Optimism from an outsider.

I may not always have this opinion, but for right now I've decided that I live in just about the best place ever.

This may reveal an intense optimism and unspoiledness, and I guess that's appropriate. I am intensely optimistic and unspoiled in many ways.

But cynicism is still pervasive. And I find myself bending underneath it's influence sometimes. Even as an outsider looking in.

I am by no means an insider in the music business. But I do live right next to Music City. And I have lived in Music City at more than one point in my life. So I can't help but hear things. I'm not completely out of the loop. And there is certainly a lot of cynicism around here.

Why are we so cynical? I am aware of many potential answers that I might get to that question, but still I ask why are we so cynical? There is so much opportunity around here. And there is music being played by someone, somewhere, all the time. How many places can say that? Not very many, I think. It's a gift.

I do know that people get burned all the time. It's an unfortunate fact. In those instances it's hard not to feel cynical. But why should we, anybody, for any reason, succumb to those feelings? They can rob situations of any good they may contain, and create people who are never happy because they're always looking for what's wrong. We need to fight against this. I need to fight against this.

A subject I am much more familiar with is the Church. I've been deeply involved in the Church all my life. There's a lot of cynicism there too. And like I said before, with some of the stuff I've seen and heard, it's hard to fight it off. But there is much too much good to let yourself be overtaken by cynicism. Even if there wasn't, I have a feeling that if there was less cynicism anyway, more good could then be created. But I do think there is still overwhelming good. There are people all around who honestly care. There are people who sincerely love Jesus and in turn love other people. And because of that the poor are being fed, the broken-hearted are being comforted, one person at a time.

So we can't let ourselves fall under the debilitating influence of cynicism. In any situation.

Therefore, in an effort to look beyond the eyes of a cynic, I'm feeling pretty good about where I live. Music is a wondrous thing. I think most people around here feel the same way and are operating under that belief. We just have to look out for the ones who aren't, who end up doing everything they can to try and spoil it for the rest of us. For someone as musically minded as I am, this place is a fitting place to be. I need to take advantage of where I live more. I love live music, and though we are never lacking in this area, I rarely go see anyone perform. And most of the live music I've taken in lately has been from a few certain musicians, so I'm not getting much variety in what little I'm taking in. I need to broaden my horizons.

Call me an optimistic outsider, if you will. I can't argue with you there. But I am familiar with human nature. I've had almost 22 years of experience being a human, and while it may not be much, I think I've learned something in that time. I've learned that we need to spend as much time as possible bringing out the good, rather than the bad. That's not to say we should ignore the bad, because to not acknowledge something that's there would be foolish, and would be an insult to all of the people who experience pain and suffering due to bad things every day. But we shouldn't go looking for it. It's quite good at making its way out into the spotlight on its own. The good is harder to see. And it is the good we find that makes life worth living, that makes all of the bad worth it in the end.

Here's to Music City. I'm proud to call you and your many suburbs home.

A day that defines a belief system.

I tweeted this earlier today: "This day has been a belief system defining day." And so it has.

The beliefs that took a firmer shape today aren't the same as my belief in God's unfailing love, for instance. That's a firm, strong belief. These are slightly lesser and could conceivably be changed. So they're not core beliefs. I have had days that were so significant that they helped to shape core beliefs, but today was not quite that significant.

Today helped to reinforce that big things will undoubtedly go wrong when it is least convenient. The higher the pressure, the quicker things will fall apart. Count on this, and disappointment will be lessened when it happens.

Knowing this, the complete weakness of humanity, of me, is also reinforced. Because you, I, can't do anything to keep things from falling apart. And usually, the harder you, I, try to do something about it, the quicker more things go wrong.

Knowing this then, a big spotlight shines upon the overwhelming greatness of God. He is ultimate. Nothing else can take His place. And He is faithful to you when you are not to Him. Which means that when you start losing your focus, you'll be amazed at how quickly you'll be knocked down on your face, reminding you of where you're supposed to be looking. Which is not to say that God directly orchestrates the falling on your face. But he could very easily keep you from falling on your face. He could easily make everything work and not let anything fall apart. But he loves you. He loves me. And in that love, he lets us see just how messed up our natural tendencies are. To do anything else would be to control us, and that wouldn't be love. Love can't control.

I said these weren't core beliefs, and that's true to a point. The first couple of things aren't settled as deeply into my core as say my identity in Christ. But the inherent weakness of people, the greatness of God and love not being able to control, those are rooted deeply. And those first couple of things help to prove those later points, which is why I tend to believe they're true. I don't see how lies could point to truth. To be sure, if we see lies for what they are, that can lead us to finding the truth, because we know whatever the truth is, it's not the lie in front of us. But that's through a recognition that something is false and then a turning in the other direction, rather than continuing down the same path. If you keep going down a path that starts with a lie, all you're going to encounter are more lies.

Thus today, I am grateful for truth. It's the only reason I didn't scream. Now it is time to go to sleep. In truth. So that I can get up in the morning. In truth. And spend my day following truth rather than all the looming untruths around me.

We are a cathedral made of people.

One of the many things I have been grateful to the band downhere for is how many great people I've met. I've made friends, great friends. Thanks to the Internet, most of us can keep in touch on a regular basis. And find ways to make some of our more wild ideas become reality.

The message boards at downhere.com is where we congregate, and a while back a group of us decided it would be fun to cover one of the band's songs. Even though we're spread over thousands and thousands of miles. So we did.

