Michael Zamora shared their story and experiences with us recently and you can find our conversation below.
Michael, a huge thanks to you for investing the time to share your wisdom with those who are seeking it. We think it’s so important for us to share stories with our neighbors, friends and community because knowledge multiples when we share with each other. Let’s jump in: Have you stood up for someone when it cost you something?
One time I helped a friend who was dealing with a really difficult and dysfunctional relationship and I said some things about his relationship that upset him and ultimately cost us a friendship for a while, but eventually we were able to become friends again after a few years of not being in contact and he was able to acknowledge that this was a difficult situation that he was in.
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
I am a 31 year old musician who fronts the band Posival. We formed when I was 18 and over the past 6 years have been releasing music consistently and touring on average once a year. Clint and I have been putting a lot of work into this project in our down time and it ultimately has turned into a project we dedicate time to diligently.
Great, so let’s dive into your journey a bit more. What did you believe about yourself as a child that you no longer believe?
I used to think that I was stupid. I didn’t go to pre school and my little brother did, and I didn’t really go to most of first grade due to some family hardships. I grew up all of elementary school being multiple grade levels behind in my reading level and math was something I consistently failed in. Having only going to Kindergarten and not going to a traditional first grade class until the last two months of the school year, I genuinely did not believe that I was intelligent and acted as such. My family didn’t stress education on me until I was in middle school. I was a very active child and loved watching TV, specifically shows like Seinfeld and Conan O’Brien. I remember finding out later in life that Conan O’Brien went to Harvard and felt like my dream of being a talk show host or comedian as a child just wouldn’t ever happen. I’m still not funny but I mark that as being my first adolescent realization that I wasn’t smart. My entire personality changed from being more outwardly charismatic to being quietly reserved and my moments of attempted comedic relief became sparse due to feeling uncomfortable. This probably sounds very strange or silly to most people but I think my realizations reached a level of self awareness that caused discomfort within me. I find myself enjoying being quiet and reserved more and more as I get older and those feelings of discomfort have faded, but it’s drastically different from how most people remember me growing up.
Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
I give up all the time. I tend to give up mentally, and sometimes even practically. Music is the one thing I’ve probably tried to give up on the most ironically. Previous band members can attest to this too. I have a frustrating relationship with music a lot of the time. It’s constantly a push and pull between being really engaged and motivated and then getting discouraged or frustrated, sometimes even confused. I think I’ve “quit” music about 6 times, definitively. Something has always pulled me back somehow. Funny story, I actually tried to sell my drum set 4 different times because I just felt like drums were too hard to learn, especially because I didn’t start until I was 24. Each time I tried to sell my drum set, someone would say they were gonna come and pick it up and they wouldn’t show, or guitar center and pawn shops just straight up told me they wouldn’t take it. Each time I tried to quit music, people around me came into my life to tell me they didn’t want me to stop. Some people I didn’t even realize were still listening like old friends from high school or friends from the neighborhood I grew up in, or even some random person that saw us play 1 time like 4 years ago. I’d always get some kind of message from someone that told me to get going. I think our old drummer Aidan just told me one time when I said I think the band might be over “just keep doing it, there’s never a good enough reason to stop” , and for some reason I’ve thought about that a lot each time it feels like there’s no point to keep going. I think I’ve been resistant because it’s really hard to work on something that you care about and have no clear markers of progress or success because art is so subjective. The best way to describe this feeling is being in a forest of poisonous fruit trees and not knowing which tree has the edible fruit, but it’s in there somewhere.
So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. What would your closest friends say really matters to you?
My friends would say that peace probably matters most to me. Feeling at ease with the people around me and having a strong level of trust with a small group of people has always mattered more to me than being liked by people I never spend any time with or whom have never met me personally. I don’t see that really changing no matter what environment I’m put into.
Okay, so before we go, let’s tackle one more area. What are you doing today that won’t pay off for 7–10 years?
Probably doing music, ironically. I don’t really see a way that music could ever really bring any sort of “pay off”. I think that’s what bothers me most about other musicians. I think everyone feels like there’s some mark of success that people look to as a way to rank themselves with other people when in reality, if you get forgotten about, what difference does it make if you did this one thing with this one band that one time or you met that one person from that one band. It doesn’t necessarily mean that anyone is better than anyone else in the same way I don’t think that’s billionaires are necessarily any more valuable as someone with only 2 dollars in their pocket. Circumstances plays a huge part in our shaping of perceptions on other people when the real measure for value has nothing to do with what you’ve done or who you know, but who you are to the people around you. From a distance, everyone looks bad, but when you’re close and can impact a person’s life in an immediate way, that’s where the real value comes from. I think people should live smaller lives.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/posivalband?igsh=aDk2aHJscWxzcTc4&utm_source=qr
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@posival23?si=ZwYbi7rb8yv1e5kt
