tumblrrhea:

Koan Sound - Coast to Coast

christ, this one’s a lot 

Current audible: Flying Lotus - “Roberta Flack”

“On our way home, we spoke of many things.
Are we allowed to make brand new beginnings?
Do we need to know where the journey starts?
On my way home, greener all the light.”

Currently visible: The 12 Secrets of Highly Creative Women, by Gail McMeekin

During the stages of my life that I am not actively creating every day, I find myself more and more drawn towards the lives of those who are. On a whim in Barnes and Noble yesterday, I bought two very unlikely books, one of which is the abovementioned by Gail McMeekin. It has always been rather against my very core to buy books that detail what other people have done to get where they have gotten. I have my reasons, the most vital being that I fear I will cease to hear my own voice if it is too inundated with the voices of others. Suffice it to say that this results in my being a poor student of history in this respect. While a lot of what I’ve read in the first 37 pages has been a lot of pep talk and woman-to-woman galvanization to sisterhood, there are moments in which I find myself reading the same sentence repeatedly, and instead of seeing the blank face of the stranger from who’s mind it came, I begin to see myself. One such instance occurred when I came across the following:

“Having the interior freedom to be clear about what is going through your filter takes a lot of sorting, examination, reflection, and time, time, time. It seems to me that there has to be room for puttering - time for just feeling and inhaling what comes in. And that’s different than ‘wasting time’, and it’s important for us to recognize the difference and not be in such a hurry with our grand scheme.”

- Carmella Yager, Boston Museum of Fine Arts

There is SO MUCH MERIT to her statement. A huge amount of my frustration with life in general is the half-assed nature of many things: people, processes, performances, products. I am surprised every day by the amount of bad music I hear on the radio, increasingly so as auto tune has become a household method to improve general mediocrity (sorry Kanye. Nice try, though). I am surprised every day at the level of planned obsolescence in our gadgetry that we are in danger of becoming far too dependent upon (cough iPhone cough). I am surprised every day by how ill thought out processes are, simply because “this is how we always do it”, something that my previous boss used to feebly remind me of on a biweekly basis in response to my (albeit at times naiive) ambition. Most importantly, I am surprised every single day by the shallow and continually evaporative nature of the interpersonal relationships I witness each day. People pass each other in the streets without so much as an animalistic acknowledgment of another being’s presence, electronic communication often outweighs face to face, tactile communication, even in instances where proximity is an afterthought (if that), and relationships are often a means to an economically (financially as well as socially) secure existence rather than a conscious choice to be with someone who brings you inexplicable joy and comfort.

I speak from the perspective of someone who has been afforded a number of great luxuries in life. I have been well cared for since birth with people who love me, believe in me, and support me in a myriad of ways. I am therefor able to express myself in a number of ways, which provides me both release and a certain level of maintained sanity. I am able to love with complete exhilaration, sometimes with a second glance from strangers who aren’t accustomed to seeing interracial couples, but they are few and far between (and, quite frankly, insignificant). I enjoyed a fine education in a fine city with fine people. I am a lucky person.

I do feel, however, that there are people far and wide, lucky and unlucky, who have walked calmly past the truths, lies, and murky existences of life into a room that is lit not from in front nor above, but from within. A single light bulb on each wall faces into the boxy room and casts no shadows under which discouragement, sabotage, self defeat, or fear can lurk. It’s bright as hell, but it’s no biggie. I brought my shades, tinted with everything I feel to be of importance. And as the hours pass in my well lit room, the filters over my eyes that I’ve collected and carried with me through life thus far are simply hanging out, throwing paint on the walls, figuring out what sticks out and what gets covered up. Cause let’s face it, everything sticks. It’s just a matter of picking out what we like.

I’m rambling a little now, but my point is this: It’s not enough to go through life every day simply walking behind the gal or guy who did it last and hope that it works for you, too. Some people have some serious shit going on in their lives that doesn’t afford them the freedoms that others enjoy, and so if keeping their head down and their feet in line is where they need to be right now, more power to them. May they make it through their harrowing times with a heart full of hope for their light filled box on the other side. For the rest of us, though, we owe it to ourselves to be not just active, but proactive. Jump ahead, take the TIME to really soak in what we’re doing every day to avoid the mental and physical exhaustion that leads to a person built from fifty different puzzles, rather than one puzzle made of fifty coherent pieces.

Stop speeding, it doesn’t save you any time.
Turn of your T9 texting and spell it out. I PROMISE YOU you’ll learn something about yourself.
Quit cultivating friendships on Facebook. I’ll bet you ten bucks Mark Zuckerberg has real human friends that he sees every day.

DO make your own sandwiches at lunch time. They’ll taste better.
DO say “WASSSUPPPP” to your neighbor the next time you see them. They won’t get it, but they’ll feel strangely satisfied crossing the threshold of their front door.
DO walk instead of run, take the scenic route home once a week (even if it means ten extra minutes on the road), meet your friends in person for some face time.

DO give yourself the time you deserve to be the person you envision yourself to be. It just, takes, time.