Thursday, September 18, 2014

Cloud Cult

I've been in such a rut with my blog.  And in my life.

After I started writing and found that it was therapeutic for me, I couldn't stop.  Some weeks I was posting 3 times.  I had so much to say and I was elated to have an outlet.  I realized that I have a continual stream of thoughts in my head.  In fact, blogging has revealed to me just how much I live inside my head.  I feel things deeply.  I analyze stuff I'm not sure most other people have ever considered.  I ask questions maybe I shouldn't ask.  I doubt things that have been an integral part of who I am since I can remember.  So blogging was awesome at first.  It was a healthy channel for at least SOME of what swims around in my head.

But I have felt afraid to be totally honest.  I've been scared to talk about who I really am and what I truly think.  I wonder...who is reading this?  What will they think of me?  What do THEY want to hear?  Am I boring everyone who started reading?  Is this another failure of mine?  Does it even matter if people are reading this or what they think of me?  Who is this FOR anyway?

I went to a concert with my husband a few days ago.  The band is called Cloud Cult.  I was moved.  I realize how extremely trite this will sound, but that concert changed me.  Or at least it has given me a renewed desire to share what is in my heart.  Who I am.  What I think about.  How I deal with my struggles and joys.  The lead singer/songwriter of this band has a way with words that gets straight to the raw emotions I have felt as a human being trying to survive just the day to day living of life.  I've always enjoyed his songs and lyrics, but being in the small venue where they played, 15 feet away from him and his guitar, watching his face, feeling the words...I sound crazy, I know, but it moved me.  I cried.  I feel like a crazy person.  It's because he was staying stuff like this:

If you pray to God for rain, 
don't you complain about the lightning. 
If you're asking for directions, 
don't you moan about the distance. 
Must you lose it, lose it all? 
To find your appreciation. 

If you rid of all your baggage you will likely float away. 
But you can't know beauty if you don't know pain 
Gotta feel it, feel it all. 
There's your medication 

You know you are as small as the things you let annoy you. 
And you know you are gigantic as the things that you adore. 
Some days you give thanks. 
Some days you give the finger. 
It's a complicated creation. 

And this:

You don't hear your intuition, cuz it says you ain't no follower. 
And it says you ain't no yellow belly. 
And it says you ain't no broken horse. 
And it says you are here to take the punches, in one by one. 
You're here to learn your lessons one by one. 
You're here to peel your layers off one by one 
by one by one by one by one. 

You don't hear your intuition, cuz it says you were blessed with sensitivity. 
But it says you can't fly with such a heavy heart. 
So it says you gotta do what must be done, so learn to do it with some levity, levity. 

You are here to let the cards fall one by one. 
You're here to let your walls down one by one. 
You're here to peel the layers off one by one by one by one by one by one. 

If you keep trying to fill your holes with the next best thing 
well, then the next best thing will give you more and more holes.

And this:

Life is a playground, but it takes a lot work. 
You better learn to love, or it'll tear you apart, 
cuz in the end, we are measured by the size of our heart, 
and we can't do this alone. 

Some of us are laughing, while some of us are choking 
Some of us can't change til every bone has been broken. 
All the while the maker just sits there joking, "You never really were alone." 

All I need is a good good friend 
To get me through this. 
All I need is a good good friend 
To help me out 
When I'm burning down 
When I'm all stressed out 
Thank you for being around.

And this:

It takes a lot of going nowhere, until you find it's not about the place. 
It takes a lot of being no one, until you find it's not about the face. 

It takes a lot of birth and death, until you ask who's really in control. 
It takes a lot of love and pain, until you learn the art of letting go. 
Let go go go go. 

It takes a lot of hurtful thoughts, until you tame the jerk inside your head. 
It takes a lot of feeling lost, until you find you're always where you're led. 

It takes a lot of broken heart to wonder why we get what we've got. 
But we get what we've got and when it comes to Heart, my friend, you've got a lot.

There are moments and events and people we (or at least I) encounter that make us rethink how we are living and how we want to be remembered and what is important.  This concert was one of those events for me.  It was good for my heart.  I have found myself listening to his words over and over again and thinking I want to be myself.  I want people to feel comfortable around me...like they can be themselves because I am comfortable in my skin and that's contagious.  I want to take moments with my son to watch him grow and discover and live.  I want to be present and open.  I want to have faith in things I don't understand, but hope for.  I want to be a hopeful, joyful person.  I want to contribute something to this life.

This feels like a huge emotional barf.  I don't know where exactly I'm going with it or what it might mean to anyone else, but it's been inside about to explode, and this is as good an outlet as I have.  Maybe someone out there has felt the same thing and now you don't feel as alone.  Or maybe I really am just a crazy person.

p.s. if you want to be introduced to cloud cult here is their website http://www.cloudcult.com/

3 comments:

  1. Keep blogging! If for no one else but you and me. Or even just for you. I love this one. Keep reading what you wrote about what you want to be like when you forget - and I am going to do that too - because this is great. What are the names of all these songs? I want to listen to all of them!

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  2. I agree. You should keep blogging, if even for yourself. But I always read your updates and love the times that it really gets me thinking about changes I want to make in my own life.

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  3. You are definitely one of those people who make me want to live a more genuine life. Blogging can be totally scary, which is why I blog so little myself, but I get excited every time I see you've written something new because I love how you narrate your experience, and I love knowing I'm not alone in feeling so raw sometimes. Thanks for being brave!

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