Finding My Chords

 One thing that I have learned from starting to work on music production is that sometimes the only thing one needs to change the tune from an almost horrible sounding monstrosity to a happy little ear worm is the right chords.  Sometimes one finds these chords through messing around on the computer, on a keyboard, strumming a guitar, or just taking a nap.  

In my personal life I have been dealing with some borderline depression.  This week has been especially bad as I felt a bit like I was on an island and nobody was coming to rescue me, this three hour tour was supposed to be over already by the way....   Let me off this island so I can get back to living.  In regards to life I have been a poorly keyed song.  There is just something off about my chord progression and I am almost unlistenable.  (Sorry there are a lot of references there and I don't even know what I am trying to say anymore.)

Yesterday I was sitting at home, working on some music, when I felt the need to emote.  And not like an emoticon emote but an actual heartfelt need for some sentiment.  I picked up a ukulele that I had bought almost 20 years ago and just started plucking for inspiration.  There was something about the sound of those strings that took me to a different place. I was transported to college where I first heard that sound, I was transported to a remote island and plucking strings under a palm tree in the sand, I was taken away from my shitty existence and placed somewhere else.  It was nice. It made me feel like I was genuinely happy, and that was a nice feeling.  The other good thing about life is that as I was plucking these strings I came up with an idea for a new song which really made me happy, though defeated the point as I was trying to finish my current song.  

My biggest take away from this experience is sometimes we just need to take some time to pluck for inspiration.  We need to sometimes take some time to try new things, try things outside of the box, and find ourselves in the strange.  I am glad that I had this experience because it did help me to learn more about what it takes to find yourself when the world seems the darkest.  

What Is The Worst That Could Happen?

 I have been working through a book that is meant to unleash my creativity.  For the longest time I never pursued my creative side, mostly out of fear of others so I decided to publicly do an exercise called "The Worst."  In this exercise one is to share some of their greatest fears in regard to unleashing your creativity, your weird, your uniqueness upon the world.

My biggest fears:

• Rejection- What if people say I'm not good enough, or tell me that I should spend some time searching for something more logical to do. 
• Hate- I am scared to death of hate.  I always choke up, shorten my stride, lose all forms of self confidence around hate. If I were to be in the public eye and received hate I am not sure how I would respond. 
• That whatever I'm working on is really good.  - I know this one sounds strange because success isn't something to fear, right?  Wrong.  If I were to hit it out of the park and do amazing on an endeavor would I be able to repeat, would people still treat me as me and not as something different (I've always been the strange kid why would I want folks to treat me like that again?)  
• Fake Friends - as someone who has never really had a strong sense of bonding with other than one or two people in my life I don't know how to recognize a friend. 
• Negative Feedback- similar to hate, what if people don't like what I have created? what if they are bold enough to tell me to my face? 
• That not only strangers but actual friends and family don't like what I have created.  How embarrassing would it be if your mother told you not to quit your day job.  I think I would die inside.  Or even worse,  what if my wife told me that it was the crappiest thing that she has ever read/heard/listened to.  Oh the humanity!!!!!!!

Looking at this list I think that I feel a little better. After all creativity, though something to be shared, is more for the benefit of the creator.  If you all are ever unsure of yourself perhaps an exercise like this can help you out as well.  

We are Making Music Now

 One of the things that always scared me when I was a kid was to play music.  I was always jealous of my older siblings who had the chance to take piano lessons especially later in life but I know why my mother never let me.  (She was very nervous that I would give up on it, I did have a very long track record for giving up on different activities.)  I tried to teach myself piano later in life but it didn't stick.  This didn't stick for two reasons: 1. I didn't have the drive to really deep dive into the craft and so I didn't spend a lot of time practicing, and 2. I didn't have any idea what I was doing and didn't have a mentor to help me learn how to play.  

My uncle is an amazing musician who has honed his craft and if given the chance would probably go play in one of those majestic concert halls in NYC.  Most of my cousins have some amazing musical skills and I feel a little left out when it comes to playing music.  I have always considered myself creative.  I love to be creative, and the way that I create is unique to me (thanks Felicia Day for helping me find this fact out with an exercise about a cat in your latest book).  Over the last two months or so I have been dealing with an injury that has kept me off the hiking trails and out of the gym.  The world seems to be falling apart and I feel that I can't make any sense out of it, let alone try to make a difference in it.  All of these things keep adding up and I find that I am more and more retreating into a place of internal turmoil that I am unable to share with anyone.  

Stepping back I found that I had a bit of a talent for, or at least the ability to, make easy chord progressions and rhythmic beats.  I threw myself whenever I felt loss, out of control, or in need of someone to listen to me into the world of music production.  In a strange way I feel that my lack of musical training may have helped me not get stuck into a loop of control but has given me the ability to really express myself and all of the frustrations that I have been feeling into a form of music.  On my YouTube I have published a single song that was kind of horrible but it felt like I could share a bit of my soul with the world.  Maybe I'll be able to share more in the future that won't sound as poorly constructed.  

So I guess this long post is more about me learning to accept my own strangeness and share myself with the world.  We are definitely making music now and it feels so amazing.  

Crisis Of Faith

 This post is going off the rails.  I have been struggling this week with a lot of questions regarding who I am, what my purpose is, and other self depredating questions.  This has led me to look deep in myself, and though I don't have the answers yet I feel that putting these thoughts out here might help me organize them in my mind.   Who knows maybe this side journey will help you all find some truths in your own life, at least that is the hope for my own. 

