Moshin’ and a-rollin’
September 13, 2010 § Leave a comment
This summer, I attended two different day long music festivals. One was Warped Tour, the other was the Sonic Boom Festival. Both were in Edmonton and set up at Northlands.
I’ve been going to concerts and outdoor shows much like these two for over a decade. It was odd watching the shows through my nearly thirty something eyes. I looked at the young kids at the shows and remembered what I thought of people my age when I was their age.
“Oh my god they’re so old. I’m never coming to a show like this when I’m that old, they’re so out-of-place. Don’t they know they’re too OLD?”
The perspective was based out of what nearly 30 somethings are supposed to be doing. When you’re this age you should be married and settled down, possibly with a couple of kids, a steady job and a house. People who have those don’t go to punk or rock shows. Once life starts, you aren’t allowed to have any more fun.
And I suppose there are a group of people who actually do live that way, after all, the stereotype had to come from somewhere. And yet there I was, with other nearly 30 somethings, and some over 30 somethings, at each show. Hanging out. Enjoying the music.
There is one major difference in how I participate in the shows though. The mosh pit. That’s right, back in the good old days I was right smack dab in the middle of it. I’d mosh all day and emerge from the pit, my hair a mess, and smelling like only a kid in a mosh pit could smell… the odour of other people’s sweat mixed with my own, perhaps the fumes of somebody’s joint or cigarette mixed in. Oh yes, somehow that was a desirable state to leave a concert in. These days, I appreciate the music from afar. I enjoy being able to see and hear what’s going on over attempting to support a crowd of body surfers above me while holding my own in a gnarled pit of other teenagers there to jump around while pushing and shoving one another in a mild form of chaos.
The rock show pit is much like I remembered it. Disorderly, unruly. Some moshers were watching out for their felling pitters, but many had no regard for those around them. They would jump, push, shove, whatever they wanted to break through a crowd, trampling any in their way. Experiencing it first hand at Edmonton’s Sonic Boom Festival reminded me of why I quit trying to be in the centre of that crowd.
Warped Tour was a different story. Find yourself a pit at Warped Tour, and you’re more likely to encounter what is known as the circle pit. I have no idea where this concept originated, but it is the most orderly mosh pit I have ever seen.
Everyone knows what to do in a circle pit, when one starts to form, the crowd that wishes not to participate backs up to make room. As soon as the space is there, participants start to run around in a great big circle. Yes, they run. And they’re all going in the same direction. There’s no body surfing in a circle pit, because there aren’t enough people to support body surfing.
Watching one particular pit, there was a point where many of the moshers stopped running around in a circle, and then started to do the same moves. It looked like they could have been kick boxing. It didn’t look like most of them knew each other, and yet they all knew the same pattern of moves. Had they been close together, they surely would have hit one another. And yet, in the confines of the circle pit, they had enough room and nobody got hurt.
Ten years ago, the pits at both shows probably would have been very similar. I find it intriguing now to see the subculture that’s morphed over the years into the different scenes I saw before me at these two shows. And it surprises me that those at the punk/metal show appear to have developed more regard for one another at their events than those at the rock show. They seem more harsh on the outside, but what I’ve observed tells me differently. What I see here is more community than we’d ever get from the mainstream.
I’m no anthropologist. But how this subculture developed is of interest to me. Did it have anything to do with a stronger sense of identity for the Warped Tour crowd? Or was it all just one big coincidence? And on a sidenote, if I were growing up in today’s youth, I wonder which group I’d identify with more?
The obvious lessons are always the hardest to learn
September 7, 2010 § 1 Comment
Image via Wikipedia
This summer has taught me a much-needed lesson. Well, it’s RE-taught me rather, because I know I’ve encountered this one before. I don’t know that it’s the last time I’ll need to revisit this lesson, but it seems to be in a different capacity each time, so that a good thing, right?
The lesson I’m learning is this:
I am not exempt from the effects of the natural progression of life or from the laws of this universe.
How incredibly obvious. And yet, it remains something that I, and many others out there, continue to try to defy. Youth has proved my defiance right in the past, but three separate instances this summer have given me reason to pause and rethink my approach.
The first one is that over the last couple of months, I’ve noticed a fairly consistent ringing in my ears. I figured it was stress and would go away once life settled down. It’s the end of summer and life is settling down. The ringing is still here. I also find myself straining a bit harder to hear what people say. I once could hear what others could not, now I’m turning up the volume?
The second is that I’ve had an incredibly busy summer, which isn’t out of the ordinary. But instead of feeling refreshed and invigorated from all of the activity, I’m just plain worn out. Where is my youth that thrived on that energy level and used it to fuel and propel me forward?
