cynosure

In the middle of the crowd, when the artist I had waited four hours for finally started playing, I spaced out.

I felt uncomfortable, I felt bothered. I felt like even though I had enjoyed the opening acts, during the act I had been so anticipating, I ironically felt hollow. Empty, missing.

Maybe music is often my way of escaping the present; but when I’m there, a few feet away from the creator of the music I run away to, I have nowhere else to escape. When I’m at a concert, I can no longer deny the fact that I still have much, much to work on.

Some of the habits that I believe are essential to happiness are: living in the present. Letting things go. Not thinking. Not taking things personally. Realizing that no matter what anyone says or does, in the end, it has nothing to do with anyone but himself.

I have this thing about one of my passions right now, this BIG thing. I’ve been getting all touchy whenever someone mentions something about it I don’t want to hear and don’t believe, or when people don’t recognize me. I feel insecure, I feel like I need to prove myself. I must only prove myself.. to myself.

So I wanted to be uncomfortable, didn’t I? I said I wanted to get out of my comfort zone. Well, here I am. I’m uncomfortable. And I didn’t even need to try– I can feel the petty feelings of immaturity, jealousy, lack of self-esteem, egotism, pride, and self-centeredness throughout my body. They mix together to create an unpleasant sphere of used bubble gum in my chest. (That’s how it feels, anyway.)

Around five years ago I was extremely possessive. Possessive in the controlling, obsessive, crazy way. I hated thinking about the fact that other people liked the music I liked and watched the shows I watched– I wanted to own them, to be the only one that enjoyed them, to have them all to myself. Out of insecurity, out of selfishness… out of the fear that, if I shared what I liked with someone else, their happiness in enjoying it would somehow take away from mine. Would somehow invalidate my interest in it.

I feel that way now. If everyone loves what I love to do, I feel competitive. I feel like I have to compete for the title of “most passionate about it”. I feel like I have to be number one… in what? In loving it, in being the best, in what?

I need to change. I didn’t even have to venture too much out of my comfort zone to be uncomfortable to be spurred to change– since I refused to budge, the uncomfortability (not a word by dictionary terms) came to me instead. The bothered feelings deluged me themselves, without any incentive or impetus or incitement instead. I wanted to be uncomfortable, didn’t I? I got my wish.

I really did. It’s a new year, a new decade, and we don’t stop changing. People get caught up in routine because they don’t want to admit that no matter what happens, everything will change. No matter how much they try to prevent it, no matter how much they try to stop time, no matter how much they want to keep things the same. They can’t stay the same.

We take photographs because we want to capture a moment in time. Moments that will never come back. Moments that can never last forever.

I have what I wanted now. An incessant, everpresent hole in my body that tells me, You need to change. You will stay unsatisfied with yourself if you do not change. I am your ego, your pride, the thief of true joy. You must slay me yourself; I will not go away.

I concede that I am happy. I am content. But I am not perfect, I am not ideal, and just because my life is filled with happiness does not mean I will always stay this same “personality”, this same mixture of archetypal-or-not characteristics.

I’m going to bend myself until I break. Fold myself.

This pettiness is meant to disappear. I have to grow up more.

When I think of my father, I realize that all this sadness, this emotional poison is all a product of immaturity. A product of the rejected teenager’s mind. I don’t think children are immature, at least not in the way I’m describing. Children know how to live. But starting from adolescence, humans become filled with all these sadnesses and insecurities and judgments. They start to take things personally. And some never grow up, never learn to live. Never learn to be alive, never learn to be a child again. To let things go. To be truly free. To live life unfettered.

When I think of my father, I think of how, if someone told him his violin skills were terrible, he’d just laugh it off and forget about it. I think of how he’d never be scared to talk to a stranger, ask them about their day, befriend them, get interested. I think of how if someone was rude to him, he wouldn’t take it personally. I think of how if even his friend was insulting him to his face, he wouldn’t care. His pride, his insecurity, his lack of self-confidence would not be injured.

Granted, my father still has his flaws. He even still has his own immaturity. We all have these issues we need to work out ourselves. Even when life is fulfilling and everything is great, sometimes an emptiness reveals itself, a rip to be patched.

Without fear. Without taking anything personally. Without pettiness.

I will learn to live, again and again, more and more.

Life is just a constant lesson on how to truly be alive and free.

—

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tags: honesty

This entry was posted on Monday, January 11th, 2010 at 12:30 and is filed under growing, uncomfortable. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.