Why I will persevere as a visionary

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I’m currently reading the first chapter of a great book called The boss of you… written by two brave women.  And they challenged me to really think about the why behind what I want to pursue.  So here’s the why behind it.

1.         For those who love creativity.  I’m creative.  I believe we can be that and be different.  We are people with conviction, faith, love and want to soak up the world around us.  But we’ve been told to tell ourselves no, believing there wasn’t an arena for us as people of faith and artists.  I’m here to tell you I will not believe that lie anymore and neither should you.

2.         I believe in the future, in the artists, the musicians and those who have worked really hard at their craft, despite math and science brains saying what they have is more important to offer.  Because if one is more important than the other, then why are the doctors buying tickets to our shows and unwind after a surgery by listening to some enchanting melody from our contribution to society?  In a world of negativity and increasing ills, hope is needed through the arts.  I believe that so much good and blessings can come from what music can offer.  And I believe that I can contribute to that.

3.         I want to be able to write songs and share them for a living and create a listening experience that is unparalleled and exciting.  I want creative venues for shows that have so often been forced into a narrow idea of what a venue is.

4.         I want to use my music to fuel goodwill and do good things in the world around me.  I want to write songs that give people hope and stir them onto good works and to look to a greater home after they die.  I want to bring people to an appreciation for life, God and a healthy hereafter.

5.         Money will not be the goal, nor will fame.  I will welcome the blessings and use them as I think God would have me do, but I do not want the goal other than supporting, saving and giving back.  And my goal is to be able to have health insurance and feed myself and others in the future all because I work hard at honing my craft of songwriting and performing.  I will be the Barnabas in a world of excuses and failings.  I will encourage the people I meet every day.

6.         I want to show people that someone who wants to do what’s right can be successful in a difficult industry by paving her own path.  Someday I hope to help others find their way of making a difference around them.

7.         I want to tour, make friends all around the world and have countless stories from a life well lived.

8.         I will not be average…. I will live awesomely through the talents I have been given and through the God who gave each of them to me.  And I will restore them to him, rusty and worn and say “thank you for these gifts- they are loved and worn and my hands are tired and my mind is ready to be at rest forevermore.”

Live the life you’ve imagined…

love,

~lme

Let me know how you can relate!

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Muriel’s museum

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Photo Courtesy:  Archive of North Carolina

She whispered in my ear

Welcome in

To something you must simply see

People in a people gallery….

 

Perhaps we are all just

traveling exhibits

with a plaque

beneath our feet

telling the reader

of all that our eyes have seen

 

Those who have been joined in marriage

off to the right

and in the great hall

are the lovers of the night

those who never find it

a gallery of shattered hearts

what pains each of them

now to everyone is art

 

Far less dirty

once we’re framed

and behind glass

to be analyzed now

and lumped together

with the mass

again and again

In perfect temperature

set to preserve us

as we once were

though the lights are too revealing

of all our faults you’ve heard

 

Chorus:

On display

for all your eyes

raw and exposed

love led them home

But love was our demise.

~lme

 

 

Immersion

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Photo courtesy: Field Museum

I read this on Seth Godin’s blog recently.  

Immersed.  It can change you.

If you aren’t following him and getting his updates, you are missing out.  I don’t think we realize how true this immersion concept actually is.  Take a person for example. We can’t truly know them until we have worked really hard to tear down any pre-conceived notions we have about them or what he have heard.  We won’t be able to love and care and help until we get our hands a little dirty.  We also can’t truly benefit from a situation, a career endeavor or striving for a goal unless we are able to really work on it, dedicating time to fulfilling it.  Do we immerse ourselves in God and the spiritual aspect of our lives?  Or do we just run in the sprinkler, getting ourselves just a little refreshed?  Immersion requires conquering fear.  Immersion requires a commitment.  And immersion will require pushing ourselves when we don’t “feel” like it.  We must ride the waves, hold on in the storms and reassess who we are and where we stand in relation to God.  

And sometimes, the first jump may be the hardest step we have to take.

May your week be profitable and blessed 🙂

love,

lme

Free things are good things

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Photo Courtesy of this flickr photostream

Things I love that cost me nothing:

Observing a beautiful moon in Nashville

Hearing the spring breeze rustle through tree leaves… knowing that God is present.

Laughing hard with great friends

A random stranger’s smile

The promise of future opportunities and friendships and memories to come.

Singing to my favorite songs in the car while keeping the beat and dancing from the waist up.

The peace I feel despite not being able to control every aspect of my life- a peace that passes understanding

The blessing to have people who are cheering me on in my goals

Singing, hearing, playing, loving music

A feeling of gratitude and contentment of my life today.

What are some of your favorite blessings that cost nothing monetarily speaking?

~lme

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The person you become

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Photo Courtesy: photostream Center for Jewish History

Things that will affect you and who you become… so choose them carefully:

  1. Friends.  Whoever they are, your companions will shape your thoughts, your perspective of the world around you and the direction you head in life.  To think that you will always be able to affect the negatives for good without ever surrounding yourself with some uplifting characters is foolish.  You need to pour good things into your soul as you go out to others and try to encourage them for good.  If the largest portion of your friends are not going the same direction as you…. Is it wise to believe that you will get where you would ultimately like to go?
  2. Your career.  Now, this is a sensitive one, especially to me.  I believe there can be good and ill in any career you choose, but you may have more control than you think.  It is interesting to me that people seem to single out the creative worlds as being worldly when no one is ok with saying that a doctor who works to the neglect of his family or someone who lets a pursuit of anything choke out their spiritual health is not hurting themselves too.  So before you decide what you will do- whatever it be- think about how you can use it as your ministry for good and service.  What about you and your talents lend themselves to being really great in that market or in that workplace?  How can use them show light to the world in any way?
  3. Your go-to places.  Where you go defines who you are.   Where are your hobby hangouts, your settings, your spheres of influence?  They tell a lot about you.  From to gyms to venues to service organizations, people will learn a lot about you from where you frequent.  Are you a healthy eater, a big coffee drinker, a late night snacker?  These choices will be evident by your hangouts and your credit card bill.  That being said, take a moment to think about how the places you go affect your life, your decisions, whether you are uplifted because of them or they are pulling you away from good and God?  For me, I have to carefully consider the places I hang out in regards to my music to determine whether they are keeping me walking the line or whether they are helping me drift a little farther away from where I should be.

Let’s all spend time carefully considering whether our choices are manifesting the good that resides in us or whether we don’t give much thought to them at all.  Walk circumspectly… and go about your day doing good to all. 🙂

Love you,

leah

Follow a Leader or Lead a following… just move

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Photo Courtesy: This flickr Stream

While reading Ross Hudgins’s blog today, I came across this statement….

“Leaders should understand the power of team, and the weakness of individualism. Communicating individualism divides team, and is a bad choice for any grammatical situation that would be better fit for “we.”

I’ve been struck recently by the difficulty of leading and having to really stick your neck out and stand for something, accept conflict at times and plow through things that aren’t often enjoyable at the moment.  I think we either yearn to follow effective leaders or to be effective leaders ourselves.  For those of us who see problems in the world at large, we want to lead some kind of effective change that has lasting impression in the minds and hearts of those who have followed us.  I believe there are four pitfalls that most leaders face.

  1. They really want people to like them and they choose to avoid conflict.  This just is not possible.  You will undoubtedly always make someone unhappy.  Trying to please each and every person will get you nowhere as a leader.
  2. They allow criticism or praise to affect them strongly.  Some people want to gripe and when you are trying to do what you can, a complainer instead of an active participant is more of a dead weight as a leader.  But on the flip side, basking in your previous accomplishments will only cause you to ferment in yourself after so long until you get the label stamped on you of “washed up.”  You should never be this- you should always be swimming onto bigger and better things.
  3. They get so focused on a goal that they forget the purpose of the goal in the first place, and when a new strategy is needed, they cannot adjust.  Leaders must remember that flexibility is highly important throughout the process.  You will have a goal in mind, but it will change and develop over time.  A leader must remember to not forget some aspects of a project will come easily and others will need work.  But you must always remember to step back and assess whether the original big picture problem or issue is being addressed.
  4. Poor communication skills.  If you want people to understand your perspective or your vision, you will have a hard time converting them if you can’t properly communicate it.  It may take work at times, but listening to others’ views and trying to really see what they are seeing is imperative for a successful leader.  You can not lead people you know very little about.  People want to be accepted and understood. If they feel this need is being met, they will align themselves with a group of people.

Preten-lightenment

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Photo Courtesy: Swedish Archives

Self is so inclined to speak

Self is not to be

 

Everything you want takes the crown

and the others learn their patience now

 

Fish within your only well

But you will ferment in yourself

 

Real is what you say you’ve seen

You claim that real comes from only me

 

Truth and secrets can’t coexist

Real love unravels loneliness

 

Standing high above a precipice

But what lies below me is not goldenness.

