Strangers
In martial arts, everyone comes to develop their own personal style over a long enough time. What's odd is how this is much more about discovery than creation. It's like through training you are revealing something that is hidden.
The masters often develop a style that is beyond derivative. Experienced martial artist come to see bits and pieces of the master's style leaking into other martial artist's styles. It's like suddenly you have finger prints that people can recognize.
Music is no different. It rare you artists being able to create a new paradigm that is immediately recognized by other artist. There are artist that you can bend a single note and novices will immediately recognize the artist whose turf you've stumbled upon.
I believe any truly creative medium is similar in this regard. The less skilled do not have the ability to create something that is recognizably their own...that speaks to their identity within the medium. The most skilled often struggle to avoid it and often feel constrained by the patterns that again and again show up in their successful work.
I believe that this is one of the most important things we do that define are individuality and identity. A person's inability to produce anything non-derivative and of any merit speaks more about them than just about anything. You can tell me about your family, your work, your history, your significant other, your hobbies and i'll still get more information about who you really are through your inability to create anything that says something about you. Your inability to have a point of view with any non-superficial medium. Your surprising lack of drive to express that which is uniquely yourself.
On the other hand, I tend to have an immediate connection when interacting with a person that has a point of view that they project out into the world. Even if I disagree with it or question the quality of it, if it's sincere, substantive and really speaks for itself, I feel like i'm really interacting with a person. That is, a developed individual that has a perspective and a sense of self...maybe not fully developed or that solid a perspective, but definitely a proper identity. Until then, I often feel like i'm strangers with a person.
I've noticed I can't ever truly be into a girl until i've seen her work. Maybe it's the way she builds sentences or constructs thought or questions (on very rare occasions), but until then I feel we're just dancing about. Falling for a girl without creative "finger prints" is like falling for a mannequin that laughs at your jokes. An empty mirror that just reflects the hodgepodge of stimulus and noise that's been in front of her within her adult life.
I believe this applies beyond just social to the existential. I don't think people really know who they are very well without creative, substantive work and expression that let's them find their point of view. One of the reasons I insist on writing often and putting effort into my side projects because I notice how quickly I forget who I am when I don't. Consciousness of self is difficult to build and difficult to keep. Anyone who thinks otherwise is ignorant or stupid.
People very much like to develop their self-concept off of social relations, which is unreliable and dangerous. They see themselves as a reflection of how their significant other, family, friends and society see them and attempt to manage their identity through attempting to manage those social perceptions. But, this ultimately just ends up creating people without identities, as the ability to truly build identity becomes crippled as they lose the ability to think beyond the social context. Everything is derivative and without sincerity when it comes from a person that has no sense of themselves beyond their social dimension.
This is why lots of repetitive, non-creative work is so dangerous: it creates robots who spend all their energy on bullshit so they have nothing left for when it comes time to work on those things which help build identity and legitimate self-concept. Tired, uninspired people just retreat into their social circles because it's the only solace they have from the grind that eats all their vigor and focus during the day. They hollow themselves out during the day, and fill themselves back up with fluff at night to stave off the emptiness. A few years of that and you forget what was like or become crippled to ever finding out.
People often view creative work as a hobby or side-show, but I believe it's one of the most essential things to developing as a sentient being and living a full life. It's often one of the first things to get deprioritized when a person gets really busy with work or family and I don't think that's good judgment. Without it, we're just strangers. Stranges to the world and strangers to ourselves.
The masters often develop a style that is beyond derivative. Experienced martial artist come to see bits and pieces of the master's style leaking into other martial artist's styles. It's like suddenly you have finger prints that people can recognize.
Music is no different. It rare you artists being able to create a new paradigm that is immediately recognized by other artist. There are artist that you can bend a single note and novices will immediately recognize the artist whose turf you've stumbled upon.
I believe any truly creative medium is similar in this regard. The less skilled do not have the ability to create something that is recognizably their own...that speaks to their identity within the medium. The most skilled often struggle to avoid it and often feel constrained by the patterns that again and again show up in their successful work.
I believe that this is one of the most important things we do that define are individuality and identity. A person's inability to produce anything non-derivative and of any merit speaks more about them than just about anything. You can tell me about your family, your work, your history, your significant other, your hobbies and i'll still get more information about who you really are through your inability to create anything that says something about you. Your inability to have a point of view with any non-superficial medium. Your surprising lack of drive to express that which is uniquely yourself.
On the other hand, I tend to have an immediate connection when interacting with a person that has a point of view that they project out into the world. Even if I disagree with it or question the quality of it, if it's sincere, substantive and really speaks for itself, I feel like i'm really interacting with a person. That is, a developed individual that has a perspective and a sense of self...maybe not fully developed or that solid a perspective, but definitely a proper identity. Until then, I often feel like i'm strangers with a person.
I've noticed I can't ever truly be into a girl until i've seen her work. Maybe it's the way she builds sentences or constructs thought or questions (on very rare occasions), but until then I feel we're just dancing about. Falling for a girl without creative "finger prints" is like falling for a mannequin that laughs at your jokes. An empty mirror that just reflects the hodgepodge of stimulus and noise that's been in front of her within her adult life.
I believe this applies beyond just social to the existential. I don't think people really know who they are very well without creative, substantive work and expression that let's them find their point of view. One of the reasons I insist on writing often and putting effort into my side projects because I notice how quickly I forget who I am when I don't. Consciousness of self is difficult to build and difficult to keep. Anyone who thinks otherwise is ignorant or stupid.
People very much like to develop their self-concept off of social relations, which is unreliable and dangerous. They see themselves as a reflection of how their significant other, family, friends and society see them and attempt to manage their identity through attempting to manage those social perceptions. But, this ultimately just ends up creating people without identities, as the ability to truly build identity becomes crippled as they lose the ability to think beyond the social context. Everything is derivative and without sincerity when it comes from a person that has no sense of themselves beyond their social dimension.
This is why lots of repetitive, non-creative work is so dangerous: it creates robots who spend all their energy on bullshit so they have nothing left for when it comes time to work on those things which help build identity and legitimate self-concept. Tired, uninspired people just retreat into their social circles because it's the only solace they have from the grind that eats all their vigor and focus during the day. They hollow themselves out during the day, and fill themselves back up with fluff at night to stave off the emptiness. A few years of that and you forget what was like or become crippled to ever finding out.
People often view creative work as a hobby or side-show, but I believe it's one of the most essential things to developing as a sentient being and living a full life. It's often one of the first things to get deprioritized when a person gets really busy with work or family and I don't think that's good judgment. Without it, we're just strangers. Stranges to the world and strangers to ourselves.