First crisis I have been experiencing is a struggle with value.  My wife and I do not see eye to eye on the value of money.  I don't care for it. It is a tool that helps us survive to me but to her it is a way to prove herself as worthwhile.  Normally we move through this very easily but for some reason I have been looking deep within myself this week after a budgeting disagreement and I feel that I have let her down.  I start so many projects that I never have the legs to finish which causes undue pain, especially when it comes to money and the making of it.  One of the goals of this blog was to try and live a life closer to nature and to find value elsewhere but as I pursue this I feel that I need to find a better paying job, I need to finish my degree, I need to go work for the corporate elites and fight my way to the top. It is hard for me to decide where to put my values.  I know that I value free thought, creativity, and the pursuit of joy over anything money related but for some reason I feel that I have to give myself up in order to live a life better filled.  

My second crisis is one of faith.  I have some family members that have embraced a more natural path towards salvation.  They have been looking at alternative faiths or in some cases developing their own spirituality.  Growing up in the Mormon church I was always taught that there was only one path to the highest degree of heaven.  Once I was in college I found that I did not really feel comfort in the church and stopped going. I still go for my families sake when we get together for the holidays but I really find no peace in the organized religion of Mormonism.  This week I have started to struggle with questions regarding the actual reality of Jesus, heaven, hell, and all that most western faiths are built on.  I began to think of Jesus as a tool of the Roman empire to make their citizens worship one faith in order to conquer and maintain power across the world.  I may be wrong but this crisis of faith has caused some sadness as I start to question whether all that I have been taught is real or not.  As I have looked at the books and research of the more earth based faiths I have found some truth but I do not feel peace in them either.  If anything I am starting to wonder whether religion is real or just a construct to maintain power over a populace. 

The final struggle this week is in my value as a writer.  I have always loved to create.  I would go out of my way to write through any and all problems that came up but I was always too shy to share my musing with the world.  In fact I have started many of these blogs that I had every intention of sharing with the world that I end up not following through because of my own insecurities and the small inner voice that nags at me about how nobody would enjoy that, or you are not worthy of anything good.  It is a hard voice to smack down. I feel drawn to the pull of its constant interference. My hope is that I will not be giving into it this time and that I will be able to push through the uncomfortable feelings of putting myself out there and that I will be able to at least follow this goal of mine.  I fear that I will not be able to keep this up but I promise that I will try as hard as I can to post at least once a week in order to keep the dream alive.  

Thank you all for taking the time to read this.  I know that personal journals are not always the most fun to read but if they give you an insight into your lives, into my life, or in any way help you understand me a bit better then I believe that it is a win.  See you next week as we look at the book "Where the Water Goes" and discuss the conservation of water along the Colorado River. 

Transitions

 Our life is a series of transitions.  In the morning we transition from sleep to alertness.  We transition from home to school or work.  We transition from place to place, action to action, and leader to leader.  We even transition from friends and family in order to better protect and live our best lives.  

I was going to write about how watching the sunset can make for a wonderful mood booster.  I was going to talk about the relaxation and the joy watching something so naturally beautiful can be, but in light of some things happening in my personal life and the transition that most Americans are experiencing right now I decided to write a short journal post about a transition that I am going through.  

I grew up in a faith that demanded strict adherence to its set of life.  During the beginning of the pandemic I started to look into it again because it was something stable, concrete, that I could latch onto during these troubling times.  I created some social media accounts to see if I could find a place to fit in and cut out a small community of people of my childhood to see if I still belonged.  I have to admit that my choice to leave the church in my youth might have been the best decision that I ever made.

During this week of political uncertainty I wrote a microblog about how now we need to figure out how to come together and learn how to repair a broken country. I was met with calls of repentance and being told that I am not a Christian because a follower of Christ would never accept people that lived certain ways and had certain beliefs.  It made me laugh at the amount of time I wasted in my youth trying to win the acceptance of a group and always feeling outside of the group.  I do not believe that this group is my tribe and I do not want to be a member of this groups tribe anyway. 

I have always felt way more at ease, way more at home in the woods and hills.  There is a connection there that fills my spirit with a rejuvenating power that I do not get anywhere else.  I have been a borderline pagan for a long time, constantly talking to the land as I work it and leaving small offerings and tokens to the land as I see fit.  There is a peace and an acceptance from the belief that the world is the provider of all mankind and that we should keep Her in our thoughts as we go about our day.  

The world does not judge us or tell us that we are going to perish in hellfire if we don't follow her teachings.  She does not differentiate between one species and another.  She balances the best that she can by making sure that we are provided for.  This is a god that I can honor and why I will be transitioning from the new gods to the old gods in my life.  I am tired of people using their faith and beliefs as a way to control others, and I refuse to be a part of that.  

Sorry for the rant.  I guess I needed a bit of a journal today.  Tomorrow we will talk about some way of connecting to nature.    

Program

 Hello Everyone!  I wanted to take a moment and introduce myself to you and share what this project will be.  I am creating a series of blog posts that I hopefully will be sharing every day in a way to help others connect with the nature around them.  

I believe that it doesn't matter if you live in the city, in the country, or in the wilderness (granted if you live in the wild I doubt that you will be reading this) we all have the ability to connect to the nature around us.  Over the past ten years I have gone from a climate change naysayer to someone who believes that something has to give in order for us to be able to survive on this planet.  One of the easiest ways that I have found to battle climate change in my own life is to spend more time in nature, more time observing the gifts that the earth have to offer us, and more time putting myself outside and less time just thinking about it. As I was brainstorming different ways that I could change the world I realized that maybe someone would love to follow this journey with me.  

My goal for this journey is to share one tip, story, experience, thought every day and try to live just a little bit more in line with the environment that we have around us.  This will be a challenge, but I am looking forward to learning about myself and how I can make an impact.  

"Never Doubt that a small group of Thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; it is the only thing that has." ~Mararet Mead~

I hope that you all join me on this journey and hopefully we will be able to change the world one step at a time!