Thirdly, I was home for the long weekend and I took my dog Tetris out for a run. As we jogged down by the creek in Millet, I noticed that my calves and my shins weren’t as spry as they should be after a summer of shenanigans and Ultimate Frisbee. In the past, I’ve always bounced back fairly quickly after a lot of activity with minimal maintenance and effort.
What’s going on?
Age.
Last fall, David had a post about the importance of health before wealth. It was a great reminder to take care of ourselves now. And yet I was still of the mindset that I was young enough that I didn’t have to. For the first time, health before wealth is really hitting home for me. Of course I *know* that things like stretching after exercise, eating well, getting enough sleep, etc. is important. But I’ve always bounced back quickly when there was a lack of any or all of these things.
Had the hearing, the sore muscles and the exhaustion not happened within a short period of one another, I doubt I would have paid them much attention. But I’ve always believed that when things come in threes it’s a signal. Here’s my signal to put health before wealth.
The somewhat ironic part is that in doing so early, I become exempt from many of the situations I may find myself in if I continued to ignore the lesson here. But it most definitely makes for a clear choice. Health before wealth now for me too.
Be. Do. Have.
July 19, 2010 § 2 Comments
For most of my life, I had the first two words of these three words reversed. Do. Be. Have. A certain type of person had the things I wanted to have in life. But in order to be that type of person, I had to first do all the things that kind of person did. That meant I had to build my life and the things around it before I would ever reach that level. To me, being the person that I wanted to be was going to take years.
Last year, those words were switched up for me. Be. Do. Have. That meant I could already be the person that I wanted to be. By being that person, it would drive my behaviour to already do the things that person does and eventually have the things that person has.
As it turns out, when you’ve lived your entire life from a ‘Do. Be. Have.’ perspective, changing that around to ‘Be. Do. Have.’ is a little trickier than just switching a couple of words around. Learning to BE before I DO has proven to be a tough process for me.
But DOing first before I can be is not working for me. It’s keeping me in a perpetual cycle where I’m striving so hard to reach the level I want and I never quite seem to get there. Why? Because there will always be an endless list of things to do. And in a scenario where DO comes first, it’s a stage I’ll never get passed.
The trick, I think, is in letting go of what I thought I was and accepting the fact that I already am who I want to be. I’m BEing her.
Who knew changing the order of two words could make such an impact?
Be. Do. Have.
Are you a rock? Are you an island?
May 17, 2010 § 1 Comment
What’s your typical response when dealing with a situation? Do you clamp down and not let anyone know what’s going on? Do you think you’re strong enough to weather it all on your own? Do you feel gratification when you’ve proved to yourself that you can handle anything? That you don’t actually NEED anyone? If you answer ‘yes’ to all of the previous questions… well, you and I were so very alike not that long ago. I had a need to prove to myself that I was strong enough, I was good enough and I could accomplish anything on my own. I could deal with any situation. Life couldn’t bring me down. I was a rock… I was an island.
At some very recent point, I pulled my head out of the sand long enough to realize just what it was I had done. I took a moment to step back and admire all that I had accomplished. I’ve done well with my career, live in a decent neighborhood, I’ve dealt with some pretty big life issues and I’m still standing on my own two feet. And I did it all by myself. The puzzling part was that the rest of the world wasn’t cheering me on when I emerged. Why weren’t they happy for me? Why couldn’t they see the struggles I had been through to get where I am? Why couldn’t they understand the reasons I had been working so hard for so long?
Because I was a rock and I was an island. Tough to the core. Unwavering. But here’s the thing: Rocks are hard to work with and islands are difficult to get go.
Nobody was cheering me on because none of them knew what was going on. My self importance, my need to prove something to myself had a much larger impact than I could have foreseen. And it’s an impact that I want to reverse.
I’m still proud of myself for my accomplishments, but I wonder how much easier everything could have been if I had taken the approach of a more malleable, connected material? As I opened up and began to share more with those that were once close to me, I found something extraordinary happened. All of those struggles, the trials and tribulations I sought to handle on my own didn’t seem so hard to deal with any more AND there were people applauding me along the way for everything I was trying to do.
So the questions remains – will I do it differently next time? You betchya. Except for me it’s not just about next time, it’s about every time. One day, one person and one situation at a time to create a new shape for me and a new connection in the world.
Forget-Them-Not
April 26, 2010 § 13 Comments
On April 28th, we will observe a National Day of Mourning as established by the Canadian Centre for Occupational Health and Safety (CCOHS).
