{"id":6084,"date":"2014-02-03T13:44:08","date_gmt":"2014-02-03T18:44:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/?p=6084"},"modified":"2014-02-13T13:31:47","modified_gmt":"2014-02-13T18:31:47","slug":"play-the-sunset","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html","title":{"rendered":"Play the Sunset"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a id=\"overlay_image_anchor_2518178\" href=\"http:\/\/www.everystockphoto.com\/photo.php?imageId=2518178&amp;searchId=88eb60614bb67782bd8c18afb4438329&amp;npos=104\"><img decoding=\"async\" id=\"overlay_image_2518178\" title=\"Skye Sunset\" alt=\"\" src=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Last night I was watching one of my favorite movies, Mr. Holland&#8217;s Opus, starring Richard Dreyfus. For those who have never seen it, it is the story of a\u00a0professional musician and composer who takes a job as a high school music teacher. At first, he is ill-suited for the position and he expresses exasperation with the students whose own level of dedication to being taught by him is reflective of his lack of commitment to being there only for the paycheck. It is when he is chastised by the principal, played by Olympia Dukakis that he has a wake up call and dives in heart first. He recognizes that in order to reach the students, he needs to speak their language and that is Rock N Roll! When the film begins, it is the 1960&#8217;s and the soundtrack includes Louie Louie, Lover&#8217;s Concerto,\u00a0 Uptight (Everything Is Alright), Imagine and Beautiful Boy.<\/p>\n<p>Throughout his 30 year career as a teacher, he continues to work in his own composition, but it, along with\u00a0his\u00a0wife Iris and his son Cole (so named for John Coltrane) who is deaf and can&#8217;t appreciate music the same way he can,\u00a0 play second fiddle to his growing responsibilities at work. My favorite scene in the movie that always bring tears to my eyes is when a student named Gertrude Lang is struggling with playing the clarinet which she only took up because everyone else in her family had a talent and she wanted something that\u00a0she could claim as\u00a0her own. She walks into the music room while Mr. Holland is playing piano. He asks her why people play music and she eventually came to the conclusion that it was because it was fun. He further reminds her not to simply play the notes on the page. The next question is what she likes about herself when she sees her image in the mirror. Of course, it is her beautiful red hair which her father says reminds him of the sunset. He then instructs her to put away her sheet music and &#8220;Play the sunset.&#8221;\u00a0 That she does, eyes closed, transfixed.\u00a0 From that point on, her relationship with music shifts. It is a goosebump and tears moment for me each time I have seen it since 1995 when the movie was released.<\/p>\n<p>What if we could each put away the instructions for how to play our soul song and simply&#8230;.play the sunset or the sunrise, the ocean tide, the thunder storm, or the blizzard for that matter?\u00a0 What if we could tap into our natural talents and allow them to play us? I like to say that &#8216;my writing writes me&#8217;, as I get out of the way and let it do its thing. It takes some amount of courage to trust that what emerges will be beautiful and beneficial to all who hear it.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/youtu.be\/qCzgK_DoKB4\">http:\/\/youtu.be\/qCzgK_DoKB4<\/a> Play the Sunset from Mr. Holland&#8217;s Opus<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; Last night I was watching one of my favorite movies, Mr. Holland&#8217;s Opus, starring Richard Dreyfus. For those who have never seen it, it is the story of a\u00a0professional musician and composer who takes a job as a high school music teacher. At first, he is ill-suited for the position and he expresses exasperation&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":233,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36,1,2,13,33,19,14,4,9,16,7],"tags":[2638,3640,3639,3638,3636,2054,3637],"class_list":["post-6084","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art","category-attracting-what-you-desire","category-bliss","category-blissfull-thinking","category-creativity","category-empowerment","category-how-to-invite-bliss","category-inspiration","category-music","category-my-personal-bliss","category-re-creating-your-life","tag-imagine","tag-john-coltrane","tag-louie-louie","tag-lovers-concerto","tag-mr-hollands-opus","tag-olympia-dukakis","tag-richard-dreyfus"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Play the Sunset - The Bliss Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Play the Sunset - The Bliss Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&nbsp; Last night I was watching one of my favorite movies, Mr. Holland&#8217;s Opus, starring Richard Dreyfus. For those who have never seen it, it is the story of a\u00a0professional musician and composer who takes a job as a high school music teacher. At first, he is ill-suited for the position and he expresses exasperation&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bliss Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/snuggleyoga\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2014-02-03T18:44:08+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-02-13T18:31:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Edie Weinstein, MSW, LSW\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@EdieWeinstein1\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Play the Sunset - The Bliss Blog","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Play the Sunset - The Bliss Blog","og_description":"&nbsp; Last night I was watching one of my favorite movies, Mr. Holland&#8217;s Opus, starring Richard Dreyfus. For those who have never seen it, it is the story of a\u00a0professional musician and composer who takes a job as a high school music teacher. At first, he is ill-suited for the position and he expresses exasperation&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html","og_site_name":"The Bliss Blog","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/snuggleyoga","article_published_time":"2014-02-03T18:44:08+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-02-13T18:31:47+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg"}],"author":"Edie Weinstein, MSW, LSW","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@EdieWeinstein1","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html","name":"Play the Sunset - The Bliss Blog","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg","datePublished":"2014-02-03T18:44:08+00:00","dateModified":"2014-02-13T18:31:47+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/#\/schema\/person\/edcd643a643a9ca91adb1e8f9e177386"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/estock_dev\/fspid9\/58\/13\/28\/landscape-water-beach-581328-m.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/2014\/02\/play-the-sunset.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Play the Sunset"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/","name":"The Bliss Blog","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Edie Weinstein","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/#\/schema\/person\/edcd643a643a9ca91adb1e8f9e177386","name":"Edie Weinstein, MSW, LSW","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/0d6\/0d6cd7619da51a9a40cc705280e88f9cx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/blissblog\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/0d6\/0d6cd7619da51a9a40cc705280e88f9cx96.jpg","caption":"Edie Weinstein, MSW, LSW"},"description":"Edie Weinstein, MSW, LSW is a colorfully creative journalist, inspiring transformational speaker, licensed social worker, interfaith minister, editor, radio host, BLISS coach, event producer, Cosmic Concierge, the author of The Bliss Mistress Guide To Transforming The Ordinary Into The Extraordinary and co-author of Embraced By the Divine: The Emerging Woman\u2019s Gateway to Power, Passion and Purpose. She has also contributed to several anthologies and personal growth books. Edie has interviewed such notables as Ram Dass, Wayne Dyer, Debbie Ford, don Miguel Ruiz, don Miguel Ruiz, Jr. Marianne Williamson, Grover Washington, Jr. Noah Levine, Shirley MacLaine, Dennis Weaver, Ben and Jerry and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. She calls herself an Opti-mystic who sees the world through the eyes of possibility. 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