When you look in the mirror,
do you see yourself looking back at you
or is it a reflection of
what others want you to be?

In my CD, Arise, I write about the struggles we all face in determining who we are and who we should be. We all battle with the influences of friends, family and even the world around us that tries to tell us everything from how we should dress to what we should think. In the song, "Listen", I sing about how we need to listen to our heart and decide what is best for us. While it seems scary or stupid at the time, we know it can only be the right thing to do.

It is a difficult decision to go on our own path and against what others believe is right for us. We often want everyone’s approval as a sort of comfort or security so we feel we are doing what we are supposed to.
However, as I talk about in "Life Goes On", if we don’t choose to be who we believe we should be, we will suffer from the never ending fear of failing to live up to other’s expectations.

For each one of us, life can be full of different fears but we have to remember that fear is a choice. When we decide that we don’t
want it and we have chosen to believe in ourselves instead,
we find that we begin to receive the things in life we hoped for.

Rather than standing in line and just doing what we're told, I believe we are free to live the lives we feel we should have and that it's a choice we make. The song, 'XtraOrdinary', looks at how our lives, the people in them and each moment that passes are more than ordinary if only we
take the time to focus on the uniqueness and beauty.

Listen to what is inside you.
It will lead you where you need to go.