“Get There”
Obviously, this is not something that’s like “hey OK, I pray now. so, i’m tight with God, bro.” — Me, yesterday
Yeah, I quoted myself. What of it?
https://evr0ck17.medium.com/800-posts-4754d03d65f1
I’m in pain, I don't know what it is I just hurt. Thinking, thinking all the time. It’s been keeping me up at night, the thinking.
I don’t want to even get into the foulness of the thoughts, it’s just…ew. Not in a NSFW type foul, but like…ew, who is this guy (me)? why is he so hard on the other guy (also me).
I haven’t got multiple personalities, i’m not that kind of crazy. I’m the thinker and the watcher. It’s the power of now! the power which I have absolutely no grasp on whatsoever.
Where was I?
Oh, God.
The universe.
So, I woke up yesterday, and I was going to the temple, I’m trying to get there, man. I decided to pull up that day in Grateful Dead history, and it was a pretty creamy ’73 soundboard which I later found out was the debut of all of these songs that became linchpins of the live Dead cannon (Eyes of the World for instance).
This post isn’t about the Grateful Dead. The Grateful Dead are very important, however.
So, I turned my phone off and went and sat in the temple. As I let the rhythm get at me I remembered something. I remembered that though I’m a cynical prick (see: Denis Leary), I’m no atheist. The reason why I would open myself to something divine being part of the whole trip, beyond all of the Acid and shit I got myself on over the years, before it even: music. There’s no other way to explain what that is and what it is and what that does for and to me (and everyone, I hope).
It was one of the lecture/podcast/stand up things I listen to at night. Maybe Duncan Trussell or one of the other Neem Karoli Baba accolytes (by way of Ram Dass). This concept of “seeking catharsis” was mentioned. It tied into this long standing conversation I've been having with another recovery friend for years. Frequent readers may remember Heady Mike (of New Jersey).
I’ve been seeking catharsis, I've been seeking the divine. Why else would I spend my 20’s going to see improvisational/ arena prog rock type jam bands?
Why else would I get dosed to the gills on trips while (and also not while) I was doing it?
“We have found that God does not make too hard terms with those who seek Him. To us, the realm of spirit is broad, roomy, all inclusive, never exclusive or forbidding to those who earnestly seek.” Alcoholics Anonymous, pg 25
Rick Rubin was talking about the Grateful Dead somewhere. He said that people who love them would drop everything and follow them around because they knew could “get there”.
I’m still pretty not OK a lot of the time. I mean, I am sober and all that. I need to maybe look at all of the nice things I have and am that I didn’t always have and wasn’t.
I was just thinking about how I know that I can “get there” too. I know this because music has put me there.
I’m actually not any happier without Instagram, but I do want to avoid it…it just seems kind of better this way, although I pop in. occasionally.
I do need to share the music I listen to, though…it’s just a thing about me so I do it on the threads:
