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Raw 'n' Uncut: The Beauty of Beauty
27 Plays1 month ago
Some things are so beautiful that they make you cry!
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Transcript
Embracing Raw Creativity
00:00:01
Speaker
Welcome, friends, to another episode of life's effin' no nuts. Raw and uncut. And when I say raw and uncut, I mean raw and uncut. Zero editing. And it's not because I'm lazy. It's because for right now,
00:00:30
Speaker
I'm more interested in the exploration of creating. i I want to give myself the freedom to explore. I don't want to be in the refining process, the perfection process.
00:00:52
Speaker
And I don't think I'm hurting anyone by by putting out content that's raw and uncut.
00:01:02
Speaker
So I'm just gonna go with it. I enjoy it. Hopefully it's not so obscure that it's meaningless or or like completely disengaging. But even if it is, I still find value in it. I still enjoy the process. I'm still learning about myself. It's also like, as I mentioned last time, like I called it a spiritual bath. It's like an energetic release for me. It's just good for my soul and spirit. Cleanses me.
00:01:32
Speaker
um and in i kind of think it It reminds me a little bit.
Inspiration from Ta-Nehisi Coates
00:01:39
Speaker
There's the writer Ta-Nehisi Coates and i I read his book called, We Were Eight Years in Power, several years ago. Great book. it and The book takes eight essays that he wrote in the Atlantic magazine and compiles them in one book and then he ah About the Obama era the Obama years in presidency and his presidency and in between each Article in the book he does kind of like a little mini essay Reflecting back on the time when he wrote the article and he in those little mini essays. He talks a lot about the development of his writing career ah his creative process and
00:02:21
Speaker
And I think, I mean, the whole book is brilliant and beautiful, but those those little micro essays were the things that really resonated deeply with me. And he basically talked about how you know he wasn't a formally trained writer. He started kind of blogging for himself, trying to make sense of the world you know in public view um on these blogs and just discussing different topics and just being in the process of exploration and creativity and creation.
00:02:52
Speaker
And over time, through that iterative symbiotic process with his audience, he developed his his thinking crystallized. his He was able to push his ideas further.
00:03:08
Speaker
And I've always resonated with that very deeply. And in some ways, like this is my version of that, that it's I enjoy. It feels almost like a lunch pail mentality. I enjoy spending 10 to 15 minutes a day exploring different thoughts and ideas and and stories. So that's that's another little meta analysis.
00:03:39
Speaker
little meta-analysis of what this raw and uncut ah journey is for me. and And I might, as I continue with this process, I might probably, in many episodes, will give little meta-analysis. I think that is part of the fascination for me, is is not only exploring a variety of content,
00:04:05
Speaker
but also exploring the nature of content creation in and of itself, if that makes sense.
Bob Dylan's Impact on Life
00:04:15
Speaker
And so today, I want to talk briefly about beauty. Beauty. And you may have heard, there's a ah biopic about Bob Dylan coming out called A Complete Unknown. Timothy Chalamet is playing Bob.
00:04:34
Speaker
And for those of you who've heard the podcast before, you know that Bob Dylan's music had a massive, massive influence on on me, on my life, um on my development, like massive. i I don't think I can...
00:04:50
Speaker
say that enough, how massive of an influence it had. It was probably the most influential ingredient or variable in my, and my like starting from my age 15 to, I don't know, age 25 in my development. It it was it was had such a profound and and and wide impact on me.
00:05:19
Speaker
And sometimes I think about that and I'm like, I like that it's like i i feel like like I'm being hyperbolic, like, oh, okay, JR, like this this little scrawny kid from Hibbing, Minnesota changed your life. Okay, JR. Okay, JR. It sounds kind of cheesy, or even kind of cliche. Cheesy, cliche, or hyperbolic, right?
