The soundtrack of my life

I love how that favorite song makes me feel. You know the one. We all do. Although our favorite songs might be very different we all have them, kind of like those other little things called feelings. No wonder  music and feelings have become a synonymous concept, because it makes us feel the things even when we don’t want to feel them. For me music has held a special place in my heart for most of my life. Being a child that was always highly emotional, anxiety ridden (or just dramatic as my mother and maybe yours too put it), teased a fair amount for being overweight and a little weird during those school aged years, music was the brave friend I needed that expressed the things I wished I could verbalize.

   There were the Paramore songs and Ashley Simpson’s “Autobiography” that made me feel punk and sassy when I was really just shy and nervous. Beyoncé for when I felt like I wanted to take over the world and all the boys as my best Sasha Fierce and Coldplay for when I just didn’t understand it all.   Its even sometimes how I relate to space and time, I can’t always remember what age I was or where I was when the event took place, but I do remember the song that helped me feel through it. Sometimes I can listen to that one song and be transported right back to that place in time complete with all the dreadful feelings.  Not having properly dealt with those feelings, overtime id feel so much that it made me afraid to listen to those sad songs that at one time I identified with because I didn’t want to feel those feeling again. I didn’t want to remember how hurt, angry, sad, disappointed, disregarded or used I had been made to feel during the different times in my life. I wanted to leave the sad stuff and the songs associated with them where they were, way, way WAY in the past. Looked away in a closet to the left like my girl Bey said it should be.

        But I started to realize something, there was a small shift and I slowly started to make peace with the scary things. During meditation I would find the craziest things would pop into my mind, things from the deep recesses of your brain that make you go “where did that come from?,” at first I would just let them pass by, the whole cloud thing just like I was taught. Then when they’d randomly show up again I  worked to stop them instead of letting them float by I wanted to stop and gaze. To really ask “Why are you here?”. A careful examination like the scientist who stands and stares at the complicated equation on a chalkboard. This is of course is the most beneficial part of meditation not only does it allow you to actually see your thoughts, but it helps to illuminate what’s really the loudest even when you didn’t know that it was screaming inside of you.

     As I began to make peace with the scary things and all the past hurts I noticed that although there was sadness in the songs there was beauty there too. Just like the events from our past although we were hurt then we are stronger for it now. I started to feel that it was ok that I was once broken or at least for all the many reasons I  thought I was because in the brokenness I was able to start to see all the pieces of myself and put them back together in my own image. Now when I listen to the songs that marked the moments in my life I take it as a time to stop and reflect on how much I’ve grown, a clear progression of all the feelings that lead me to be the woman I am today. Still a little nervous at times but totally ok with my awesome weirdness. Taking over the world in my own special way but still Sasha Fierce as hell.  And no longer trying so hard to understand the world all at once just trying to be the best me while I’m in it. 

I say all this to say sometimes when the scary things come up, those past events that are seemingly too dark to look at yet little triggers like songs, smells or sounds bring us back and even take us down. Its okay to want to look away but then eventually we must turn around look, we must examine the complex feelings that keep us from really feeling. Make peace with you past. Rewrite the story. Conquer your villains,  make yourself the hero of your movie and live to love the soundtrack of your life.