Dreams Aren’t Meant to Keep You Awake

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The night before my 8:30 a.m. jazz theory class, I couldn’t sleep.

Not because I’d been practicing, or at a jam, or cramming for an assignment. Just lying there, staring at the ceiling, counting the spaces between thoughts that didn’t stop bouncing around my head. Months like this. Nights that felt longer than days, and days that felt like a prelude to another night like this.

I thought about the Sydney Opera House. Not as a dream, exactly, more like a shape in the distance I wasn’t sure I wanted to reach anymore. My fingers twitched. My toes curled. I kept checking my pulse, wondering if being awake this long was breaking me in ways I couldn’t feel yet. Sleep had stopped being sleep and had become a tangle of thoughts I couldn’t unravel.

I imagined getting up, catching the 7 a.m. bus, walking the twenty minutes through streets that were quiet except for the hue of streetlights, showing up to a classroom that felt like it belonged to someone else — someone who still believed in the idea of music as salvation. And I wasn’t sure I did.

By 4 a.m., I stopped counting the hours. I counted the seconds instead. One by one. One by one. Waiting. Waiting. Waiting.

The first month at the Conservatorium, something felt off.

Sydney had just come out of its first COVID lockdown. Everyone was “back.” Students buzzing. Lecturers reminding us how “lucky” we were. “Next generation of jazz musicians,” they said, “carrying the legacy.”

I think I heard the word lucky more than I practiced my melodic minor scales.

On the surface, it looked fine.
Smiles in hallways. Lunchtime jam plans. Students talking about “shedding like crazy” now that stages were open.

But underneath, something had cracked. Like someone had crossed out March to December 2020 and decided those months never happened. No one wanted to ask what they’d done to us.

I’d spent years getting here. Three attempts to get in. Gigging, teaching, practicing, writing — all to walk through those sandstone halls. I thought I’d feel like I belonged.
Instead, being surrounded by 112 other young artists and some of the best jazz teachers in the country felt like being dropped in the Netherlands without speaking Dutch.

The hardest part wasn’t the coursework. It was the silence around everything else.
Mental health? Student wellbeing? Not a topic. Old school: turn up, practice eight hours, or fall flat. No excuses.

A month in, I mentioned my schedule to the head of jazz: 9 a.m. classes, long gaps, finishing at 5:30. I was 23 — not fresh out of high school — renting an apartment, running a small teaching business to survive.

His response:
“Oh no… we can’t change those classes. And you can’t be teaching too much. You’re part of the CON family now. Do you feel you are?”

It was such a strange question to be asked when I’d just explained I was burning out.

But sure. I’d “find a way,” I replied. I mean…what else could I say?

My days were relentless. Guitar lessons at 6pm, home at 9:30, dinner at 10, assignments till midnight. Sleep — if I was lucky — by 1:30am, up at 6am, to catch the 7am bus. Walk twenty minutes. Make the 8:30am class.

Some nights, I didn’t sleep at all. My mind raced with stress and adrenaline.
It wasn’t the classes. Not missing lessons. It was knowing I’d have to cut my students, lose income, and still show up here.

By June 2021, lockdown hit again. That’s when it all cracked.

I fell into the worst depression I’d experienced. My friend — 31, an IT worker who’d moved to Sydney to study jazz — was in the same hole. He slept an hour a night. Didn’t eat. Instead getting high to numb his pain.

I tried to hold myself together with writing, Zoom lessons, running, meditation, visits from my girlfriend when allowed. But inside, the question started to echo:

Do I even want this dream if it means breaking myself in the process?

The university’s mental health response?
One counselling session per student. Run by student counsellors who’d barely graduated.

Counselling? One session. Run by student counsellors barely out of school. I might as well have just watched Dr Phil.

There were nights when the line between reality and night terror blurred. Moments when I genuinely thought I wouldn’t make it. When the idea of taking too many pills, or jumping from my building’s roof, didn’t feel hypothetical anymore.

But I’m here. Four years on. Not completely healed. Not ‘back to normal.’ Just okay. Determined to make sure other young musicians don’t go through what I did.”

I can’t control institutions. I can’t rewrite policy.

But what I can do is keep this community alive here.
By writing. By sharing stories like this one.

This is only one chapter of many. And I hope, with time, this community grows,
that more people read these words, that a teacher, a leader, or someone with the power to make real change stumbles across a story like this and pauses long enough to listen.

Because that’s where change begins. With listening. With awareness.

For now, all I can do is speak to you.
Reach the people who care.
And keep showing up, so that no young artist ever has to feel as alone as I did.

Chasing your dream should never come at the cost of your health—or make you wonder if your life is worth living.

And for my friend—he’s okay.
He moved back to Melbourne, found his footing again, got a new job that pays well, and is back in a city where music is alive and well.

And me? I’m getting some more sleep these days. I’m doing okay.

Thank you for taking 10 minutes to read today’s newsletter.

This story is part of a series I’m working on — short stories based on my own music career, showing the reality of chasing a professional path, the setbacks, and the mental health struggles that come with it. Paid subscribers get an exclusive first look at the full drafts, and your feedback will help shape the stories. These aren’t just my experiences — they reflect what many musicians go through.

Even if you’re a free subscriber, you’re already supporting me, and I’m grateful for that.

If this story resonated, I’d love for you to forward it to a friend or fellow musician who might find comfort in it. The bigger our community, the more we can help artists around the world share their mental health stories — and feel less alone.'

📹 You can also check out my latest YouTube video where I talk about why it is so hard to understand what depression is for those don’t have it.

And if you’re struggling, I’m here for you.

DM me on socials.
Email me: [email protected]
Or join the Substack chat: https://substack.com/chat/2118157

Take care of yourself,
Brian

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