This Is What Life Is All About: Love And Shoestrings

Every once in a while you will see something that really inspires you or just hits on something so near and dear you can’t help but keep thinking about it. Sometimes it brings on goosebumps, sometimes the feeling that you’re right where you should be, sometimes it’s a smile you can’t keep in. The feeling of validation, or connectedness, or wave of motivation; whatever takes hold in these moments is, what I think, makes life worth it.

For me, times like these usually happen in that perfect moment where life syncs up with the perfect music. I like to think about the future and when I hear a song that connects with what I’m thinking about, my imagination runs off and I get goosebumps thinking about life’s potential.

One of these moments in particular led me to a couple others and the end result was a new definition of my own passion: entrepreneurship.

It started when I first heard the song ‘The Town’ by Macklemore some time ago. If you live in Seattle, you have to hear it. If you have already listened to it, you know why the song has become synonymous with Seattle in my mind, and somewhat of an anthem for our great city.

I heard the song right as the sun was coming up on a randomly sunny day in the middle of winter and after a night of working, my mind drifted out the window and to the horizon as the song played…

“This is our city, town pride, heart, blood, sweat, tears, I-5, North, South side, vibe, live, ride down these city blocks.”

Seattle is where I want to create the life that imagine every day and in that moment the song synced up just right with the sunrise, the feeling of accomplishment after a long night of writing, and my penchant for dreaming of the future. My friends are here, my opportunities are here, I live here and I’m putting my heart, sweat, tears, and my blood if I have to, into making things just the way I dream about them.

Fast forward to Bumbershoot this year and I’m sitting with two of my absolute best friends at the Macklemore show inside Key Arena. On comes ‘The Town’…

“…I carry the torch and what I do with that flame, is lit everytime that I step on the stage, the skyline is etched in my veins, you can never put that out, no matter how hard it rains.”

Here come the goosebumps again. I may be a transplant to Seattle, even a recent one, but this is the first place I ever chose for myself to live and it’s definitely home. Entrepreneurship is going to be my stage and my flame isn’t going to be put out for anything. The song was expressing my dreams at the perfect time once again. I looked at my friends, up at the stadium ceiling, and back down to where my own reflection was staring back at me in the blank screen of the phone in my lap. Shivers.

The feeling stuck with me for a while and I had to listen to the song again when I got home. It was then I realized I had never seen the music video for it. I know, there is this crazy thing called YouTube that has all these videos you can watch for free, but normally, when I love a song I avoid the video like the plague. One of a few things happen after watching the video; I get creeped out and can’t think about or hear the song without imagining the weird video; the video doesn’t do the song justice; or the video destroys my mental images associated with the song.

Well, I took the risk and watched the official ‘The Town’ music video and loved it. I was so impressed by the respect (not to mention the artistic elements) it had for the song I loved, I dug a little deeper into who made it. That led me right to Zia Mohajerjasbi and Love and Shoestrings. I quickly learned that they also made the video for ‘Wings’ by Macklemore and quite a few other videos for local artists like the Blue Scholars.

What hit me wasn’t all the great videos or even the awesome talent behind them. No, it was the idea of Love and Shoestrings. Love and Shoestrings is the name of Zia’s company and it couldn’t be more perfect. It embodies everything they do, why they do it, and how they get it done.

“It was on hour 33 of the 39 hour, no-sleep, keep-going, get-it-done, we-can’t-afford-this (concerning both health and finances), Blue Scholars “Loyalty,” music video shoot on December 9th, 2007 at 5:30am, as we wrapped location at Beacon Hill Elementary School, that the idea for Love&Shoestrings came into being. Though it didn’t bear such an endearing title at the time, the concept of documenting the absurdities of our ludicrously small production team’s process, seemed like the perfect way of embracing (for the time being) our high aspirations for cinematic excellence on unmentionably low budgets.“

This is what it’s all about it. Scrapping to get it done, working to be the best, and delivering against the odds. Entrepreneurship isn’t about anything other than love and shoestrings. Using what little you may have at the time to accomplish big things. Loving it so much that you toss neighsayers opinions out the window, shove through tough times, and just laugh and continue when someone tells you it can’t be done or you don’t have the money for it.

I just had to write down and share this revelation about entrepreneurship and what it means to me. I’d love to hear what it means to you or if there was a moment that changed how you thought of it, when you knew it was your path, or even just a song or phrase like Love and Shoestrings that puts it all into perspective for you.

Many thanks to Love and Shoestrings, not only for the great videos, but for dreaming big and showing that limitations are nothing with enough love pushing you through.  Please go check out their stuff, it’s absolutely awesome. I have no doubt you will be hearing a lot more from them. And of course, thanks to Macklemore for penning a great song for Seattle and putting ideas into words and music in a way only few people really can.

“Now looking over the city’s the only thing that keeps me calm, scattered thoughts jotted down by this pen in my palm, it’s like my city stands still, the world looks on, if I could only capture its beauty and put it in a song, Northwest, making you feel the vibe, check how Seattle do.”

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIBdAdnTqqo[/youtube]