The Power of Music

     Music. Such a short, simple word, yet to those who recognize it's significance it becomes a word loaded with meaning: to them music is the stem of thoughts, emotions, memories, life experiences, hopes and dreams.

     Music has the potential to heal an aching heart; to soothe the pain of life's struggles; to inspire someone to greatness; and to bring joy to the heart, mind and body.

     Music means a lot to me personally. As a pianist, when I play my music there's this undercurrent of energy that I feel connecting me to the music I play. My fingers play the keys; my thoughts, while varied, echo the cadence and feeling of the song; depending on the song, I sometimes relive different memories, and match the emotions connected to those memories with the intonations of the song, telling myself a story of the past; i'm emotionally involved in my music, an experience that, at it's height, actually floods my brain with a rush of dopamine that gives me a literal high.

     Music helps me connect with other people in more ways than one. Of course, it's always fun talking shop with fellow pianists and sharing music, sometimes taking turns playing our songs. More significant are some of my fondest memories of dancing with my beautiful girlfriend Maryssa; she's an amazing dancer (naturally i've got to be pretty good to keep up with her hahaha:) and when we're dancing--our bodies close, sometimes touching, staring into each other's eyes, laughing, smiling, moving with the music--the music sets the mood and prepares tinder for a flame, then the dancing lights a fire that burns inside the both of us, stoking our emotions: feelings of joy, love, happiness, and fun! It's quite a rush! In this way dancing and, by extension, music, is the conduit by which we re-experience true happiness over and over again.

     The music I listen to reflects my mood or my current activity. When I workout I listen to rock; when I do math homework I often listen to piano; when i'm reading scriptures I listen to hymns and LDS music; when i'm in the shower I listen to several other Pandora stations; and other random times I listen to various types of music channels and genres. 

     So overall music is definitely an important part of my life! I don't know if it means as much to any of you who might read this, but I hope you at least enjoyed the read!

  Coming Unto Christ and Recognizing the Voice of the Adversary


  Lately i've been working a lot more diligently on developing spiritually. It's interesting to me how, as i've progressed in becoming closer to the spirit and coming unto Christ, there are things that I never clearly recognized in the past that now appear so black and white.

     Case in point: The scriptures frequently mention that there must be opposition in all things,   e.g.    2 Nephi 2;11  "For it must needs be that there is opposition in all things. If not so...righteousness could not be brought to pass, neither wickedness, neither holiness nor misery, neither good nor bad...."
(That's a verse found in the Book Of Mormon, for any non-LDS/Mormon person who might read this random blog)
So for us to be happy, there must be sadness and trials. For us to find joy, there must also be pain. That's just how it works. But we're not alone! Christ is there to guide us in our journey, if we'll just reach out to Him =)

     The reason I bring this up? Well i've been trying harder to make good decisions and keep negative, spiritually detrimental things out of my life. More recently i've been having a lot of success, which is wonderful, but i've noticed that the more I try to be good the more the adversary tries to stop me from doing good things and developing spiritually. I recognize this happening every day. I know for a fact that reading my scriptures will make me happy and uplift me spiritually and often emotionally. I consciously recognize that. But every time I think about reading my scriptures there is immediately a voice in my head that tells me "it'll take too much time; it'll be boring; it's too much work; I don't want to stop what i'm doing now; I can read them later; it's not that important." That part of my consciousness is really Satan trying to worm his way into my head and convince me not to do something that he knows will push him away. I regret to admit that most of the time I sit down to read my scriptures it is with a bit of reluctance, often accompanied by impatience, and I think to myself that i'll just read a chapter or two and get it out of the way so I can go back to doing other things. But without fail it's always a great experience for me in one way or another!

     And that's only one example: Every time I think of doing something positive and spiritually uplifting there's a counter-thought; every time i'm in a positive and uplifting environment there's a negative thought or idea or image that flashes into my head; every time I do something good it's immediately followed by a temptation; every time I start feeling better about myself and where i'm at in my personal progression, something happens to try and tear me down. The list just goes on and on!

     The only difference is that now that i'm trying to stay on the path, and i'm opening myself to the Spirit a lot more, I can actually recognize these things and take measures against them. It's not easy, and I often fail, but with Heavenly Father's help i'm doing better.

       Patience Is A Virtue, Success is Earned

     Patience is definitely a quality that I tend to struggle with. Unfortunately, it is also something that is becoming more and more necessary for me to use on a daily basis due to some changing life situations. My difficulties with keeping my patience have led to some unpleasant situations...situations that could have been avoided with the thoughtful application of aforementioned virtue.

     My father recently sat me down and had a talk with me. One of the points that he stressed was that patience, for him, is a learned behavior; but because of his patience and persistent hard work over the last few decades, this past year he made "ten times more money that 90% of the people in the United States." My father has become a hugely successful businessman because of his "persistent execution of the fundamental basics of success."

     So what are the fundamental basics of success?

- Patience

- Diligence

- Persistence

- Hard work

- Never quit (unless quitting achieves a better outcome than staying the course)

- Be honest in everything you do

- Stay positive

- Keep your goals in mind

     After my conversation with my father I sort of re-evaluated my life and thought about how I measured up to these basics of success. From a scale of 1-10, 1 being awful and 10 being amazing, this is how I rated myself:

- Patience? 5-6

- Diligence? 4

- Persistence? 4

- Hard work? 5-7

- Never quit? 6

- Be honest? 6-8

- Stay positive? Well for the past month or so, my rating for myself on this one would be a 3 :/

- Keep my goals in mind? honestly I tend to be more of an in-the-moment person, so I often lose focus of my long-term goals. I'd rate myself a 4 or 5 overall :/

     So obviously I could be doing better. Of course I want to be successful, but I struggle with these fundamental things that apparently lay the foundation to great success in the long run. 

     But what can I do to get better at these things? Well i'm not entirely sure tbh. Practice? Find better motivation? Don't be a sloth? Idk, I don't really have all the answers. 

     But I do know one thing; Patience is a virtue and success is earned. Keeping that in mind and putting in the effort needed to get ahead in life, and to be happier in my personal life, is something that i'll be sure to work harder at from now on. I know I won't be entirely successful at first, but everyone has setbacks and trial and error is part of the learning process. And who knows where i'll be in a few years? I sure don't, despite my hopes and plans for the future. But we'll see. Success is calling, and I think i'll answer the phone this time :P