The Widetrack Chronicles 22: Life Force

The Windetrack Chronicles 22: Life Force

Last week, in our private Facebook group, I posted a question:

"What's your opinion: Is the world getting better, or worse? Feel free to explain why you believe this way..."

I was a bit surprised that the majority of the people answered, "Worse"...

I've been thinking a lot about this over the last few days...

I remember that magical time of childhood when life for most of us is so full of possibility... For me, it was superheroes... I absolutely worshiped Spider-Man, Daredevil, Ghost Rider, Batman, etc... The storylines that accompanied these characters' amazing artwork would stir my imagination to reach beyond the boredom and frustrations of pre-teen suburban life...

Then, at 8 years old, I discovered KISS...

Nothing could have prepared me for this... Rock stars and superheroes combined??? For the next two years, this was what it was all about for my friends and I...

Then adolescence hit... All at once, there was nothing more uncool than KISS... My heroes were now the rock bands I was hearing on popular rock radio: Led Zeppelin... The Rolling Stones... AC/DC... Black Sabbath... Rush...

These bands, and many more like them, gave my life a sense of meaning... I realized that I had to become a musician... I knew in my bones that this was what I was born to do...

Then I started playing in my own bands... What a fantastic youth it was to have rock and roll be such a big part of my life... The future was so full of possibility... I really believed all my dreams were going to come true, just as I imagined they would...

But as youth passes into the trial-by-fire of "growing up", life throws so many ups and downs at us... The personal victories and tragedies one goes through... The love and loss... Dreams and disillusion...

Little by little, many of us start to believe that the magic isn't real... We've seen how the trick is performed... It's all just misdirection and sleight of hand... The world starts taking on a less colorful hue...

And so, we seek other escapes... Sex... Partying... Drugs... Buying things... Whatever it takes to escape from this nagging feeling that the magic has faded...

We then seek out evidence that our cynical worldview is accurate... Such validation is easy to find... One scroll through the newsfeeds of our preferred social media platforms shows us all the proof we need of just how insanely off-track things have gotten...

When viewed from this perspective, I don't know... maybe things are getting worse...

In many ways, things are seriously bad out there these days...There's no guarantee that this planet will even survive another generation... or another second, for that matter...

I remember when my father passed away at the young age of 57... My "life anchor" of believing that only good things happen to good people was suddenly gone... It became horrifically clear that life really isn't fair... There are zero guarantees; anything can happen at any time...

For a time, this messed with my head in a big way... I became deeply cynical about the future... The negativity and "why even bother?" attitude began eating me alive...

Something had to change...

I realized that I had to begin making a serious effort to form the new habit of diverting my thoughts from the things I can't do anything about, and focus on the ones I can influence...

In his best-selling book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen Covey talks about Proactive Focus vs. Reactive Focus, and working within/expanding our Circle of Influence...

Proactive behavior involves acting in advance of a future situation, rather than just reacting. It means taking control and making things happen rather than just adjusting to a situation or waiting for something to happen...

Covey writes:

"We each have a wide range of concerns—our health, our children, problems at work, the national debt, nuclear war. We could separate those from things in which we have no particular mental or emotional involvement by creating a “Circle of Concern.”

"As we look at those things within our Circle of Concern, it becomes apparent that there are some things over which we have no real control and others that we can do something about. We could identify those concerns in the latter group by circumscribing them within a smaller Circle of Influence. By determining which of these two circles is the focus of most of our time and energy, we can discover much about the degree of our proactivity."

"Proactive people focus their efforts in the Circle of Influence. They work on the things they can do something about. The nature of their energy is positive, enlarging and magnifying, causing their Circle of Influence to increase. Reactive people, on the other hand, focus their efforts in the Circle of Concern. They focus on the weakness of other people, the problems in the environment, and circumstances over which they have no control. Their focus results in blaming and accusing attitudes, reactive language, and increased feelings of victimization. The negative energy generated by that focus, combined with neglect in areas they could do something about, causes their Circle of Influence to shrink."

"As long as we are working in our Circle of Concern, we empower the things within it to control us. We aren’t taking the proactive initiative necessary to effect positive change."

This idea served as a major theme behind one of the key tracks that will be on the new Widetrack album...

Like many other times in my life, music saved me... Maybe it's not music for you... but I'd be willing to bet that there's something positive and fulfilling you want to do with this all-too-brief time each of us has here on this earth...

As previously stated, besides the creation, production and performance of our music, one of the main missions of this band is:

"To build a network of true friendships, cooperating towards spreading the influence of excellent things - whether they be music, art, movies, writing, coaching, etc. - and thereby do our part in helping make the world a better place..."

For the purposes of this particular blog, I would like to emphasize the last sentence, "...and thereby do our part in helping make the world a better place..."

The things we do can make a difference... This starts with resisting the urge of accepting that things are only going to get worse...

Keep fighting the good fight, my friends... ;)

Always love hearing from you! Feel free to respond: Ron@widetrackmusic.com

And if you’d like to join our Facebook group, we’d love to have you:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/Widetrackband/

The Widetrack Chronicles 22: Life Force

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