"Eyes are the windows to the soul" ~Unknown

I disagree.

There's just something about music that can speak so eloquently.

I love music. It's one of my joys in life, along with (have you guessed?) writing. The thrill I feel when I hear a tune for the first time that... how to put it without sounding ridiculously cheesy?... connects with me. Funny that, as a writer, I connect quicker with the melody - not the lyrics - of a song.

Music touches you in some innate way, more than anything else ever could. Beyond the most poetic words and the loveliest expressions, music speaks to the human soul the most profoundly. Music inspires; it gives and it takes. It needs no language; it is.

It's mysterious - one melody is put together to form something beyond what words can say. Tiny atoms are thrown together, in this cosmic universe, without accident to create something beautiful.

But... couple the music with words, and you have something that can give warmth and melt a frozen statue.

It's strange what music can do. It can throw me into a completely different mood, or I can lose myself in it. One instance, late at night, one song even made me cry. Sad songs can make my heart ache; the voices that sing are filled with such an aching and longing that I can't help but feel it too.

The deep chords, the right instruments, and the pure notes, and an expressive voice can do wonders. I can easily lose myself in music, however lame my musical taste (I can't help my pathetic taste). Lots of times, I will just zone out when I listen to music. Why?

It reaches somewhere deep inside me, past my subconscious, into my core - into what gives me hope, sadness, what makes my heart weep or leap for joy. Somewhere, the music rushes down into my being, and releases my imagination. When I hear good music, my mind goes soaring. Bits of stories, flashes of feelings, snippets of emotions, even vivid colors - I see these, in my mind's eye, as different pieces capture different parts of me.

But what intrigues me is that these feelings and emotions aren't mine. They belong to the writer of such a piece. How can one being pour so much of his heart and soul into one chord, one progression of notes, one resounding chorus, so that the listener feels what they feel? And so acutely?

The writer and listener both, for one short moment in eternity, transcend time and space and beat with one heart.

That, truly, is the essence of being human.

what makes you different makes you beautiful

Last fall, when I went to visit my old gym coach, she told me, "Don't change."

God..... she's so right. Maria's always had good advice, but I didn't realize what she meant by it.

To change yourself to become someone's idea of a better person is ridiculous, stupid, and just plain BS.

But at the same time, to stay static is to refuse change, improvement, and growth..... How can I word this the way I'm trying to say it?

Don't change your looks, your ideas and opinions, your person to satisfy someone else. Don't stay static out of fear you'll become different. Grow as a person, but don't degrade yourself by succumbing to the demands and the pressure of others to become someone you aren't and never will be. No matter how hard it is, stay true to yourself.

I know it's cliche, how everyone says "Be true to yourself". The thing is, they never tell you how difficult it is, how it may happen without you realizing it. And they never tell you how difficult it is to go back to being yourself after you've been impersonating others for so long.

There was nothing wrong with me last year, when I listened to alternative music, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, and laughed when I felt like it. People liked me for me because I didn't care what other people thought.

Somehow, sometime last spring, I became different; I paid more attention to what people thought of me and I cared. @$&%! I became one of them.

But no more.

I am me.

Don't like it? Sucks for you, cause there is nothing you can do about it. There is no reason I should change myself to please others; if changing myself for you is what I have to do to be approved, you weren't worth my time in the first place.