Let My Love Open The Door

Yes, Pete Townsend and The Who had the right idea. I've known this song since I was little, but not until I heard Sondre Lerche's acoustic/string quartet version of it did it really hit me. I'm just two and a half songs plus a string session away from having my album finished and I'm coming back to the lesson I learned while writing these songs. Those of you who will take the time to listen to it will see the big picture I see now, but in short, it's all about love. It sounds so overdone and common, but this is about love, expectations, moments of clarity and what bouncing between the extremes of love and sadness will do to a twenty-something. Funny, after a year of tracking these songs, a few days seemed to make me forget all of what I had learned. Then came Sondre with his update on a classic. That was the start, and then I began to notice more around me…like in the movies. Good people at their best just brings out the best in me and pushes me to find newer ways to love and be kind. The opposite is true as well, being around negative or deceptive people will tempt me to play their games to survive. I know the balance of dark and light is what sustains this world, but I think I'm at home in the light. There's a friend that I've recently been able to finally hang out with after the rampage of gig schedules with work. He's a good guy and what is encouraging is that he's a good guy that people recognize as so. Like Matt Parkman on "Heroes", most nice guys just get misunderstood and the world won't ever give them a break. Being around a good person has really brought out good in me as well and I really like becoming a better person. Not that I was a Grinch prior to this last week, but there's so much good in us that remains dormant and usually we wait for things like Christmas and birthdays or until tragedy or death to dust it off and let it shine.

This little moment of clarity also made me realize when I'm around people that embody negativity or just dishonesty, it really tempts me to play their game. Luckily, I grew up a good boy and don't inherently do wicked things, but even a generally good person that doesn't take responsibility for their actions have negative vibes all over them. There's someone else I'm around all the time that I'm not really friends with but for career reasons have to learn to cope with nearly on a daily basis. They smile, act nicely around people, but when the crap hits the fan, they'll hide their dirty hands behind their back and try to turn the situation around to the manufacturer of the fan instead of the person that threw the crap in the first place (himself). Imagine that on nearly an hourly basis and the people around him are almost forced to become the worst of themselves just to not get trampled on. I find a lot (or maybe ALL) of my stresses from work are due to this person…not just for me, for the majority of anyone around this person. I would stay up nights debating this in my head until I was at work doing a video shoot for a motivational speaker. This speaker had a lot of bunk to fill his time, but one thing hit me when it got to Q&A time. An audience member asked him what to do if a generally skilled and well-meaning person has negative attributes that bring down everyone within proximity. The speaker simply answered, "By definition, they are not a good person." That sounds harsh, but I get what he was saying. Unless the person is somehow mentally handicapped in such a way that they are unaware of their surroundings, there comes a time they realize their affect on others and chooses to remain the same disregarding how they affect others that haven't done anything to them.

So what to do now? My first strategy is to be around the good people as much as possible and nurture that side of me that wants to better myself and love deeper. When I do have to be around others that challenge that goodness, well, that's my time to exercise the muscles of positivity; not just smile or ignore the negativity, but work on genuinely feeling good inside and making sure as many people around me feel the same love despite the dark around us.

I know that was a very ambiguous post, but it's a long way of saying that I went into this last weekend expecting a bad work week and some emotionally challenging situations in my personal life, but surprisingly, have spent the last 5 days smiling bigger and brighter than before. So, as Pete and Sondre have told me and my friends have encouraged me to do…Let My Love Open The Door…

G'night friends,

-Rod