MUSE

Muse started the concert with Uprising. When I heard that first note, my body responded--the core of me moved forward as though it was being pulled magnetically. I couldn't stop smiling and singing. It's true, with Muse I come out of myself. The music takes me infinitely outward and what a welcome change that is.

Muse knows how to capture emotion as my friend said last night. Even with all the props and lights, it's all on purpose. One could say Muse is over the top but because they know how to capture and relay emotion, one becomes a wave in the ocean of life. There's no way around it. Bellamy's voice, the way each of the band mates play their respective instruments, the lyrics, the dynamic relationship between the members--there's so much synergy and power created.

I enjoyed watching them in their element. There isn't anything more beautiful than being a witness to that, than getting lost in the to and fro of sound and movement, than watching masters of their craft in action. And isn't this what we all strive for? To be connected with something we love in order to express that which moves us? To fuse with that something that highlights our strengths, that expresses emotion, that in turn, inspires others? Listening to Muse inspires me to be better, to do better, to create, to claim what's mine and let go of what isn't.

I can travel to distant places. I can see the warrior that is me. I can feel the cold of space. I can see the nebulae, the supernovae, and all those misty pink, orange, and purple colours. I can see every star, every speck of dust and realize nothing is ever destroyed, only transformed. You can throw out a piece of paper or light a match to it, it still exists. I guess it's true when they say that change is the only constant. Change and I haven't always been friends. When I took a nice long look at my surroundings last night in the midst of sound, joy, and light, a silence began to emerge and dominate, a deep silence with such clarity of purpose that I was forced to listen to it, acknowledge it, respect it. My my, how apparent it felt to me in my present that in one hundred years, the faces in that stadium would all be different, that I, the crowd, and Muse would eventually cease to be as we know it, in some unknown time we call future. Muse's Time is Running Out never felt so poignant. But Muse will leave something behind. Each of them does already. Let's hope we all do in some way or another. This is what inspiration promises.

Thank goodness for moments of denial, for sleep, for these little blessings. I don't want to be aware all of the time, not unless I'm prepared to see and understand their role and significance in their entirety. And since I lack a certain kind of wisdom but am aware of its existence, I'm willing to settle for things as I currently perceive them to be. How does one know when to take control or to surrender? When does something become an issue of faith versus one of hopelessness? I don't want to be a feather in the wind drifting aimlessly unless I want to be a feather in the wind drifting aimlessly. I want to matter, to materialize. I want to be seen in words and heard in the spaces between them. Let the dot above the i have meaning. Please. Let me have meaning and purpose.

With Muse, I see my limitations and the possibility of transcendence. I see what I can become with persistence, patience and dedication. And I also sense resistance and how equally powerful this is if I let it occupy my space. I see that I am a culmination of pattern, a kind of pattern that needs undoing, dismantling. Who's going to give me purpose? Where will I draw inspiration from? The only purpose we are given is the one we give to ourselves. Isn't that so? Don't we essentially create our own realities? Is there not an inherent difference in the perception between a glass being half full and one being half empty?

When I change my perception, the world changes too. Everything is possible. I am possible. Fear has no hold over me. I see it for what it is--a tool for transformation. Nothing stays the same for too long, does it? I'm not fond of how something begins and inevitably metamorphosizes into something different, whether beautiful or otherwise. I dislike the disintegration of spark and momentum, how excitement and anticipation can move and uplift me only to be transmuted or taken away somewhere down the line. And yet, there needs to be a dip, a moving downwards, in order to fully experience the highs. I should find peace in this except that I'm always too aware of the lows.

I want to be master too...