00:05:49
Speaker
And so I'm always like, okay, like maybe they're like maybe and and also like romanticized in some ways. Like I won't stop talking about it. um But but I think it was Friday a few days ago. I i just had to and I don't listen to that much Bob Dylan anymore. I also have my little moments where I'll go back and listen, but I don't have the same relationship to the music that I used to, but I'll have these little moments.
00:06:18
Speaker
where I'll just like, ooh, I'll have like a vision of hearing a particular song. And so I was eating my lunch, taking a little lunch break from work on Friday, and I put on, um i think i can I think I put on like this very obscure Bob Dylan song that never even made it on a record called The Ballad of Donald White. And I'm sitting there eating my lunch, listening to the song, and I'm just like,
00:06:50
Speaker
I was reminded, I was reminded of part of the reason it was so meaningful and impactful for me is that it just felt so goddamn beautiful, like overwhelmingly beautiful. And as I'm sitting there eating my lunch, like my little whatever I was eating pasta, angel hair pasta, Italian sausage, I start, I'm like crying.
00:07:19
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, like, it's it's it's beautiful. It's fucking beautiful. It's fucking beautiful. Like, forget all of for me, like, forget all the mythologizing of it and the endless stories that I want to tell about why the music so important, this, that and the other.
00:07:42
Speaker
The biggest aspect of it is that for me, it's just so fucking beautiful. and And that might sound a little strange because commonly Bob Dylan is thought to have a a ah grading, G-R-A-T-I-N-G, voice. like he's not he's known to not Not only is he not known to have a good voice, he's known to have a bad voice. That that is the thing that turns people off, but that was just never my experience.
The Allure of Dylan's Voice
00:08:15
Speaker
I find his voice so hypnotizing and so entrancing. and maybe Maybe when I first started getting into the music, there was a little bit of a barrier with the voice. like it just The music sounded kind of weird. It wasn't pleasant. But after listening to the music for 25 years,
00:08:37
Speaker
the And the resistances go away. And then the the voice and the tone and the rhythm and the melodies and the words and the stories, they just they but they I had no barriers against them. they They would just go straight into my soul.
00:08:57
Speaker
And i guess I guess as I was sitting there Friday crying at my lunch,
00:09:06
Speaker
i it I don't even know. it just it felt like I felt like had these large feelings about life and humanity and the nature of beauty, that that life can be so complex, so sad, so stressful, so upsetting, so confusing.
00:09:31
Speaker
So many things. It's so disorienting it can and so many things that are unpleasant, life can be. I mean, Buddha said that all life is suffering, right? And i and often I'm like, man, Buddha is right. this's It's just so, you know, like we get old, people pass away, time marches on, dreams die, disappointments happen. like
00:09:58
Speaker
life Life can be a lot, especially, the the and wars, oppression, all these horrible, vile things.
Is Beauty Objective?
00:10:11
Speaker
Yet, somehow, someway, there's this thing called beauty. And I don't even know how to explain it or what makes something beautiful.
00:10:22
Speaker
But their beauty exists. I truly believe that beauty exists objectively. i don't And I'm sure people have studied it to like be able to identify and and like define what beauty is. And maybe i maybe I would actually enjoy reading a little bit about that because maybe it would make it even more rich for me to understand why that's happening, why I hear a song and and and it hits me, it literally like hits me like ah like like a force and then tears just stream out of me. but i'm i i And I think maybe this is why, if I don't generally identify as an artist, but if I was to and i identify as an artist, it would be because of this. Because I have such, I'm so,
00:11:13
Speaker
It feels like a predisposition to beauty that that I'm so drawn to beauty and so fascinated by beauty. I think that if I was to identify as an artist, that's why I would. Anyway, and the last little thing I'll say, as I was sitting there at my lunch, crying, listening to a Bob Dylan song from 60 years ago,
00:11:40
Speaker
um I also thought of back in the day, um and and you've heard, if you've listened to this show, you've heard some of this.
Finding Beauty in Simple Moments
00:11:50
Speaker
I and i think 2004, I took a Greyhound bus to Oklahoma and then I hitchhiked to New York City and I spent the summer in New York City ah living in like squares and parks, living basically outside, unless it was raining, I would get a hostel room. um And I got a job at this place called Sprout.
00:12:11
Speaker
And Sprout was an organization for developmentally disabled adults and um basically like three staff people would take a group of roughly 14 participants on these really cool trips. One time when we went on like a baseball trip and we went to um ah Philadelphia Phillies game and in Philadelphia and and a couple minor league games. One in Reading, Pennsylvania, one in Delaware, and another time we went up to the Finger Lakes in in upstate New York. Gorgeous. um And another time we went down to nash r two but ah to Tennessee, to Nashville, and to Memphis. We went to Graceland. We went to the Grand Ole Opry.
00:12:55
Speaker
And on this one particular trip, the Tennessee trip, there was this this man, this participant. And and I'm not sure... i' not sure um Exactly. you know There was ah a number of the participants had Down syndrome, but there was there was a variety of um conditions that these participants had. This particular man, I'm not sure exactly um what his story was or diagnosis was,
00:13:22
Speaker
um but he had a he he talked in an incredibly throaty way. It was very difficult to understand what he was saying. He he would kind of talk like this. like or um And so that that to me was like kind of the biggest impediment. like um he Yeah, so he he he was very difficult to understand, um but he was very, very smart um and very kind of dynamic and complex guy. And I formed this bond with him. He was a really cool, interesting guy. And and over time, I started to learn how to how to like hear what he was saying, even though it was really difficult to make out.
00:14:02
Speaker
um And I remember being at the Granol Opry in Nashville. If you're not familiar the Granol Opry, I don't even know the history of it. Basically, it's like probably I think 75 years or something like that. It's a country music show that happens on Saturday nights. And I don't know if they still do it, but they used to um syndicate
Music's Emotional Impact
00:14:21
Speaker
the show nationally and it would play on the radio all across the country. It was a kind of a big deal.
00:14:26
Speaker
And so we're at the ground, the Opry, it's this beautiful old theater and there's beautiful music. And I'm kind of, I'm really into it. It's a very cool scene. I grew up um very interested in country music and and that whole scene and the whole vibe. And so we're there and I, during one of the songs, I look over at this guy with a very throaty voice. He was sitting next to me.
00:14:48
Speaker
And he has tears just streaming down his face, streaming down his face. like It's like he's splashed with a bucket of water. And I heard him in his very throaty way saying, like it's just so beautiful. It's just so beautiful. And i I've always remembered that little moment. And I i always remembered it kind of independently. like I just thought it was really sweet and beautiful and true. But as I was sitting there on Friday with my my little lunch and listen to the Bob Dylan song and tear stream down my face. I was like, not only was that a cool moment, but it was, it's kind of brilliant. Like, like that's, and, and I guess I don't even know what I want to say. I guess there's something like,
00:15:38
Speaker
there's you know There can be so many complex layers in life, like I mentioned before, and like so many different ways that we show up in life, especially as we get older, we become more guarded, more defensive, ah least most of us do at least.
00:15:51
Speaker
um And our our personalities become more hardened, we become more cynical, more jaded, all these different things, all these different layers.
Primal Beauty in Human Experience
00:16:01
Speaker
But that i I feel like the brilliance of of that man crying is that beneath the surface, all those layers of hurt and disappointment and ego and pride and deception and duplicity beneath all that, that I believe at least that for most of us, probably there is this just this raw, raw, I don't know, like,
00:16:28
Speaker
primal beings, these raw primal, we we are these raw primal beings beneath all the layers of all that crap and that often there's an incredible just earth shattering beauty too to that rawness.
00:16:44
Speaker
I don't know if I'm fully articulating that last point, but i I'm just gonna go with that. End it there, and you can make of it what you will. Anyway, I'm JR, your host, life's effin' nuts, one man's stories and ruminations on being human in an upside down world. Catch y'all soon.