Songfacts®:

• This bouncy ballad was written for the Disney animated movie Moana by Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda. The film is set in Polynesia and this tune is sung by its titular character, a young princess. It concerns her planned journey from the South Pacific island to save her people.
  
  If the wind in my sail on the sea stays behind me
  One day I'll know
  If I go there's just no telling how far I'll go
• The song is sung during the movie by Auli'i Cravalho, the actress playing Moana. Later Alessia Cara's version plays over the end credits. "So cool to be a part of @DisneyMoana," Alessia tweeted. "Such a killer story. thanks disney for letting me sing this song."
• Alessia Cara told ABC Radio that she was thrilled to sing a tune written by the Hamilton creator.
  
  "Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote the song, which is incredible," she said. "So we Skype called and he just basically let me do kind of whatever I wanted with the song, and change it up to make it my own. And they ended up really liking it, so they put it at the end of the movie."
• Miranda described this to the BBC as "an 'I want' song" in the tradition of The Little Mermaid's "Part of Your World."
  
  "The first time I sat at my piano to work on it I said, 'Don't think about Let It Go!" laughed the composer. "But the job is to tell the truth about our characters and really make you feel about where they are in the journey, so you try to treat it as honestly as possible."
• Both Auli'i Cravalho and Alessia Cara's versions entered the Billboard Hot 100 in the week after the release of Moana. Auli'i Cravalho's version eventually peaked at #41 on the listing.
• Lin-Manuel Miranda locked himself in his childhood bedroom to write the song. "I wanted to get to my angstiest possible place," he said, "so I went Method on that."
• This won the Grammy for Best Song Written For Visual Media at the 2018 ceremony.