The purpose of the day is in “commemorating workers whose lives have been lost or injured in the workplace.” The CCOHS estimates that from 1993-1998, 14,190 people lost their lives due to work related causes. In my books, those 14,190 deaths that could have been prevented.
On August 10, 2005, a police officer came to my door. I had just come home from a 4 week trek through Italy and Southern France two weeks earlier to celebrate the end of my degree from the University of Alberta. I had begun my job search as soon as I was back in the country and had an interview scheduled that day in Edmonton with Enterprise Rent-a-Car. I never made the interview.
I was just about to step in the shower when the doorbell rang. I grabbed my housecoat and headed upstairs. On my doorstep was an RCMP officer. The next couple of minutes happened as if they were in slow motion. Every word, every detail is etched in my memory.
“Do you know a Wayne Jacob Peters that was born October 21, 1978?” the RCMP officer asked me.
I looked at him a bit suspiciously as I replied “Yes, I do. He’s my brother.”
The RCMP officer looked at me and said “I’m sorry, your brother has been in an accident.”
That sentence hung in the air for a moment before settling on my ears. A million thoughts and questions raced through my head in the ensuing seconds about what could have happened before I answered “Oh my God! Is he okay?”
I expected to hear that he had been in a bad accident and that we should get to the hospital right away. Something like “Your brother was hit by a drunk driver and is in critical condition” was along the lines of what I was preparing myself to hear.
But life doesn’t ever bring us the news we expect. The RCMP officer looked right into my questioning eyes. I could see the answer then before he even said the words, but even a split second of warning wasn’t any preparation for what I heard next.
“No he isn’t. I’m sorry, your brother didn’t make it.”
I can hear those words as though the officer were repeating them in front of me now, they’re still that clear. I looked at the officer in disbelief and all I could muster was “Are you kidding me?” Of course, the answer was no. Wayne Jacob Peters of Millet, Alberta, born October 21, 1978, was found dead the previous evening 90 km north of Slave Lake around 11 pm.
The RCMP officer proceeded to ask if there was anyone he could call for me. My mom was in BC, but I got a hold of my dad. He happened to be in Millet. I now stood on the other side of the news. Having to repeat the devastating information I had received only minutes earlier to my father was worse than hearing it myself. As soon as he drove up, he rushed out of his truck and hugged me so hard. At 23, that’s a lot of emotion to take in in only a few minutes.
After that news and that hug, a part of me shut down for a very long time. It’s been only in the last month or so that I’ve began to understand the shock and trauma my system was subjected to, and that six years later, I’m finally able to start processing it.
The Workers’ Compensation Board proceeded with an investigation. Wayne was a chemical engineer working in cathodic protection. He was checking on a pipeline in Northern Alberta. On August 9, 2005, he was to meet his coworker back at the motel they were staying at by 7 pm. When he didn’t show up and wouldn’t answer his cell phone, his coworker knew there was something out of the ordinary. At 11 pm, Wayne was found dead by the rectifier he had been checking earlier. He had been electrocuted.
After reading the report from the Worker’s Compensation Board, no one party was at fault. There had been several factors at play with regards to the voltage going through the rectifier, and the fact that Wayne was performing tasks only intended to be performed by a certified electrician, which he most certainly was not. Mostly what I got out of reading the report was that his death, this work site “accident” could have been prevented.
Wayne was 25. He had a bright future as a chemical engineer. And now he’s one of 14,190 Canadians that died for no particular reason.
I’ve struggled for years with the suddenness of his death. I tried to tell myself that I was fine, people all over the world go through this too. I felt like I didn’t have the right to be angry with the rest of the world, after all, there were still people much worse off than I. But in doing so, I didn’t allow myself to find a way to come to terms with what had happened. When I heard an ad on the radio for The National Day of Mourning on April 28th, I felt like now I could give it a reason, even if it’s just to put my own mind at ease. He died so someone else wouldn’t have to.
I often forget just how little it takes to prevent an accident. Turning off your phone while driving, inspecting your equipment to make sure it’s safe, not performing a task you’re not specifically trained to do even though you may have done it before. And then something comes up to remind me of Wayne. And paying attention resurfaces as a priority in every task I perform.
My brother died so you and I wouldn’t have to, at least not from something we could have prevented. So, on April 28th, I’ll be joining people from over 80 other countries around the world not only to remember the dead, but to help protect the living. I hope you’ll join us too.
Earth Day: The impact we make is beyond a piece of litter.
