A Little Man with Big Ideas

Did I ever talk to you about the little man that lives in my belly? Remember him? Yeah, he’s this little guy that, for a long time, was given no power over me and appeared to be sleeping. I discovered him, and, through meditation, have slowly come to realize that I have to become really “centered” in order to listen to him.

He is me, you see. He is the wise old man that is my inner self. Any of you that really know me can understand why I identify myself with a wise old man—kind of act like an old man, anyway. (It was a horrible commentary on my lack of fashion sense when I looked around the chorus the other day, realizing that the only people that dress like me are all retirees. What’s up with that?)

Anyway, as time went on, I began to understand certain things about myself, and the little man that had been given no voice. In time, he was given freer reign over my psyche, letting go of my silly, often illusory and child-like conscious desires, and, replacing those with sounds from the deepest part of me—the supposed real me.

Jayne say that I will be ready to start auditioning by January, and, after my last lesson, she was so enthused (even more so than me) that she recommended that I go coach with the main vocal coach from Mannheim, so that I can get my repertoire ready for the Spring. Wow. Translation: she’s convinced that I am going to come onto the scene with a grand entrance. It is really inspiring to see her exuberance.

Anyway tying this all together, I spent much of my life convinced that I had something to give. I kept trudging along even when it appeared that I was going to be a has-been, over.thirty, loser singer with no real future. Coming to such psychological lows, though, has helped me, allowing me to realize that life can still be complete even if the little, oblivious man seated in the cockpit of my brain thinks that I have veered fatefully off course. The Driver, though, is the part of our consciousness that thinks we are in control of our own destinies, that we can plot our own courses, and perhaps the most silly of all, the Driver thinks that he knows what we want and need.

Focing myself to let go of these stupid notions was what the circumstances of life over the past few years have given me. Being able to work in a chorus and see, up front, in focus what this career actually has to offer allowed me to take the mystical ideas out of what it means to have mzusic as a job. Knowing that my life can be a happy one without a solo career, that life can go on, often beautifully, if one listens to oneself and is open to what life brings are the lessons that have allowed the Old Man to come out of the recesses of my inner dungeon.