Out of my head

and into my body.  So I’ve been thinking about a few different things and starting to understand something finally.  First I was thinking about why it is that I catch myself barely breathing when engrossed in a highly intellectual task, like programming.  I finally consciously understand why.  When I’m doing that, I’m completely disconnected from my body.  My awareness is completely in my head where I’m doing all my thinking.  Thus, my body reverts to doing the bare minimum needed to keep me alive, which equals shallow breaths.  As soon as I return my attention to my body I notice it and start deeper breathing.  This is something I’m working on throughout the day.

Also, while at work I’ve been listening to tapes of my playing from back in high school.  One tape in particular is my senior jazz concert.  It was painful at times.  Granted, most of these kids had no idea what jazz was and sounded as white as they looked.   And I, for all my knowledge, sound much younger than I realized before.  Though, I may be overly critical now, considering how little I also knew.  But, the advantage of living in a small town is that you can be considered awesome when you would otherwise be just a midlevel player somewhere else.  Though, as a side though, I fully believe if I went to a powerhouse music school like New Trier I would have stepped up and been a much better player.  After all, I stepped up at camp every year surrounded by those students.

So, for a day or so I was thinking I sucked.  I can hear mistakes in the tape from Birch Creek also, which further taints my view.  But then I remember other times.  Like the year the group of kids from East St. Louis adopted me as an honorary black kid.  (I’m too tired to try to be pc right now)  I honestly don’t know what they heard from me, and I even remember wondering that at the time, but I went with it.  Hell, it was a completely new experience for me since there were only a literal handful of black people in my town, and I didn’t go to school with any until high school.  lol  So I had to have some good musical qualities for them to pay any attention to me.  And another year (or perhaps the same year, they run together) I was in one of the top combos, led by Reggie Thomas.  I was still pretty young as a drummer, but I know there were times when I did some good things.  As he said, “Jackie was Jackie’n”. (reference to a TS Monk song Jackieing) But then again, he’s also the nicest person in the world, so maybe he was being nice.  Actually, no, he was sincere.  I can’t allow my insecurities to taint what actually happened.  He was excited when he said it, and there’s no hiding that excitement that comes from a good feeling moment.

Now, the relevance here is that, when I think about what I’m playing, I suck.  My feel is off, my time gets off, my focus just isn’t where it should be.  But when I can relax and just be in the moment, I think that’s when everything clicks and everything I do feels good.  That’s when I’m “Jackie’n”.  If I want to not suck at music I have to continue working to stay in the now, stay unified, and just flow.  I need to practice, of course, so I have tools available to me to be in that moment, but this is the key.  It’s the key for life really.

At this point, it’s impossible for me to not get this message.  I’ve caught it about breathing, from aikido in multiple ways, and when thinking about music.  I am starting to believe that once I develop the discipline to stay in the now more and maintain connection with my body at least, reducing unnecessary tension and breathing, then I will have made a huge leap.  And then things will really start moving again in tangible ways.

So this is what has been slowly churning in my head.

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