Who I can be, Who I might be, Who I am now

One of the things that has been flitting around in my very cluttered mind is the paradox of mental states that befalls a musician. On one hand, we must constantly criticize ourselves and our work to become better musicians and teachers, and this constant self-analysis is what propels our progress and growth. However, when can we know that we are good enough? It's a parallel with our personal life- are we ever done changing and readjusting as people? I suppose not- if there's ever a time when I'm not learning and changing, then I will have arrived as a stagnant product. At the same time, how rarely we allow ourselves the opportunity to say "I am good enough, in this moment, because it's how I am." Our goal as musicians is theoretically the pursuit of perfection, the unreachable. One of my friends put up this quote, which I find quite relevant:

"The thing that is really hard, and really amazing, is giving up on being perfect and beginning the work of becoming yourself." - Anna Quindlen

When should we give up on this perfection that we so earnestly seek? When do we ever accept the way things are? Rarely, at least in my personal experience. I find myself in a constant struggle between success and failure, between confidence and tears, between weakness and the ego. Every day, I'm in a different phase of this cycle- some days I love myself, other days, I want to stay in bed and burn my viola. And yet, I can't give it up. It is the paradox by which I live, each day.

Small Things

I was behind a car today with a bumper sticker that said,

" if you don't trust a woman with a choice, why would you trust her to raise a child?"

That made me chuckle.

I also discovered that the Midol package has a warning that says

"Ask a doctor if you have difficulty urinating due to an enlarged prostate." YES.

The Body Electric

So I opened the infamous Eckhart Tolle book, "The Power of Now." I've read snippets of Tolle, but I concluded a while back that it was watered down Buddhism for the Oprah evangelist crowd. That doesn't mean it's bad, by any means, but just that I could acquire similar information from other sources. Anyway, I was feeling spiritually needy this morning, after a highly mediocre Wednesday (tummy troubles, head ache, highly mediocre studio class performance) so I picked up this book (along with my slew of trashy but fun sookie stackhouse mysteries). I just opened it to a rather pertinent page in the jucispeak realm, so i thought i'd bring it up for discourse.
Transformation through the body
Why have religions condemned or denied the body? It seems that spiritual seekers have always regarded the body as a hindrance or even as sinful.

"On the level of the body, humans are very close to animals. All the basic bodily functions- pleasure, pain, breathing, eating drinking, defecating, sleeping, procreation...we share with animals. Humans woke up in what seemed to be an animal body-and they found this very disturbing...Unconscious denial of their animal nature set in very quickly. The threat that they might be taken over by powerful instinctual drives and revert back to complete unconsciousness was indeed a very real one. Shame and taboos appeared around certain parts of the body and bodily functions, especially sexuality. The light of their consciousness was not yet strong enough to make friends with their animal nature, to allow it to BE and even enjoy that aspect of themselves...They now saw themselves as having a body, rather than just being it.

The fact is that no one has ever become enlightened through denying or fighting the body...Although such an experience can be fascinating and can give you a glimpse of the state of liberation from the material form...you will always have to return to the body, where the essential work of transformation takes place. Transformation is THROUGH the body, not away from it."

Fascinating, isn't it? That so many cultures struggle to drown the existence of a feminine body in cloth, or to pretend that a woman's wobbly bits are not what makes her divine. While the body is impermanent, evanescent, always changing, the body "conceals the splendor of your essential and immortal reality." Whoah! I like that. When you fight against your body, you fight reality. "The body that you see and touch is only a thin illusory veil. Underneath it lies the invisible inner body, the doorway into Being, into Life." Now, I'm not going to advocate the moderately pretentious language Tolle uses sometimes, but on this note, we agree. So much of our culture, our religion, denies the true essence of our bodies: aging, pain, injury. We focus all of bodily love on what makes us better than other people, or worse, rather than valuing it as the manifestation of the divine, whatever that may be. It's like when you see a beautiful old woman with silver hair in a bun- she can't hide her age, and she doesn't want to. Age is beautiful. Or a child with tiny hands and gaps in their mouths from lost teeth. We are creatures still, and we constantly deny it. Truths are hidden in the folds of our skin, in the space between our teeth, in the deep caverns of our ears. Are we here to observe them?

Leaving

I'm driving to Boston today for a moderately humorous audition tomorrow for Yellow Barn, which I'm 95% sure I won't get into, but I'm trying to be optimistic about it being a "positive performance experience." In other words, I'm bullshitting. I'm also trying not to stress out too much, since being stressed has:
1) Made me lose my appetite and my ability to process food.
2) Made me tired all of the time, even after 8-9 hours of sleep.
3) Made me grumpy.
Hopefully, this weekend will diffuse my stress, or at least 6 hours in a car will do that? We'll see. In other news, I'm happy to see some friends in Boston, like Julia! And spend some time with her roomies, and be immersed in the liberal feminist mormon experience. So yes, this will eventually be a good trip, once I chill the f*ck out. (And why won't Itunes open? I haven't been able to open it for a week, which is unfortunate, and I can't update my phone or listen to Contra, except in the car. Suggestions appreciated.)

Watch out

If you watch this video too carefully, or more than once, you will lose it.

That being said, say to yourself that you're glad you don't do drugs.

Personality Stereotypes on facebook

I saw this funny piece from the LA Times that pretty much summarizes all of my facebook gawking.
In other news, I'm proud to have not used farmville, the ultimate facebook game villain, in 5 weeks, ever since I went to california and only had dial-up internet, making my animated farm null.

Proof the white boy can't dance

I often have major crushes on the indie/alternative/other bands...grizzly bear, decemberists, vampire weekend...but this video is absolute proof that my favorite paul simon stylized band singer (graceland era) simply can't dance like everyone else in this video. And it's kind of a amazing. Here is ezra koening soloing with "The very best" and his vocals sound terrific, but man, he doesn't hold a candle to the band's booty shaking. But I manage to love him anyway, even if he is wearing a plaid shirt over a striped or plaid shirt. Too bad he doesn't wear glasses.

In other news, there's a great quote from pitchfork: ""I just love the Grizzly Bear. That project was great. It sounds like these church cathedral chords-- it's just sick what they're doing."
-- Jay-Z, sounding more and more like somebody's cool grandpa every day. The Grizzly Bear!"
I wish grizzly bear would take the hint and make a super sweet collaboration with THE Jay-z. ok? Because that could be awesome.