Music comes in all forms, not only the audible. There's music in action and motion, in words and images, and even in body expression. Music is heard in how situations develop, and is even made by the pressures of stress. Music permeates our lives with discords, strident clashes of noise, singular notes, and a droning dirge. In my post "Wading" I've epitomized my dominant experience of 2015, yet this fails to reflect the singular bells of pure notes, for like a scarlet thread there remains an ever-present melody of grace fighting to be heard. Here's a reflection on the sound of 2015.
I started 2015 optimistically, enjoying my self and perhaps presciently quoting Melanie Penn's "Shadow of doubt". I followed this with a post on "isms", notably on mystics and mysticism. This has been an emerging undercurrent as I've become disillusioned with how readily people will substitute a nebulous fell-good massage of their conscience for the hard reality that is life. These beginnings translated into both workspace and personal life. On the one hand I was wrestling with the ills of the politics of climate change and multi-generational suffering, and on the other hand trying to think through the role of a Christian in a world gone wrong. Both aspects are rooted in the same issue; who am I before God? Once again I found my thoughts and feelings expressed through life's music, like in Jenny and Tylers "Faint Not" By now the stage was set for the year, and I quickly wrote my way through ideas about Liberal Theology and institutionalized religion, reacting to platitudes that avoid reality, considering the hard grey decisions about marijuana and sex (and including at the end Gray Havens' multi-faceted song "Gray Flowers"), as well as touching on the political stupidity around climate change. And that was only January! These grew into what seems to be the recurrent 2015 sub-themes:
But all the time was this meta thread; reality is not what I say it is, reality simply is. As is my penchant, images and music remained a hugely evocative (and obtuse?) way to capture thoughts when words fail. I don't know how many who read here saw what I saw in the images I used (e.g. here, or here), or some of the music I included (e.g. here), yet for me there are so many helpful layers of meaning that only await someone taking time for contemplation. By the time it was approaching mid-year my life was an entangled web of stresses. There was too much travel, pressures of work, and a growing anger at the intransigence of the church to get to grips with inner-city reality. While I tried to find a positive conclusion in each post, this was a depressing time amplified by perceptions of idiocy. By the time July rolled around I had a head full of frustration. Yet the ever-present music (see the double meaning there?) still kept my mind from drifting into a void, and led me to include songs in posts such as the one from Katie Herzig at the end of Anger. At this stage of the year I was blog-bottoming out, and after a few splashes of rhetoric trying to capture my thoughts on spirituality (here, here, and here), I basically stopped thinking much while I did battle with the immediacy of needs. Music in all its forms ultimately broke through and came to the rescue once again. In Nov I re-emerged into blog space to frame some words to my thoughts, and twice included Katie Herzig (again) with her songs "Lost and Found", "Walk Through Walls" and "The Best Day of Your Life" in a post titled "What's your face say". December arrived, and I began to think again. "Wading" was an attempt to capture how I felt about the year's experiences ... mostly about the church, but paralleled by the work place. This is my favourite post of the year and simply rolled off the fingers; almost as if it were saying "Finally, you're typing me". The year closed on a note of "let's think again"; a new start to reflect on things (e.g. Fathers, and Metrics). At the end of the day I write to think and think to write, motivated by the models of Hadassah and Mordecai, as therapy for hubris, and to crystallize the deceptions of the mind. If others find value in these words, all the better. Now 2016 has landed like a lump of wet clay embedded with a structure to guide my blind fingers. Happy New Year.
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Why?
Probably the best therapy is to express yourself. Why do you think psychiatrists make you lie on the couch and talk, while all they do is murmur "hmmm", "uhuh", or "go on"? Archives
May 2017
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