“Funny how a melody sounds like a memory; Like the soundtrack to a July Saturday night…”
– Lyric from “Springsteen” by Eric Church
Why do I do “Lyric Month” twice each year?
To connect melodies to memories and to trigger new ways of thinking from old connections. To create new memories and build bridges between stages of our lives and careers. To get us “unstuck.”
Every day we’re faced with dozens, if not hundreds of opportunities to rinse, repeat and just. Stay. Stuck.
Now, if we’re in a good place, in a groove, being stuck isn’t a bad thing, until it is. Inertia is a bitch, and that’s why I’m a big believer in looking at the mundane through different filters, through different sources of light and thus, with different perspectives.
So, why music? There were songs we always, and I do mean always played before high school basketball games and college baseball games. “Pump up” music, if you will, and I still respond viscerally when I hear them. There are songs (old, new, original, remakes and everywhere in between) that (based on circumstance, memories, challenges or the moment) help shift my thinking just enough to allow original thought to venture in, and once that happens most of the barriers are broken down.
It doesn’t have to be music. It can be a book, especially “The Book.” It can be a painting, it can be a cup of coffee without the newspaper, the mobile device or the TV. It can be time on a bike, or walking in fresh air. The source doesn’t matter, the outcome does.
These are trying times — in our society, in our businesses (perhaps) and maybe just our world in general. Heck, if you believe the campaign rhetoric and ads, we’re screwed no matter who wins — and that’s not a healthy perspective. There are no “news” outlets anymore, it’s all editorial. Play-by-play announcers want to tell us that either our team is the best ever or the worst ever, instead of just describing the action and letting us make our own judgements. Social media wants us to believe that everyone’s life is perfect, and that ours would be too if we’d just post more, covet more or pose more. In these times, it seems very few people stand for something, and more and more people stand against most things.
Cue another lyric: “You’ve got to stand for something or you’ll fall for anything.”
We owe it to ourselves to stand for something, and we ought to decide what we stand for while we’re in our happy places. For me, music is one of the happiest of places, and I hope lyric month gets you closer to one of yours.
In trying times, the fresh perspective, the intentional decision to stand for something and make a difference — well, it makes a difference. And whatever triggers that mode for any of us is worth pursuing.
Justin Strom says
From The Piano Man – He says,
“Son, can you play me a memory
I’m not really sure how it goes
But it’s sad and it’s sweet and I knew it complete
When I wore a younger man’s clothes”
For me a lot of music takes me back to a specific time, place, memory, feeling, etc. I agree with the article that a caution is that it is while it is comfortable and maybe easier to live in the past we all need to focus on moving forward and the future.
Steve Heston says
Justin! This is a great call-out. The rear-view mirror reminds us where we’ve been, when we wore a younger person’s clothes. The windshield is where the action is, and where our focus ought to be, with the perspective of what we learned in the past there as a guide / reminder!