Blog: Censoring Myself As An Artist

I think I’ve reached a point as a songwriter where I’m actively censoring myself. It’s not something I intended to do or wanted to happen but alas, that is where I find myself. I don’t think that I was always this way nor do I think a lot of the songs of my past are vague on the details of my personal life but I’ve had events happen in my life where people I’m close to have hurt me deeply & I find myself incapable of putting pen to paper or note to track out of a fear of hurting their feelings.

This is a problem I developed a couple of years ago that I am waking up to. You see, there are times where those in your life who support & cheer you on do the most undeniable damage they can to you & all you feel like you can do is march on & hope that time heals the wound & it doesn’t happen again. A lot of times these people don’t even know that the'y’ve caused you pain or that the things they’ve said or left unsaid made it to your eyes or ears & dug a sharp gash in your heart. I had one of these & while I wrote several songs around the events in question I began to self limit because I felt they were songs I could never share or release because they would upset the people they are about. Here in lies the paradox for me.

The thing that sucks is that I know these are songs that need to see the light of day because the struggles that I went through are not unique to my person & in releasing them to a broader audience they stand a chance of helping someone else out there who is struggling. I also understand that I am doing myself a disservice by locking these songs behind the screen of my iPhone or the hard drive of my computer & that the greatest art often comes from the greatest pain. In all honesty I’m looking at myself going “wtf am I doing,” as I write all of this into a blog even though I’m not specifying anything.

But here’s the problem. Art is expression. It’s meant to evoke an emotion from the listener, viewer, taster, etc. & by cutting myself off from the art that hurts, the art within me that is real, I am censoring myself as an artist & producing blunted content that helps no one & limits my growth both as a human being & as an artist. In shying away into what is safe like a chastised dog I have placed a wall between myself & the true art that lies in wait within me & I’m not sure I know how to tear it down.

The easy answer to that, naturally, is share & release the songs, but they are songs that require difficult conversations & may cause further damage to a wound that has found some form of healing, even if It’s not how I would like. But what must be done to the bone that has been set improperly & healed crooked? It must be unmade to heal properly. It is a redemption that my heart yearns for but that I fear is nothing more than a fantasy, so I sit stuck in indecision & with a great filter hindering my art.

This is true for those of you reading this who may not be artists as well. I think that we often times allow our ache to be swept under the rug so that we can continue to have certain relationships where we feel the connection outweighs our suffering. It’s a hard road to tread & a hard decision to make, especially if the wound is old. But I feel that we limit ourselves entirely by doing so, not just in the artistic sense but in our development as human beings. It’s often said that you can tell when someone experienced unresolved trauma because they often stagnate in their personal growth. People harmed at 25 remain the same mentally emotionally as they move into their 30s because they would rather cover the wound than face it.

I know I am not alone in this &, if this resonates with you, I hope you know that you are not alone. Your reservations are just as valid as your pain but can you imagine just how joyous it will feel the day that pain is set free, the day the conflict that has been eating you up inside is resolved? Maybe it is worth it, maybe it’s not, but in the end, that’s up to you to decide, just as it is for me. I want so badly to lean into the freedom but I’d be lying if I said fear wasn’t holding me back. As my friend Stephen Lovegrove says, “the path that scares you the most is usually the correct one.” Maybe it’s time to take the scary path & step out of the pain that has become comfortable. Maybe it’s time to step on a few toes.

As always, much love to you all,

-C

Blog: Stop Pressing Mute

Do you ever find yourself minimizing yourself, omitting parts of your personality or who you really are as a person just to make the other people around you feel more comfortable? Do you often do so even when you have no idea how that other person will reach? It’s sometimes like you have this whole preconceived narrative in your head about how they won’t want to be around you any longer or you feel like they won’t love you anymore because it doesn’t fit into their ideal of who you are as a person. You’re not alone if you do, I think to some extend we all do this, we all mute parts of ourselves, situationally, in an attempt to fit in.

I mean, why shouldn’t we? We evolved from hunter/gatherers, a society where being outcast could mean life or death. We depended upon the tribe or the collective for shelter, food, water, & other resources, so of course that mentality has been drilled into our brains. From there we cultivated farmland, becoming agriculturally bound & even then if you didn’t present properly to the ruling faction or the person in charge of getting your food, granted you weren’t farming it yourself, you would starve. These social constructs continued on & on & on perpetuated by class, religion, tradition, & other miscellaneous societal contracts that we’re all expected to adhere to, even if some of those contracts have long since expired.

We are now living in the 21st century, never have we ever been, as a global community, more connected. I know a lot of you would argue a dissonance because of technology & while I definitely think it’s a double edged sword, it has never been easier for us as human beings to find communities where we belong. There are people out there who believe the same things, feel the same way, geek out over the same material or hobbies as us & yet still we mute ourselves.

I am beyond guilty of this, it’s something I still fight to break on the daily because there is an expectation when you grow up a middle-class midwest American white boy in a baptist church with an often old school family. That’s nothing against them or my upbringing, it’s just a lot of the time for so many of us, the expectation & the reality collide & usually the expectation seems to win.

Think in terms of tectonic plates. One plate represents who you are as a person, the other being who you’re expected to be. As you grow up those plates fight for dominance & eventually one wins. I have always been envious of those who let themselves win over the localized social constructs. To many of us, they bear the name of “black sheep.” I always thought myself a black sheep because the person living inside didn’t match the mask I was presenting, but I let the weight of expectation submerge me.

There are so many things, even to this day at the age of 29 that I wish I could be, so many regrets for times I wished I were bolder or more “me” so that I didn’t have to actively & delicately tear down the person that so many thought I was in order to reestablish the truth. That, however, is a waste of time. Living in regret is giving energy to a past that is already written, not a future that is yours to make. There are so many things I wish I could be outwardly without the fear of losing those I love or feeling their affections diminish. There are so many songs, speeches, blogs that I’ve written, that no matter how much I want to share will probably never see the light of day & that sucks. They are the parts of myself that I continue to lock away out of someone else’s comfort because at the end of the day I am still choosing comfort over the truth.

I hope you’ll do better that me. I hope you will choose yourself. It’s a hard thing, believe me, I know, I just want you all to know that you’re worthy of love as you are, as who you are, unapologetically. You are worthy of love. This is as much a reminder to me as it is to you all but I hope you take it to heart. As I said before, there is a community out there that would love nothing more than to embrace you, as you are, complete & whole with no alterations & no subjugations & I ache for you to find them if you haven’t already. It’s time to pull back the curtain & show the world the beautiful being that you are. It’s time to stop pressing mute on who you are.