~lme

The Well Wishing

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Photo Courtesy: SDASM Archives photo stream

People carry sorrows

like chains around their feet

so carry your brother

when the water gets too deep

Wherever you end up

Just step on outside yourself

Let your word be a promise

Let your love be deep as a well

Chorus:

Into the forests

Out of the past

Running through the trials

Clutching the mast

The darkness may trail

the light of this tune

But someday I’ll make a promise

Beneath a summer moon

All words have two meanings

That get turned in the toss

I don’t understand it

But love suffers long

I’ve seen vice and virtue

From all to old

No matter the substance

It poisons the soul

Chorus:

Into the forests

Out of the past

Running through the trials

Clutching the mast

The darkness may trail

the light of this tune

But someday I’ll make a promise

Beneath a summer moon

Music wafts through us

Like spirits in this realm

Truth becomes us

Once it has been found

Hymns and thistles

Tied up with a bow

Wherever this road carries us

Few will come to know

~lme

The great divide

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Photo courtesy: OSU flickr photostream

Hear the whisper of the dogwoods

Like they could hardly wait

The lust of open roads

Spread out before us

Like a patchwork sheet

Our future was not certain

In the binding of a storybook

You can’t see everything

 

Chorus:

We will follow

the Oregon moon

That will welcome us in

I can taste the halo

Shoulder to shoulder with my kin

You and I will falter

But we’ll see the other side

I was once a pioneer

Crossing the great divide

 

Hey sweet baby

I don’t mind if you grab my hand

Secrets pass between us

As we ride across this land

Across a prairie backdrop

Floating wagon sails

We can only find the heaven

If we pass through this earthly hell

 

Over the horizon

Lies the promise of much more

Bluebonnets bow their heads

In a Western swinging door

The dust settles where it may

On the hearts of those who say no

Birds learn to use their wings

and we were bound to go

Bridge

our belongings packed up so tight

bouncing round and out of sight

the days, the nights

the fireglow

tales to keep us entertained

of gold that could be attained

the days, the nights

Let us reap, let us sow

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Self-indulged and sick with it

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“The self-indulgent man craves for all pleasant things… and is led by his appetite to choose these at the cost of everything else.”
― Aristotle, The Nicomachean Ethics

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Photo Courtesy:  George Eastman house photostream

We are self-indulged.  And we’ve never truly known poverty or hunger or bitter cold.  Much as we’d like to deny it, there isn’t much we can’t have right at our fingertips at any given point and with the right amount of money.  And if we are forced to “wait,” we become quite impatient and angered at the situation.  Believing we are self-made men and women, we have slowly drifted into a mindset that we really have no need for God.  Why depend on someone when we believe we can do it alone?  We are self-sufficient and have no desire for anyone telling us what to do or how to live our lives. Sadly, this quote by Aristotle rings true in the world of musicians.  Therefore- a picture of a self-sick society…

Life was good there.  And in this prosperous society, there was a sect of people.  They were called musicians and they lived in their own separate world, believing no one understood them.  They were continually busy with distraction, every form of media on which to plug themselves and their talents.  Their pursuits and fever for fame flooded the bulk of their thinking, acting and discussion in the community.  While those in the worlds of ancient Greece and Rome worshipped physical idols, the musicians had no need for these.  The idols were rampant in their hearts- held up daily as they bowed mentally to them both day and night.  They could have been faulted had it been completely their doing.  Rather, they were products of their society to some extent.  They were put on stages, high above the crowds.  Looking down on others always helped one to feel loftier than the others below.  The observers would scream and chant praises.  Others would grab at their legs, longing for one touch.  And still others would emulate their style and strive to meet them backstage. 

It was innately human, though.  Like all beings, they had a need for association and to become a part of something bigger than themselves.  In the music industry, they had found something to fill the void.  God had made them with this need for acceptance and to connect with something grander in scale.  But this desperate need for association had become misdirected somewhere and was funneled toward a people, performance and things.  The musicians were sadly warped in their thinking.  They knew that the world did not revolve around them, but somehow, they had been led to believe that it did by a self-sick society.

Moral to the story:

As musicians, we must work to not become saturated with ourselves.  What is continually in our thoughts?  That is what we are serving.  We often say daily that we are “pursuing” something.  Our truest pursuit should be toward the ultimate Creator and then whatever goals we work toward are merely just honing our skills and talents in this and that area.  It would take an immense pressure off of ourselves if we let go of the thoughts that we had to prove ourselves to the world, become well-liked by everyone (which is a total joke) and that success in music was only measured in terms of dollars or facebook fans.

No wonder musicians have such a warped view of themselves.  We commoners treat them as gods.  But what if we treated musicians and the actual process of making a living at music as less-dreamy and as something that required hard work just like an architect or a teacher or a dolphin trainer.   If we put jobs on respectable, even playing fields and believed that everyone should use their talents to better the world at large, we might not see the arts as being so lofty.  If we viewed it as a normal career path that one might pursue- and not some lottery, one-in-a-million chance to make you a big star- then society might begin to view musicians in a healthier light.  My feeling is that as musicians, our business models should begin to include more service and a change of heart toward fans and a respectful kindness toward all we come in contact with.  I’m not sure how start this change on a larger level, but I welcome ideas in the comment section below.  Feel free to leave comments and thoughts!

Enjoy your Tuesday!

~lme

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