Yoooo, peace fam.

In 2016, somebody turned the lights off on me while I was live on stage. SMH

Like, literally.

I was in the middle of my set, performing my song “Manifest.” My band was behind me. People were still in the crowd. I had on this fur vest I used to wear when I needed to conjure up the confidence to perform.

I called it The Manifest Vest.

And right in the middle of the song, the power cut off.

Lights out.

Band stopped.

Room confused.

And I’m standing there, hot, sweaty, embarrassed, and passionate.

For a second, I just stood there.

Then I said:

“Y’all can turn off the lights, but you cannot stop the vision.”

Then I stormed off stage.

It literally felt like that one scene from Purple Rain.

Almost ten years later, people who were there still bring that moment up.

Not because the show was perfect. It wasn’t.

But because something real happened.

A quote came out of embarrassment.

A principle came out of a public failure.

Let me back up…

This was during one of the wildest seasons of my creative life.

I had moved from Dallas back to St. Louis in 2015, and by 2016, me and my roommate had turned our loft into a creative headquarters.

From January to June, we hosted monthly kickbacks for artists, musicians, thinkers, and people in the city who were aware of themselves, their creativity, their community, and their spiritual wellness.

Those kickbacks got bigger and bigger.

That season changed my life.

I met my wife there.

Some of my closest friendships either started there, or some of our first times really hanging out happened in that loft.

It felt like something was bubbling in the city.

At the same time, I was releasing music on SoundCloud, doing local shows, hitting open mics, and starting to get a little buzz.

Nothing crazy.

But enough to feel like people were starting to notice.

So I put together a showcase with a bunch of artists I respected.

Looking back, it was actually a fire lineup. Like, if I saw that same lineup on a festival flyer today, I would still go.

In my head, that night was supposed to prove something.

It was supposed to show that the vision was real.

But the show started late.

We struggled to bring people in the way I pictured.

Everything was still happening, but it was not flowing how I imagined.

And because I was the last act, I went on extra late.

By the time I hit the stage, we were already past the time the venue expected us to be done.

So they started giving me the signal.

Like, “Wrap it up.”

And I’m looking back like, “Okay, I see y’all. We wrapping it up. Chill.”

But then they cut the power mid-song.

No warning.

No graceful ending.

Just darkness.

And honestly, that embarrassment hit hard.

Because it was not just the lights going off.

It was the lights going off during the moment that was supposed to feel like proof.

It was the lights going off in front of people I respected.

It was realizing, in real time, that I was not as “there” as I thought I was.

After I stormed off stage, I went outside and found this pile of rocks and rubble behind the venue. I guess they were doing construction.

So I climbed on top of it and just sat there.

Sweating.

Mad.

Embarrassed.

Still in the vest.

Sitting on a pile of rubble, feeling like I was sitting on the broken pieces of what I thought the night was supposed to be.

At the time, I made the venue the enemy.

And to be fair, cutting the power on somebody mid-set is still wild.

But looking back, the deeper enemy was my own expectation.

I needed that night to prove I had arrived.

I needed the room to confirm what I felt inside.

And when the room did not match the vision, it hurt.

But that night also taught me something.

Sometimes your vision is real before your structure is ready.

Sometimes your belief is ahead of your capacity.

Sometimes you are not wrong for seeing it - you just still learning how to carry it.

That night was embarrassing.

But it did not stop me.

The lights went out, but the vision stayed on.

And maybe that was the real lesson.

A room can interrupt the moment.

A venue can cut the power.

A crowd can get confused.

A plan can fall apart.

But if the vision is really in you, it does not die just because the conditions changed.

Almost ten years later, I am still here.

Still creating.

Still building.

Still learning how to make the vision visible.

And thank God nobody has cut the power on me mid-set since then, because once… was definitely enough.

But if the lights ever go out again, I know where the real light comes from.

You can turn off the lights.

But you cannot stop the vision.

4real tho…

Who else has had a “lights off, vision still on” moment? What happened? The comments are open fam!

-Gold

If this resonated, here’s mo where dat came from:

• Grand Vibrational Design – the framework behind everything I write and teach - for creatives who want alignment without the burnout.

• The Gold Giraffe Audio Notes Podcast – quiet reflections for when you need your mind to slow down but you still wanna move forward.

• The Book - The 12 Laws of Grand Vibrational Design – the full foundation in one place - the laws, the language, and the practices to build your creative life on purpose.

• My Music – sounds made from the same place as these words - for the days when you don’t wanna read, you just wanna feel understood.