Potential

Life is a music composition. A symphony, a tune, a song, a melody.

It can host a variety of different sounds and dynamics, twists and turns and styles and vibes.

It can be very long, solemn and heavy.

Or it can be brief, soft and light.

It can be a mixture of those things and change genre any time according to absolutely no strict laws whatsoever.

So much potential…

We are the instrument.

We’re responsible for the condition of the instrument. The tuning, the maintenance and the eventually needed repairs.

So much like guitars, to make a tangible analogy, we come in different sizes and shapes, colours and materials.

We can be tuned a million different ways and play the sound of a million different tunes.

So much potential…

We are also the player.

We’re responsible for the training, the dedication, the passion and the commitment to playing our instrument.

We are brought into this world and are carried, influenced and characterised by a multitude of melodies, songs and rhythms, slowly practising how to produce our own tunes, somehow shaping our own style through experience.

So much potential…

Many millions of instruments and players have existed, many millions exist now.

So many symphonies, tunes, songs and melodies, shaping our history.

Although we are all given a unique set of quirks and registers and possibilities, most of us are tuned the same way, and play very similar tunes.

It’s easier that way.

It’s easier being part of a duo, trio, quartet, band, ensemble, collective, big band, orchestra.

It’s easier being part of a well structured organisation, follow the dynamics of an existing composition, play to the tempo of everyone around you.

The biggest downside in being part of a structure, in my opinion, is the wasted potential.

Our uniqueness expresses potential for new kinds of compositions.

New kinds of compositions create currents.

Currents shape the times in which they develop and create a pathway to follow until a new one is created.

Currents can coexist and this allows for a variety of options we can choose from for maintenance and performance.

But the number of currents will always be a small percentage of the number of instruments and players.

I often wonder how the world would be, and how many different genres and styles and structures could exist, if everyone focused their efforts on coming up with a unique style matching their qualities, instead of following an already existing current.

I often wonder how the world would be, should that potential be fulfilled.

We could all play to our own tune, create our own kind of compositions and carve the path of our own current.

We could tame and control the sense of dissonance that we try to ignore to fit in a structure.

We could let go of that need for acceptance that forces us to cut out parts of ourselves to avoid conflict.

I might be wrong, but I think it would be a better world.

I imagine a cluster of symphonies making their way through space and time, adapting, harmonising and changing through encounters.

But I know it’s kind of silly.

I understand that the world is the way it is, and things just go as they do.

I understand the different nature of different instruments and different players.

Most of all, I understand that I can only consider my own definition of wasted potential, which is the massive amount of current we sacrifice in order to belong, while someone else’s definition might be the one of sacrificing being part of a collective in order to create a new current.

In conclusion, the truth is that I like the world the way it is, and when I find some strong dissonance, I can tune myself up a little different to harmonise with the external sounds, to kind of create collateral currents that somehow put to rest my need to rescue the wasted potential of the world.

I also wanna say,

whatever your tuning, genre, style and nature is,

play on.