musicianship as well as his humility. He would tell me about how he made music for other people, simply because he loved the way it made them happy. Music was more than just his hobby or his job. It was the way he connected with others, and he viewed it as something of a sacred duty to use his talents to spread joy. His band used a lot of anchors in their symbolism as well, representing humility and groundedness. He never wanted to lose sight of why he did what he did. He never wanted music to become a selfish act.

That philosophy really resonated with me, especially as a music therapist-in-training, and despite the relationship ending, I held fast to the wisdom he had shared. Music — and all my creative endeavours for that matter — now held a deeper meaning to me, and I adopted the anchor as a symbol of staying humble and remembering why I do what I do. Getting that tattoo, my first tattoo for that matter, was my way of making sure I always had that reminder to put others first in all things. Music and life in general shouldn’t be about getting famous or hitting it big. It should be about leaving the world a brighter place than how you found it.

No matter how far I sail in this life, I won’t forget or forsake the people and places I hold dear. May everything I do reflect a heart of humility and love.

You Can’t Always Get What You Want

Scrolling through Instagram as I tend to do on a lazy Sunday evening, I found this infographic:


I could write an entire doctoral thesis on how this relates to my own life. Like, how I’m glad I didn’t end up a journalist, because I can’t handle that kind of pressure. Or how I’m glad I never reached Taylor Swift levels of fame, because, well, I can’t handle that kind of pressure.

I’d like to think I’m the fancy bejeweled Russian kind, though.

Young Jess wanted a lot of things that, in retrospect, adult Jess would have considered a nightmare. None more so than my middle school crush, who I absolutely believed was my soulmate.

Ah yes, the face of a woman who knew exactly what she wanted.

I remember crying myself to sleep over this kid, who will remain unnamed, but we’ll just call him Kyle. The way his floppy auburn hair jostled in the wind at youth group meetups, the way his blue-green eyes shone like sea glass at Cedar Point. I was obsessed with this guy in a way I’d never been obsessed with anyone ever. I didn’t think I was capable of having a crush. The closest I’d come before was strange thoughts about Ann Wilson from the band Heart and this dude from an American Idol knockoff no one remembers. I wasn’t supposed to have crushes on people I actually knew. That was preposterous.

But there he was. I was so enamored with him, I couldn’t imagine a single flaw in him. And young me thought this is what love is. I would have done anything for him. I would have let him walk all over me if he wanted. I would have readily given up everything that made me, well, me, if it meant a chance to have him. And I did. I changed the way I dressed to be more like his then-girlfriend. I started trying to be someone I wasn’t. And surprisingly, it worked! A few years later, I ended up dating him. And…it was anticlimactic. We kissed once, and there were no sparks. I had this boy of my dreams, but something wasn’t right. Shortly after, we broke up. it was mutual.

I had many crushes since, but none were as intense as Kyle. I think everyone needs a Kyle, just to show them what love isn’t. Love isn’t obsession. Love isn’t being a doormat. Love isn’t losing yourself to someone else. Kyle wasn’t a bad person. In fact, he was a great person! Just not my person.

Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like had I ended up with him. Before writing this article, I looked him up on Twitter, my last connection to the boy that changed my life. It was…mostly hockey. Some stuff about Bitcoin. A retweet of Ben Shapiro, which is probably not a good sign. But mostly just hockey. Even if middle school me got her way, she’d be miserable today. I’d be miserable today. I don’t give a shit about hockey or Bitcoin, and Ben Shapiro kind of sucks. And he’d be just as miserable with some eccentric artsy chick who likes Bernie Sanders and blogs for fun.

Sometimes we don’t get what we want, and that’s okay. I’ll let the Rolling Stones take it from here.