Music

I love music. I love listening to music. I love creating and performing music. If you do not like any kind of music I probably will not like you at all. Whatever. Anyway, there is something about music that keeps driving me towards an ultimate end. I think this "something" is the fact that I will constantly improving my abilities and searching for the perfect beat. For example, I have been playing guitar since I was 9 years old but I have gotten rusty since son was born. I also can keep a beat on the drums, but I would not be able to perform well for a crowd. This is because I am rusty on the guitar and I am not a good enough drummer to improvise beats or even have enough different beats for all the songs that I have guitar parts for. This may seem like a problem at first, and probably is, but I know what I have to do to fix it: practice. I just need to practice a lot to get back to the guitar playing abilities that I used to have and practice will help me with my drumming skills.

Music is my drugs. Instead of doing drugs to escape life or help deal with life, I use music to escape or to express my reaction towards the events that happen in life. I don't have any problems listening to music other than finding music that I like to listen to. I do, however, have problems creating my own music with the band that I have currently.

I am in a band here in Springfield Missouri call "Strictures."My band mates are often difficult to work with. Most of the time I do not have anything to do with the band until I actually go on stage to perform their work. We seem to be incompatible to the point that we cannot work together and make new music collaboratively. Anything that I bring to the table such as new basslines or anything, always gets rejected and criticized. When this happens I just turn my ideas into a song of my own and release it to the public as my "side-project." This doesn't bother me like some may think, because everyone, EVERYONE, tells me that they like my music better. What does bother me about this is: I can't seem to work with my best friends. They ARE my best friends and I love them dearly, but we cannot work together on the things that we all love more than almost anything. They just want me to perform their music because they have told me that they think I am the good looking one and I actually dance at our shows. This is an insult to me. Not the part about them calling me good looking, but the part about them thinking I am okay with their intentions.

To me, it seems that their intentions are to have me show up to band practice only to be a hype man. We do not accomplish anything during practice other than watch each other smoke cigarettes while "the drummer" just opens YouTube to entertain "the singer." To me, this is not a practice at all. This is just some friends hanging out listening to OTHER PEOPLES MUSIC.

I am so fed up with this crap that I am about the quit the band. We are playing every Monday night at the Magic Bean on Glenstone right now. Show up and ask for Jacob if you don't believe me. I will be showing up to play with my band today, Monday the 9th and if we as a group cannot find a solution or at least acknowledge this major issue then I will be officially quitting the band.

Since these guys are awesome people, I will continue to help all of their endeavors. However, I will only help them with our Monday night gigs by either opening or showcasing the night with MY OWN music.

Time

I suck at time management. There is never enough time to get anything accomplished and it gives me a headache. On top of all this, when I actually do try to get something done I am overwhelmed with some synonym of writer's block. This "universal writer's block" often prevents me in many different aspects of my life, such as: homework, working on new music, skateboarding, drawing, helping people, and probably more.

There has to be a way for me to overcome this. I have scheduled things for myself before, but I always lose the book or it gets destroyed somehow in some freak accident. Regrettably, what seems to be a good example is the word count of this post.

Word Count: 120

Decisions

It is nearly impossible for me to make decisions. Now, this statement is not entirely true. Sometimes I can just quickly react and the end result is fine, but other times if I am slow to react it Here is an example: I will go inside the gas station with the intention of buying some beer. Sometimes I will simply walk in and grab some beer and get out. And I will go home pleased with what I have brought home. If I just stand around and think about it too much I will almost always be disappointed. I will either feel that I paid too much for this beer or I will not like the way it tastes or something. People are in prison for making decisions so I feel that decisions are important. I can sit down and write a song in about 10 minutes and feel okay about it. Spending a lot of time on a song can either be good or bad too. It seems like making the decision to spend more time on a project can be a difficult task. For myself I guess I have to look at it and see whether or not I am wasting my time polishing a turd.

Word Count: 208

Aliens

On a summer afternoon many years ago my brother and I were shooting fireworks in our parent's friend's front yard. The adults were getting drunk in the hot tub. So my brother and I were minding our own business just playing as usual and then suddenly this giant black triangle showed up just above the trees. Immediately we turned and looked to see the horror in each other's face. I turn to look back at the immense object and notice out of the corner of my eye my brother shooting rockets at the damn thing. This instantly caused me to panic and try to stop him from showing aggression towards whatever is piloting this silent polygon. My next recollection is us both standing facing East as the huge craft slowly skids across the sky. This is when I notice a light in the center of the object that slowly pulsed from dark blue to bright blue. And it was gone. . .

My brother and I sprint to the garage where the adults are now extremely worried about us. We didn't understand why they were mad at us. We just wanted them to come see this thing in the sky. They were worried sick because to them we had been missing for over three hours. I thought they were just kidding. To me, we had only been outside about two or three minutes total. The only evidence that we had to show for ourselves was that we still had almost all of our fireworks left. I mean, what kid with fireworks just holds on to them for three hours? Well definitely not us.

Word Count: 269

I Believe

1. I believe that I am in over my head.
2. I believe that I do not know what is best for me.
3. I believe that I drink too much.
4. I believe that most people in my life are a pain in the ass.
5. I believe that I have lost touch with myself.
6. I believe that violence will solve many problems.
7. I believe that people often distract me more than the TV does.
8. I believe in ghosts.
9. I believe in aliens.
10. I believe in multiple universes.
11. I believe criticism is good.
12. I believe that the planet Venus entered our Solar System as a comet, thus pulling Mars and Earth further from the Sun. Venus, being a comet, had a tail of ice which was grabbed by Earth's gravitational pull.
13. I believe that this is what caused the Great Flood mentioned in many of our ancient religious texts.
14. I believe that aliens created mankind in their image.
15. I believe that this is the missing link between cavemen and modern humans.

Reflections

     I thought that the results of the Jung typology test was an accurate representation of myself, because while reading the results I related to them as if they were thoughts out of my own head. For almost every paragraph, I could think of events in my own experiences. . . Things I find myself doing on a regular basis could be easily seen in the ways depicted in the results written by J. Butt and M.M. Heiss.
     I can agree with the results of the test, I guess. I try to say what I mean in my writing, but sometimes find myself censoring what I write down. I would like to display my opinions, but end up wondering what people will think if I write those thoughts down. I often see my self as a leader in most roles that I go through in life. I find myself trying to help others out by showing them easier ways to accomplish their task. I don't have any issues with approaching others and giving them advice that I have learned along the way. I often spend time thinking of better ways to do several things so that I can save time and add other things to my agenda.
     I have to disagree with the part of the test that claims I have a judging personality. I do what I can to not judge others. I guess that from time-to-time I might judge those that I give advice to. If they take my advice I don't judge them badly. If they don't take my advice then I tend to not understand why they take the approach they do. I usually end up helping them. I suppose that sometimes I judge, but only if I don't understand what you have to say.
     I try to make my writing have a purpose. I want to teach others a way to handle a situation. I try to think of a problem and think of several ways to solve the issue while I am writing. Trying to do this is sometimes more difficult to do than others. I find myself thinking and free writing to try and find answers to how to write out my ideas. I guess that reflects my intuitive and thinking personality. I think that this test will make me think more about the subjects I am writing about. I will do what I can to avoid judging others and try to think more about how my writing can affect others. All while trying to remain unbiased.