Part I: The Gift Acknowledgment
I have been having tough weeks, since the beginning of me joining my company till today. Every now and then I look at my electric guitar, bass guitar, my classical acoustic, the effect pedals, my keyboard... and every day I am depressed to think I can only play them full time when I leave the profession of mainstream work and commit to a full time work as a musician/producer.
Every Friday night, I remembered going back home feeling extremely unhappy, because I remembered the days when I could play music all Friday long, and jamming the way. Sometimes, I remembered the awkwardness to play those tunes as I tried nowadays, because all I could hear is a single instrument playing, whichever it was. And many times, I almost drown myself in tears thinking that I couldn't do it in a community that I felt I could relate to, and share my passion of doing it for God.
On recent notes, I thought of playing music alone, writing songs myself and tried to dictate myself to have a disciplined life of maintaining work and my music. I tried in vain as well to continue the passion of listening some songs that I really hope to be able to produce it live, on stage. Just like how I did back then when I was in my university years. During those days, I could jam every day, forgetting school and life, and just jam - because I have a bunch of friends who shared my passions for music.
Now, when I think about that life I lived, I somehow felt nostalgic, yet regretful. I left that band because of their insistence to do music the mainstream way: sex and rock 'n roll. I have struggles with sexual immorality, and I needed a strong time out to get away, and focus on music for what's worth. And in that decision, I have to choose the lonelier road to recovery. Which often fails.
Every Friday night, I look at the first song that I wrote at length, and I couldn't help crying over the tune. The raw tune of desolation and agony. The need to be heard and the need want to share this burden with someone, who would even care about my pain of idleness and lonely struggle.
I looked at my song 'Epiphany of Misery' with some guilt and shame, because that was written at the height of my depression over life. Suicidal tendencies are prominent because I need so much to be heard, whoever it is. At that time, God is in my mind but not to the sense of comfortable sharing with Him my struggles. And when I tried to rewrite the song, I cannot help but felt jaded and often depressed about recollecting the passion of writing that song with intense shame about life.
I will not say what the song is about, because I intend to release the song on the blog when I have the time to write, but I wish that one day, even if I were to die anytime soon, I will end my life with that song.
But...
Whenever I think about writing songs, I felt extreme regretful and ashamed. I am not able to write songs that give hope. I seemed to be perpetually lost in my own world, forgetting about God's immense grace on my life. How, in the first place, my ability to randomly play music was actually a gift from God, not my own self-induced hallucination or possession.
I remembered the first time I am able to play piano. It was in my third year, in the midst of a depression. I completed my song 'Epiphany of Misery', and at one point of my life, I decide to randomly think about life and start to play around chords to relate my life. I passed through the piano lounge near my hostel, and decide to try something. Honestly, I was just expecting simple chord plays.
That chord plays ended up being a tune of what I later remembered as the tune of 'Nothing Else Matters' by Metallica. And I did improvisations the way I never expect myself to do. All within my first time.
The pleasure of playing is immense, and I remembered skipping my lecture just playing plenty tunes along the way. 'Wake Me Up When September Comes' by Green Day, 'Pieces' by Sum 41, 'Closing Time' by Semisonic, 'In The End' by Linkin Park... the tunes just went off. And I did a few of own improvisation on that piano.
It was monumental. I knew that I could never do it if I thought consciously how to play piano. It was in my semi-consciousness that I am able to play. And that semi-consciousness nowadays have become the consciousness in me. And I start to learn how to play more improvisations in different keys, and I am greatly thankful that I could it just by listening.
And it is in all these that I reminded myself that these were the gift of God, not of men. My ability to play songs, to write a little, and to play instruments I could never imagine... I am very humbled to think that God has never given up on me, despite my often giving up on myself.
Part II: The Temptation, Escaping...
To be frank, I am not a strong willed person. It probably come through from my extreme emotional characteristics. I get very happy and sad easily, and I swing in between the emotions in the split seconds if I have to. There hence, whenever a decision is made, it may change as time goes, especially when difficult circumstances arise.
I remembered the reason why I couldn't do music was because of my commitment in work. In my current work place, it is difficult to maintain the 9 to 5 work mentality. Sure, technically I should be so, but because of the workload I have been having on recent notes, it has been difficult to maintain that culture. Often time, I went back home tired and still thinking about my work, and tried to plan in my mind what to do at work the next day. Maintaining a dichotomy between work and life is difficult for me, especially when it became an integral part of who I am. I am not exactly interested in my work but I am enjoying some of the incentives there which indirectly feeds to my interest: I am doing home theater products. So I will be able to get, ultimately, good deals on home theaters. I already have a few of them at home, in which I am enjoying with through listening to various music and even playing my music through them. Which I think, is a sad thing.
