My mom asked me how I’m feeling and how I’m doing psychologically. Many people ask these questions of me. I hate them. I hate them because how I’m feeling and doing psychologically is temporal. A healthy mind does not stay in a certain feeling or state without end — feelings, like everything else, don’t persist forever.
There are, of course, lingering thoughts. I often think about how much people misinterpret my responses as odd, not what they would expect if they were in grief, or the doubt they appear to have when they ask how I am. I entertain that thought often because I find it fascinating.
I often think about the death process. For some people it’s short and sudden, for others it’s long and drawn out? In a sense — like a war — a nuclear blast versus a cold war of attrition. What would loved ones prefer? What would the dying prefer? How much energy goes into one or the other? Is there a third option?
I wonder about energy. Is the energy from the person that dies wasted? Where does it go? It’s been studied that humans give off an aura. What happens to that energy? How is that energy re-used by the universe? Is this energy actually consciousness? And, does it move into some kind of other state or dimension?
These thoughts occupy brain space. Tons of my own cognitive energy goes into these thoughts and questions. Since I find that a majority of the people I encounter don’t enjoy entertaining these thoughts, or they think I’m crazy, I must go elsewhere. In fact, as I write that, I have another thought — why does this experience with others reinforce my irrational belief that I’m typically the outsider?
It’s easy for musicians, and many other artistic types, to feel like outsiders. The artist notices the world and humans in ways that the non-artist might not. And our noticing generates thoughts, wonder, and inquiry. And where conversation with other humans fails, I find communion with this energy field known as music.
Imagine music as an aether that floats above you. You interact with it from time to time when you hear it. When you hear music that touches your soul you laugh, cry, dance, or whatever you do. It’s a public good we all benefit from. Well, that public good is made possible to you by the work of music artisans who are tapping into and restocking that aether for everyone’s benefit.
Through the piano, I am communicating all of my thoughts, the hard to express feelings, I am giving the energy I have inside of me into the instrument and thus through the disturbance of air molecules that translates into sound that when interacting with your ear.drum gets perceived by your brain and thus a conversation and communion with a human is born.
And then,
When that music ends, so too does that communion.
All that’s left is your memory of that idea.
For me, the heavy burden of my thoughts is lifted,
I am relieved.