April 22, 2010 § 1 Comment
A friend of mine lent me a book called “The Hundred Year Lie” by Randall Fitzgerald. The first half of the book was a depressing read about all of the chemicals and synthetics that have made their way into our food and the resulting increase in cancer, diabetes, obesity, number and level of toxins contained in our blood, etc. I struggled to get through that part of the book. When I reached the second half, it was a welcomed read about eating better, making more natural and/or organic choices, basically taking ownership about what we’re putting into our bodies and being accountable for the results.
One part that stuck out for me especially is when Randall Fitzgerald talks about the rise in male breast reduction surgeries. He attributes it to there being so many more hormones in the water today because the birth control pill has become so commonly used among women and there is no process to remove it from a city’s water system.
This kind of indirect result of increased use of birth control made it’s way to the forefront of my thoughts as I read a friend’s Facebook status this morning:
Rea Sauter wishes you a happy Earth day! Pick up some litter today, or pick up a new green daily choice. It’s your planet & your karma.
It is my planet and my karma. Combined with the new outlook to treat my body better from reading “The Hundred Year Lie” and the fact that whatever we put into our environment affects the health and wellness of other people, I suggest we all look not only to pick up some pieces of litter, but also to think about the foods you eat and the products you use, the chemicals that are in them, and the impact beyond today that they have on our planet and on your fellow man.
Spring Cleaning
April 5, 2010 § 2 Comments
It’s almost March. And it’s a beautifully sunny day in Calgary. In my apartment, my entire south facing wall is nothing but a huge window and a sliding door overlooking 17th Avenue. I don’t live in a big building, it’s only 6 floors in all, but there aren’t any bigger buildings behind me, and so the sun shines into my little abode pretty much the entire day. Today is the first day in a long time that I’ve been in the right mindset to check in with myself, take inventory of where I’m at and just see how I’m doing. In these kinds of moments, I can spend 20 minutes, sometimes more, just gazing out the window. Focusing on each car that goes by, each bird riding a current, and how the sun falls on my favourite leather chair just so.
Today, as I settled in to ponder and my gaze headed out the window, I noticed just how dirty the windows had gotten over the winter. It’s funny how we sometimes don’t notice the build up of dirt and grime over time, or how we’re willing to look through the dirt to see the world because we don’t really feel like washing that window.
Somehow, gazing through dirt just didn’t cut it today. It was time to wash the windows. I have these microfibre clothes made by a company called Norwex. There’s one specifically for windows and glass. You don’t need any cleaning agents. Just some water and the cloth. And boy, that cloth can clean a window and make it sparkle better than any bottle of Windex I’ve ever tried. In all, it only took me about 20 minutes to clean off the dirt inside and out. I’m back on my couch and the difference 20 minutes… 20 MINUTES… made for a clearer view is phenomenal.
How much scum and dirt do we let pile up on ourselves and on how’re we’re seeing the world around us because we’re too lazy to take a few minutes to wipe it clean? I want to compare looking out my windows now to looking out of them before being washed to that drinking and driving commercial where it shows how much your vision is impaired after each drink. How much less clear is our perspective with each layer of dirt that settles in (on our windows or in our lives)?
I’m sure I’ll be going through this exercise again. A few months will pass and I’ll notice that my window isn’t quite as clear as it could be, and that’s just from day to day exposure. It makes me think about my own housekeeping, all of the things I’m exposed to day to day that I don’t notice until they build up and just how much better I feel after it’s all been wiped away. Whether we think our lives are currently well put together, or there’s a pile of dirt that seems to have built up and soiled what we have to show the world, and what we can see of it, there’s always going to be some housekeeping to do for optimal performance. The good thing is, it doesn’t have to take a lot of effort to wipe things clean again.
On Growth…
March 30, 2010 § 2 Comments
My mom once said to me “You know, I feel like I’ve learnt everything there is to know about myself.” That thought scared me. To me, that meant there was a ceiling to my growth, a limit to my potential. In that moment I vowed never to be in a place where I felt like I knew everything about myself.
You’ve heard that people don’t actually change, right? Except that we do. We just may not want to see it, or acknowledge it. If people don’t change, we think we know them. If we think we know them, we feel safe, because we think we have them figured out. We know what their patterns are, their actions, their behaviours. They’re predictable. Predictable people don’t change. But, if we don’t change, we don’t grow and if we don’t grow, what else is there for us to do except to pass on?
I think my vow to never be in a place where I had reached my potential wasn’t really all that necessary. Because, really, the day I stop growing will be the day that I die. It’s impossible to go through life without becoming something we weren’t in the previous moment. And none of us can go backwards, we can only go forwards. Therefore, we can never shrink, we can only grow. Yet growth may be in one direction versus another, because where we feel we’ve reached our potential, we’ve automatically put a limit on ourselves as to how far we can go.