I often tell myself that I should not maintain this kind of rhythm too long, so I decide that after my current project (which will end on early January, if the project runs smoothly), I will take a month break for my leg to heal (the ingrown nails had hurt the flesh of my thumb that it is important to do a cleansing of the fungus infection inside the toe nail. Gross stuff). In that time, I will look for a better job offer. Probably higher pay and lesser commitment.
But...
Every week, especially on a Friday night and sometimes the whole Saturday - I would lament of this kind of lifestyle, the rhythm that's very monotonous - and I got back home slightly late (8 pm), with a tired physical body to maintain. I jogged 2-3 times a week, but not enough to keep my body in check for long hours. I sleep early because I don't want to dwell into too much emotional jargon on the disappointments in not able to play music freely as how I want to be. I tried jamming occasionally with people who loved music, but somehow I couldn't bring myself to love the way they did (I saw their love for music as a form of escapades). And the only time I think I would feel great about playing music was when I am able to finish writing songs for someone who I knew both shared the passion for writing extremely deep and well intended music. And that, till this day has never happened in my life.
A good friend suggested to be content with life the way it is, and learn to take one thing at a time. Sometimes I found that to be mockery of my intelligence. One step at a time? Look at where I am. Yeah, I am taking one thing at a time, and every week I am very disappointed with holding up myself in a house with my own sanity to deal with. I could only dabble in pornography as a mean to ease myself from the pain of disappointment in life and pain and hurt. Of course, various other reasons, such as hungering for a lifetime partner - also motivated me into seeking false intimacy through pornography, but I do want to suggest that my disappointment in not able to play music enjoyably is also a main catalyst.
Part III: The Slow Recovery
The recent Friday was a not an eventful Friday. I woke up slightly later in the morning trying to read up Philip Yancey's 'The Jesus I Never Knew', and my mind was still reeling over the stuff that I did on the keyboard the day before. It was the melodrama 'Epiphany of Misery' on my keyboard attuned to 'Grand Piano' sound. Playing that song reminded me of the emotions I had while writing, and the agony of my not being able to do something for the world is sometimes quite saddening. I read about a chapter in that book on how God actually restrained Himself into a tiny baby in a place that was obviously quite unpleasant and dirty - a humility to reach to this level. And I often look at times when I wanted to rise up to the occasion, being known as a person who is philanthropist, and constantly actively doing something in the name of the Father who has saved me through the cross. And when I read about the story of Jesus' descend into our planet Earth to reach out for mankind to love Him, I often cannot come to terms with these two notions. I ambitiously aimed high to be known as a philanthropist in the name of a God who actually descend into mankind, and to the least of all, and would not openly acknowledge His supremacy until at the end of the day when He was hung on the cross. And even in that acknowledgment of supremacy, He was not spared to be treated as a criminal. What an irony.
Because I couldn't come to terms with these two extremism, I often tried to put myself away from these thoughts and just pick up something to distract me. I took music, but it reminded me of my pain and hurt of not being able to play music the way I wanted. So I decided to catch up stuff on Facebook (knowing that I am not the type who would be so hyped about these new generations' social networking devices) - and saw several ex-band mates doing so well in their dream pursuit. My ex-band is going to Japan for the Asian Beat final this year. My roommate won the Suntec Dance finals and now preparing for the month-length trip to Korea to dance for worldly renown modern dance troupe. A few of my other ex-band mates were studying music in overseas, and some were doing some occasional Youtube uploads on their covers.
Those were painful things for me to watch. That's why I hated Facebook. It reminded me of my inability to do something against my crippled mentality. It was sad and I had no choice but to ease the pain through mental stimulation.
Into the night, my cell group leader actually invited me over for a PS3 playing, and I actually felt glad that he actually took me seriously when I told him how weak I am every Friday night and Saturday. So, when I reached there, I am introduced with a few of his friends, and we played soccer console game.
I am very encouraged to know I have such a nice cell group leader. I remembered when I played console games at a younger age, I always got scoldings and humiliations from friends and even my parents. I am not good with card games either, so whenever I play social bridge with my friends in university years, they will try to not to call me as their partner. So when my cell group leader actually encouraged me to tell me what I should do and also tell me what he found that is of strength in me, it was a miraculous feat for me to be able to catch up playing a game I have never played before. I was quite emotionally affected by his genuine concern for me.
