Inspiration Abounds

I find it so amazingly interesting how the human condition can be so radically different, from person to person, day to day, moment to moment. How is it that I can look at something, or think about something, and see it, hear it, feel it so completely different?

Being individuals, none of us are built the same way, of course. That's why individual means. All our experiences are customized TO us, BY us. How this came to be, I'll leave it to each of you to decide. Ha! Even there is an individualized response.

Recently, I happened to be given, digitally, the new George Strait album, called Honky Tonk Time Machine. I'm a pretty big fan of his, and I must say this album is pretty darn good. It's tough for me to get past the ADD of my world and listen to an album start to finish any more, but in this case I did several times the past week or so.

No, this post is not a music review. I do have a point. I think.

There is a song on there called, "Some Nights". I have no idea if it will be a single, or a hit song. Many that read this wouldn't care if it does, or care for it at all, just because of the genre. I will admit, you have to be able to stomach a form of music to get anything from it. I'm sure there is wisdom in hip-hop music, but it's just not a form I can digest, so I'm left to sources I'm familiar with.

The song is a typical, post-breakup song. The girl had left him, and now what's he gonna do? Well, like most of us, he rides the emotional roller-coaster. I like the song because it's very easy to me to sing along to, and his roller-coaster, as described by Strait, is a lot like mine:

"Some days are better than others
Some are mothers
I ain't even gonna lie
Some days, I don't wanna get up
I just wanna give upAnd don't even get me started on some nights"

I especially like the line, "ain't even gonna lie". If you know me, I've always been honest. You either get the truth, as I see it, or I'm quiet. More quiet than anything, actually, but I digress. Some days this guy's life is crap, and hopefully, since he's using the word "some", other days are not crap. Most all of us are this way. Good days, bad days, going half-mad days. I'm a person who tends to feel bad stuff only happens to me. I'm working on that.

It's true, I often want to give up on things, even everything, but somehow I don't. If you're around to read this, YOU don't either. And a big reason why is finding the inspiration, the strength to keep going. Music is a big source for me. I can remember a good long stretch, in the past few years, where I was so low, I wasn't really bothering to listen to music. Those were tough days. But I'm back to it, and as mentioned in the last post, doing relatively well with life's struggles.

Yesterday, I was on a long car trip, by myself, and listening to music on my USB drive in the car, as I often do. In my mind I was thinking about writing this post, lay down some paint (wink) as it were, about how I identify with that new song. I guess the inspiration I needed for it wasn't quite finished, because after several hours, listening to all kinds of songs (who has Metallica come up,  randomly,  in their personally-selected music, after George Jones? Followed by ABBA. I do), ANOTHER George Strait song comes on, another non-hit song most have never heard unless you have the album (It Just Comes Natural). 

Just so happens, on many mornings where "I don't want to get up", but do, with some seemingly-random song stuck in my head, the lines that come to me are:

"One foot in front of the other

Take one step then take another
Keep on walkin', we're headed in the right direction
Puttin' one foot in front of the other
Little by little gets a whole lot furtherHittin' our stride, one foot in front of the other"

Another catchy, easy to sing, song. They used to call such songs "album filler". A nothing kinda song, unless you happen to be paying attention. A song that, semi-consciously, is serving a purpose of literally pushing me forward. Some days I realize it while singing it in the shower, sometimes I don't. Life is quirky that way. Yesterday, I hear it in the car, I'm singing along, paying attention to it (and the road, don't worry), and towards the end, I hear this part:

"Safe and sound, covering ground

Steady as she goes"

At that point, I just friggin' laughed out loud. So coincidental. Or not. If you read my LAST post, maybe you realize quickly why I laughed. I thought to myself that my new friend Renee wouldn't believe it....we had literally talked about that very phrase, which I had stolen and used in the last post. I think now we likely know WHERE I stole it from, specifically. She told me she was going to use it as she moves forward with hormone treatment and life, for which I am super proud to have helped in some small way.

I decided just now to look up the meaning of the phrase, to put it into the correct words. I knew it's a nautical term. On the interwebs, it says, "It is a instruction from the captain to the helmsman of a ship, to keep the ship heading steadily on the same course regardless of gusts of wind or cross-currents."

Well, isn't that just like life? Until we find changes in course that we want or need, don't we just fend off the slings and arrows, the gust of wind, until the time comes? Don't we "ride the roller-coaster" every day, just putting one foot in front of the other?

Some might say that we just psyche ourselves up, any way we can. Of course we do. But, just as we should "stop and smell the roses", it can be fun to consider at times HOW we are psyching ourselves up. This can happen in a negative sense too. In that case, perhaps consider one more phrase I like: "If you don't mind, it doesn't matter".

Inspiration abounds. It's everywhere. Use it, for it is power.

Until next time, stay inspired (and thirsty) my friends....