We’ll never be the same person twice. We can never recreate the same circumstances unless in a controlled environment, and yet, if we’re in a controlled environment, there is a limit to what we can learn. There are a finite number of things that can happen. That’s what’s exciting about life. It’s uncontrolled. We are not in control. And because of that, we must always grow and adapt to what’s happening around us.
I’ll never be in a place where growth isn’t an option. At least not until I leave this earth. Growth is inevitable. It’s another fundamental truth to life. Whoever you think I am today, know that I’ve already found new ways and directions to grow and whoever you were in that moment, you’ve grown beyond that too.
You do it to yourself…
March 8, 2010 § 1 Comment
You do it to yourself, you do
and that’s what really hurts
You do it to yourself, just you
you and no-one else
You do it to yourself
You do it to yourself
Oh Radiohead. How much truth is in this chorus, well, you probably know because you wrote them. The song, however has just implanted itself into my brain after a morning of doubt and fumbling, and some resulting blog posts.
I really did it to myself. I did, and that’s what really hurts, I did it to myself, just me. Me and no-one else. I did it to myself.
What did I do exactly? Well I let doubt get the better of me. As much as I wish I were at the point that I could spot doubt as it was starting to plant its seed and pull it out then and there like a weed that has not yet rooted itself in the ground, I am not. And as of today, I generally acknowledge doubt after it’s had it’s way with me a few times. And when it’s done, all I can think is “I’ve done it to myself.”
However, what’s the use in beating myself up over it? There isn’t any. Doubting myself doesn’t have to really hurt. Not if I don’t let it, and not if I choose to learn from it instead of letting it get the better of me. Because if I did it to myself, I can undo it to myself. I can move past it, or I can dwell on it. I’ve never learnt anything from dwelling on an issue, but I’ve certainly learnt much from moving past it.
The choice seems an easy one now… and Radiohead’s lyrics… more a chance to blame than an opportunity to move beyond.
It’s all in my head: How visualization has helped me
February 22, 2010 § 2 Comments
I’ve been reading The Secret over the last couple of months. It hasn’t taken me a couple of months to get through it, but I’ve been reading it over and over, letting it sink in, seeing if I could swallow what the author is saying or if I thought she was missing the ball. I think, that like anything else, there is some truth to what she is saying, but there are important elements about myself that I have had to recognize to find a way to make what The Secret is about work for me.
Take, for instance, the idea of visualization. If you visualize what you want, it will become reality. The mind has a tough time differentiating between imagination and reality, so by visualizing what you want, it will come to pass because your mind already thinks it’s real. And to some degree, I think this does work, but, I’ve found that I’ve had to make a few modifications for it to be successful. See, for me, I need to know where that difference is between reality and make believe. I’m all too willing to believe that what’s in my mind is true today. Except that half the time, this isn’t the case. And without recognizing that fact, I would never have believed that visualization could be a successful exercise in getting what I want. Because I wouldn’t have seen that sometimes, visualizing what you want isn’t enough, sometimes the stuff around me needs for me to be present in it and take action in it as well in order for this to work
I live the majority of my life in my own head. That sounds a bit absurd to write, if I wasn’t in my own head, who’s head would I be in? Well, nobody’s. Just my own. But what I’m getting at here is that I have always had an incredibly active imagination. And in some cases, that imagination has gotten me through some tough times. It’s been my cocoon from life’s events that may have otherwise taken me down. But it’s also kept me in a world entirely of my own.
I’ve had some very good relationships in my head. I’ve loved and I’ve lost. I’ve overcome so many barriers… except that many of them never made it past the walls of my cocoon. And that’s where I’ve found the greatest benefit for me with visualization. It’s helped me see where there’s a disconnect between what I see in my mind as true and what the situation around me actually is. It’s reinforced the importance of balance in my life. Balance of work, balance of friends, and balance in the amount of time I spend upstairs, and how much I’m out taking action, ensuring that what I find when I close my eyes is what I will find when I open them.
When they don’t match, that’s when I know I’ve got some work to do. But that’s the easiest place for me to get tripped up – when I think everything is going according to plan, but I’ve only checked in with myself, not with the situation around me.
I’m not sure how many people out there are like me, and how many are the opposite. But I do know that living in either extreme does not get me any closer to having what I see internally and what I see externally mirroring one another. How about you? What kinds of things do you use to keep yourself in check and on track?
The Muse and Views 