Inner and Outer Life

Tag: music

Good Things Grow From…

Most of us know this song.

Sing along:

“We all live in a yellow submarine.”

Now, hear the demo version for this landmark song:

Doesn’t sound like the final version that we know, isn’t it?

That’s why I love hearing musician’s demos. It the genesis. It’s the raw “toddling” beginnings.

 

Scrambled Eggs

Play along with me for the next one. Can you guess what song this is (hint: It’s a famous hit):

“Scrambles eggs, oh baby how I love your legs.”

Any luck?

That is the first lyrics for Paul McCartney’s hit, Yesterday.

The lyrics erm, improved.

“Yesterday, all my troubles seem so far away.”

 


Take the First Step (Not the Second)

All things start from somewhere.

And that somewhere may seem unpromising. Heck, you might even feel like an impostor, or not good enough. And that does not matter.

What you think about you and your abilities, doesn’t really matter.

Say you go for a job interview. Who gets to decide whether you are “the one” for the job?

Not you.

When you go on a date, who gets to decide if you are “the one”?

Not you.

When you release a song to the streaming platforms, who gets to decide if your song is going to be a hit?

Not you.

So what are we to do?

Take, the first step.

That first step, is everything.

Here’s the poet David Whyte:

Start Close In

Start close in, 

don’t take the second step, 

or the third, 

start with the first 

thing

close in,

the step, 

you don’t want to take. 

 

Because, as we observe this in nature and biology—just notice your gardens and potted plants—good things grow from sh*t.

Anaesthetic vs. Aesthetic Experience

Reading a book is like having a deep conversation.*

Watching a movie is like experiencing vivid dreaming.

Listening to music is like hearing the sound of emotions.

Viewing a photograph or a painting is like stopping time.

All forms of art, provides an opportunity to engage in an aesthetic experience.

A doctor applies an anaesthetic when she wants the patient to feel nothing. Anaesthetic leads to numbness. On the other hand, an aesthetic awareness is a door to wonderment.

So much of what we consume today is like anaesthesia. Yet, what is needed is aesthetics that un-numbs us, that provides us a “waking up” to the inherent beauty that is possible to be engaged with.

As Proust says, “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.” Engaging in art has a way of clearing the fog in our eyes and waking our senses. 

Art might be “useless” in a conventional economy paradigm, but it is highly valuable from what it means to be human.


Footnote:

*Reading a poem is like listening to the the truth, told “slant”.

Photo by Mr TT

Moved By Music

It’s been a long time since I’ve discovered a new artist that moved me. Rosie Carneys music doesn’t scream for your attention. It’s probably not going to hit some charts. It’s quiet, but penetrating. It’s soft, but her songs invites you in.

I am so taken by her music.

I first hear this track that she did called Thousands. In this track, she had the backing vocals from someone she looks up to, fellow Irish singer Lisa Hannigan (formerly singing with Damien Rice)

Here’s a live performance of the song, Thousands.

I wanted to learn more about her. The Web isn’t sprawled with information about Rosie Carney.

I was surprised that she’s only in her early twenties. At the age of 16, Donegal’s Rosie Carney signed a record deal that guided her away from the unadorned and honest songwriting that she wanted to pursue. After that false start, Carney knuckled down and got even more real and began to address her battles with anxiety, depression and an eating disorder that occupied her teenage years. “I lost so much weight. I don’t know how I didn’t die.”

Here’s a short documentary about her battle with anxiety at a young age:

 

 

In the video above, she said that the catalyst for change was when her grandmother, who was suffering with dementia.

One day, (my grandmother) asked my mother if I had cancer, as I was so thin…. that’s when I realised I need to completely sort myself out.

Music really became a form of therapy for her. The song “Thousands” speaks about her grandmother

Carnie Rosey’s music reminds that our life is not about comfort, but about courage. It not about living an anesthetic life, but to be awaken each day to the aesthetics around and within us.

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