I saw an acoustic guitar there across the living room of his house, and I decide to play a bit stuff there. And strange - it has been a while, but I am able to simply play anything on the guitar without feeling any restrains. I just played blues, rock, metal, jazz, pop, ballads on the single guitar as if I own the guitar, and my cell group leader just let me do what I like on it. And it was through playing the guitar that I am able to get to know another friend of my cell group leader who happened to got interested in my guitar playing. He invited me to his house warming next time and decide to have a moment of me playing guitar with him - just to have fun.
I just suddenly feel that perhaps, music is meant to be enjoyed in this manner, not in a 'noble' sense, like how I envisioned it earlier in my life.
Part IV: Reminder of Servitude
I think, generally, we are given gifts in our lives. And I do believe that we all are given different traits for different reasons. I cling to believe, although with doubts at times, that these gift are given because God knows where we will be put in the situations in our lives. When I was younger, I have not a clue of my inclinations in artistic endeavors. I only know how to study physics, maths, engineering, language - but apparently it seemed that in the everyday of my life, I was meant to be just doing my best in the situation I was given. When I got older, my tendencies to know more than just those physics caught my attention - and the apparent interest in music got hold of me since. Since then, I took up music through various sources in less than a decade, and I have not found a moment to give up the journey since.
Nevertheless, I acknowledge that I don't know what is God's purpose in me through music. I know it is God-given, but I don't know if my current life is God-directed. Many aspects of my life seemed to be inclined on selfish living - to pay loan, debts, for my parents' pocket money, insurances - and it seemed like I have little for myself. So if my current stable life is already stretching to its limit, how about when I do music full time? And I thought about if it is worth it to do sound engineering from the start - should I go for classes? But it is not cheap, and I am not sure how much of those lessons actually help. I look at the profile of many prolific producers - they learn more through life around them, rather than strictly adhering to the syllabuses in school. And I am stifled to think how much my limitations of not being able to play music as freely as I want because of all these things at the back of my head.
Towards the end of Saturday, I watched the movie "Ratatouille" by Brad Bird of PIXAR studio. I caught myself in tears when at the end, the food critic Anton Ego let down his gauntlet to realize of his role of being a critic without considering the effort of the artist of the food. The critic mentioned that it was out of sensational instinct that food critic often liked to pass pessimism on certain art simply because of the fame that would be garnered there after. But when the critic realized on the recent food that he had tasted was made by a rat, his preconception of an artist being merely impressive broke down. In the end, he was humbled to realize the ordeal of a rat and how he came to cook and serve dishes that were considered the best of France delicacies - and in his notion, "I begin to understand Gustaeu's remark on 'Anybody can cook' clearer - not everyone can be the great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere'". He was humbled by his past pessimism on Gustaeu after realizing that this rat, Remy, actually defied any odds of being a chef, and his passion to cook the finest dishes out of a very humble dish (called Ratatouille - it is actually a peasant dish in France) - and on top of all, risked himself to coerce with human to cook - tugged into the heart-string of Anton Ego.
I caught myself in tears because often not I don't think the way Ego realized in the end. I wanted a very good stage for performance, I wanted popularity and gain ownership in life as a rockstar or a sessionist. I wanted to be known as a philanthropist and the best lyricist and bassist in the music scene. I wanted attention. I wanted it done the right way. But I often forget that God doesn't work in that way when He descended into humanity. He humbled himself to live among the people He loved. His passion was humanity's redemption, and in the end He risk His position as a deity to descend as a human being. That very act of humility deserved to be reminded.
Of course, much of the show 'Ratatouille' is very humanistic and addresses the struggles of Remy the rat chef. After all, the director wants to remind us of the fallacy of us humans. The show did portray many parts of the many casts inside that were quite realistically human struggles. But the point at the end of the movie was remarkably directed towards humility and acknowledgment of gift that was given and the effort to realize it.
I looked my music gift this morning, with new light. I want to play music so much, but I need to withhold the passion with a different light. I don't know where I should be led here after, but I do hope that I am able to play the music that God desired me to be. And that, first of all, means waiting for the right moment. And that waiting has to be of a patient endeavors. Perhaps one day, I would be playing music actively, but perhaps it may never happen. But if I am willing to be humble enough to just do music the way it should be - simply enjoyable - perhaps something may come out from there.
Perhaps. Who knows.
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