Here's the finished product. Recorded on less-than-state-of-the-art equipment from the east coast to the west by a bunch of people who don't get paid to make music for a living. Not too shabby, I think. At the very least, it was a lot of fun for us. And that was the whole point.

Downhomies performing downhere's Cathedral Made of People:

Rebel without a cause: Part Two

When I wrote the last blog, I did not know what would happen today. I couldn't have planned better timing.

I really didn't realize this until it was brought to my attention, but I take a certain pride in the fact that I've never watched the Simpsons. I've seen about five minutes of the show in my life. I was once going to watch the movie with some friends, but I fell asleep before five minutes had passed, and I really remember nothing about those five minutes. So I essentially have never seen the show.

My professor walked into the classroom today just before my survey of pop culture class was set to begin and started writing our homework assignment for today on the board. Pretty much everything is already laid out in the syllabus, so I was looking at it as he was writing and shaking my head, because I already knew it. I knew we were scheduled to be reading some articles about the Simpsons, so that was old news. But then he wrote something else. He wrote that he wants us to watch at least one episode of the Simpsons, and do some character analysis, to see if the characters match up with how they are described in the articles we're reading.

What? I did a double take. Does it really say that? I guess it does. I have to watch the Simpsons? Really? I've made it through the entire life of the television show without watching it so far. Why?

I was slightly taken aback by my reaction. It's just a TV show. One to which I don't remember having given much thought. But apparently I've given enough thought to subconsciously determine that ever watching it would be unacceptable.

But, knowing myself as I do, one would, I would, think that that kind of thing wouldn't surprise me. There have been several things in my life that I have not done or experienced that I thought I had no opinion on, but then the idea of doing or experiencing them would be presented to me, and I would shoot it down immediately. No! That can't happen!

Why? That's the question of the hour.

It's because I like being different. I like being able to say that I've never seen the Simpsons, even though it's been on TV almost as long as I've been alive. I like being able to say that I know nothing about The Office, or Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Thus I'm not thrilled about my next homework assignment. Looks like I'm going to be visiting Hulu for the first time. (That's something else I haven't done yet, watched anything on Hulu, that I was sort of beginning to appreciate about myself. How ridiculous is that? Oh well.)


Note: Despite how disconnected I feel from pop culture, when it comes to playing pop culture trivia games, I'm not the worst person to have on your team. I'm like a sponge, and I retain a lot of information. For example, although I've never seen a full episode of the Simpsons or seen the movie, I can still name all of the main characters. So keep that in mind the next time we're playing a game and you're wondering who you want for your team. I don't want to be picked last.

Rebel without a cause.

Rebellious, I think, is not a word that anyone would use to describe me, lest it be those who know me best.

I've stuck pretty closely to the rules my whole life, so it seems likely that even they would not think to use that word in reference to me.

But does rebellion only show itself in breaking the rules?

There seems to be a part of me that not only is directly opposed to them, but also takes pleasure in defying conventions.

A perfect example of this is how disconnected I feel from current popular culture. There is one show on television that I make a point to watch, and only one. Any other rare time I find myself watching TV, nine times out of ten, it's on Disney Channel. While that is popular culture for many in America and around the world, most of them are not in my age bracket, so there I go defying conventions again.

I also don't listen to most of the music that the average person my age may listen to. When asked what my favorite music is, the questioners often get quizzical looks on their faces when I give them my answer.

Movies? The newest movie I've seen is The Box, but that was so terrible, it doesn't count. (It's movies like that one that make me run from mainstream entertainment.) Before that was Disney/Pixar's UP, and that released nearly 9 months ago. Before that? I can't even remember.

One of the biggest bandwagons I could consider myself to be a part of is that of Harry Potter. But like I said on my Facebook, I actually left the bandwagon a long time ago, and I now ride a thestral. (Sorry if you don't get that reference. Read the books.) I'm not one of the average, casual Harry Potter fans you can easily find out on the street. I can't count how many times I've read those books. I've studied them as if I was being tested over my knowledge of them. I've read the fanfiction, listened to the podcasts, read the literary criticism, listened to the Wizard Rock, written my own fair share about them, and have dreamed of having my own podcast. I've obviously gulped the Kool-Aid, and it needs to be noted that I've gulped it, not just sipped. Things I just sip, I don't often deem to be worthy of my time. It should also be noted that I wasn't really trying to get on the bandwagon initially. I just read the first three books because my brother bought them, and at the time I thought, "Why not," and honestly wasn't expecting a whole lot. I found more than I bargained for.

Just a little while ago, I got into a discussion on Facebook about my lack of interest in the 2010 Winter Olympics. I haven't watched any part of them, nor do I have any desire to. When I started the conversation, my feelings were that if I happen to watch some part of the Olympics this year, that's just fine, but I don't intend to seek them out; quite neutral, in other words. And then after going through and explaining my complete lack of interest, something changed. I suddenly started feeling like I needed to intentionally go out of my way to make sure that I didn't watch the Olympics. Not because I think there is anything wrong with them, but because everybody, even the apathetic, watch the Olympics at some point, myself included. But I should be different. Because I can be. Therefore no Olympics for me.

I do this kind of thing all the time. Ooh, the general public takes some sort of interest in this, I should stay away. Is the root of all this found in the same place where typical rebellion is found?

I tend to think that is, that this is my form of rebellion. Rebelling without breaking any rules.