Dear readers, real or imagined, let me tell you, it is extremely difficult to write consistently when your mood has more swing than Elvis; I’m all shook up, hm, hm, hmmm, hmmm, oh yeah!
Anyway, I did go out again today, and was this time better prepared than ever. Besides my books, camera and notebook, I also thought it would be a good idea taking my I-pod with me, giving me the pleasure of listening to ‘Meat is Murder’ by the Smiths while I am writing these lines.
The mind is a strange and complex thing. It seems as if you can get completely lost within it, or get stuck in a certain mode of thought with no clear means of escape. Just yesterday for instance, while writing yesterday’s blog, I felt a sudden urge to listen to music. It was five minutes to six and I was sitting at Jansen. I actually felt such a strong urge that I ran the few yards to the record store to satisfy my need before closing time.
Such behavior puzzles me. Just so you know, I can go on for weeks or even months without music, it has just never been as important to me as books and if you think of it, the means of processing the data are rather different. Still, it is not that I cannot appreciate music, I can listen to Morissey for days in a row and I am currently really enjoying Elliot Smith’s figure 8. Many of my childhood memories are also bound to particular sounds and songs, but still I am rather infrequent in the right mode for music, so to speak, as if my mind is stuck in a different mode altogether, not suitable for processing sounds.
People who know me longer, know that I have a tendency for melancholy and over-analyzing, an example of which you could read in yesterday’s blog. I have discovered a few different modi, which serve as a sort of filter or level of analysis in the mind. I don’t know how they get turned on, or off, but it sure sucks when you’re stuck in one of them. For instance, I believe there is actually a certain modus operandus which tends to lead to over-analyzing and when stuck in it, you are overcome by philosophical more abstract tendencies, it’s hard to concretize anything, and it is as if the mind is constantly running in loops and while thoughts might be really deep and thought provoking, I mostly end up feeling like a dog who is running after his own tail. I can’t listen to music when I am in this modus and I guess I am not always fun to be with either. To make matters worse, because the thoughts are overwhelming and abstract I can hardly put them into words, rendering the analyses pretty useless. I don’t know if there is any truth in this little theory of mine, but my mind sure drives me crazy at times.
For now I am happy to force my creative mind to work, and it might be no coincidence that there is automatically more room to absorb the creative work of others, through the senses. It might be plausible that I am actually sensing the battle between my left- and right-side brain. Let’s hope the right side wins, I am tired analyzing.
Leave a Reply