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Gratitude can often mean openness to new experiences.

Growing up in Brooklyn, Evan Seinfeld was part of a music and cultural scene that supported openness.

Embracing impermanence as an opportunity for self-actualization can be a powerful approach to development.

As a young man growing up in the 1970s and 1980s in Brooklyn, Evan Seinfeld found heavy metal music culture at the legendary venue L’Amours. “The first time I walked into L’Amours… It was like I was home,” Seinfeld told me. “I walked in, and there were people there standing around who weren’t the usual characters. They had long hair. There were people with tattoos. There were people … with different types of style. There was a different kind of music. There was a subculture. And it felt organic for me as part of it … I was home.”

As heavy metal was growing as a culture, New York City was also the home of the developing underground punk rock and hip hop scenes. Seinfeld recounted when the late Pete Steele of Carnivore, for whom Seinfeld was a roadie, took Seinfeld to the birthplace of punk rock, CBGBs. “I was a metalhead … I used to roadie for Pete Steele when I was 16,” he recalled. “And then one day, Pete says to me, ‘Bring your car, pick up the equipment. We’re gonna go play CBGBs.’… I’d never been to CBGBs … The only person with long hair was me and Pete … And I’m like, ‘Wow … Eyes open to a new........

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