It’s been some time since I had last seen the movie Soul, so last night I decided to give it a watch again. I had the night to myself since Pete went to bed early and I wanted to watch a good animated movie. After scrolling a few apps, I almost landed on A Goofy Movie as my evening entertainment when suddenly I saw Soul pop up. I’d seen the former plenty of times, but Soul I’d only seen once a few years ago with Pete and I had already nearly forgotten most of it. So it didn’t take much more convincing to go ahead and watch the still fairly new movie.
I’m working on avoiding spoilers but I can’t promise anything, so if you haven’t seen the movie stop here and go watch it. This can wait and it’s well worth it.
Simply put, Soul is a movie of self discovery and personal growth. It’s so much more than that too, all mashed into one incredibly touching tale of passion, love, grief, acceptance and pain.
The opening scene says everything you need to get a feel for this movie. We begin in a dreary classroom setting with a group of careless young kids in a band class all attempting to make music. This is accompanied by a desperate looking teacher trying his best to make something out of the madness erupting from the students’ instruments. The class continues miserably for a few moments when suddenly a beautiful series of notes breaks through the chaos. A young girl in the center of class holding a trombone has entered “the zone”, which we learn is a spirit like place where people go when they lose themselves in something they love. This girl had lost herself in her trombone and played her heart out in front of her whole class. Until she realized nobody was playing music anymore and she sheepishly slinked back into her chair, embarrassed that she had done something to make people laugh at her. Still, she showed incredible talent in those few moments, which catches the eye of our main character and the teacher, Joe Gardner.
Upon first glance, Joe looks like your average music teacher. He’s a bit older in age, has some belly fat with him, and in general seems like a very simple and humble guy. Yet it only takes few moments after Joe sits down at the piano for us to see the real Joe. This Joe is a man of sophistication, incredible talent and unbound ability to play jazz music. He shows himself getting lost in the music, which both inspires the class and gives the talented girl a spark in her eye again. Joe then reveals that he’s had an incredibly difficult time trying to get his life on track to complete his dreams to play in a big jazz band. Instead he’s resorted to teaching music classes to make ends meet, which is simply not what Joe wants to do with his life.
I don’t want to spoil too much more, but soon enough Joe finally gets a break. He’s given a chance to play with a big name star in the jazz game, and all he has to do is show up on time looking good. This ends up being much more difficult that anyone could imagine.
Unfortunately this is where the story turns. We realize Joe had slipped while walking home and died falling into an open manhole. He wakes in great dismay to see he’s on his way to the great beyond. Somehow, in a complete panic he finds a way off the conveyer belt system he’s stuck on and into a sort of soul purgatory until he’s able to figure out what’s going on.
With that amount of background info out of the way, onto the reflection.
To me, Joe is a very relatable character. Simply put, he’s a good guy that has his mind set on something and has dreams to accomplish, but fell short along the way. At first, I think both we as the viewer and Joe think that he deserves a chance at greatness, even if it’s just a night to prove himself, and he gives nearly everything to get that. It’s easy to get excited along with him for his moment, and we’re along for the whole ride. Yet as we get deeper into the movie, we start to see a change occur in Joe. He’s less and less attached to that original goal as he starts to see things from new perspectives. He’s learned to not only appreciate the beauty of jazz, but also the incredible ways he impacts others’ lives.
A lot of this movie focuses on finding your “spark”, which is interpreted to mean somebody’s purpose in life. Joe has always thought his purpose was jazz, and had spent his entire life grinding away at making that goal a reality. Since he was destined to do it, he was bound to fall into the right spot eventually, right? If he just keeps working at it, he’s due to have it come true eventually, right?
Unfortunately, I think we all know that’s not how this works. To Joe’s surprise, while he’s helping others find their spark, he discovers that his purpose might not actually be jazz at all. Sure it’s something that he’s passionate about, and he’s great at making people happy with it, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be everything he does, or mean he has to be a performer. Jazz is something that he loves but it doesn’t have to be everything. And once he accepts that, I think he truly finds peace with himself.
And this idea is what i wanted to bring to the blog today. Finding purpose is not an easy thing. We all have quirks, talents, gifts and setbacks that make us different, yet we can all find something that we can do to give back. Soul challenges the idea of what a dream is and what your purpose is supposed to be. I think a main message is to not confuse the two, and to let dreams exist and to let them push you, but to also accept that your purpose could be something entirely different from your dreams. Of course don’t let this stop you from dreaming, just give space to know that your purpose is separate from your dreams and passions. We all have something we’re destined to do deep down, and then we have things we love and are great at. Sometimes those combine, and other times they don’t. In Joe’s case, he’s passionate about music, and for the longest time he thought he hit the lottery having the two align. But maybe his purpose is just to pass on that passion to others.
And the beauty of this movie is that it shows that this is okay. It’s okay to change gears. It’s okay to fall short. It’s okay to not know what your purpose is. It’s all okay, and it will all work out in the end. Just be you and do what you love, and the rest will work itself out.
That’s all for today, just wanted to get writing again with something easy. On a brief side note, I’m officially ending my February writing challenge early. It felt too forced, was not of the quality I’d hoped for, I missed too many days and honestly I was not well prepared to have ideas ready to write every day. Plus I didn’t want to keep updating people on my life daily like I’m some sort of celebrity or influencer, which it seemed a lot of posts turned into. I’ll pick it up again in a month or two after more planning is in place. I don’t quit, I regroup and refocus.
Anyways, thanks for reading. Rock on, stay strong.