“You need to build a mausoleum in your head with big iron doors so that nobody can get in there except you. You don’t let me in there, you don’t let June in there, you don’t let your manager in there, you don’t let the record company people in there. You have to decide for yourself what you want to do with your music and not let anyone else tell you.” Bob Johnson to Johnny Cash
By: Gabriela Yareliz
Picture it— I am walking through the Times Square subway station. There is a man with a full blown salsa band performing a salsa version of Despacito (trying to make this sexual song romantic) in the middle of the station. He is loud on the mic. The trumpet, drums and keyboard behind him are equally loud. The whole station is shaking. I look around as I try to get to my next train platform. The music is so loud locals are looking disoriented (you just know who the locals are; they are walking slower and wincing, looking at signs). Tourists are straight up covering their ears and some wander in circles, lost, and others are trying to yell arguments as to why they should take a certain train to the other members of their group. A young woman with a mask and plastic gloves takes her bag charm Labubu and stuffs it into a plastic ziplock. Looks like the charm is being put to bed and sanitation and is done for the day. She lifts her eyeglasses and looks around the station. The police stand in a corner and shake their heads as they witness the confusion and all the noise.
Noise.
Noise, in real life, has a way of making even someone who knows their way around disoriented. And if you are new to the route, then, you are really lost and out of focus. Noise can be so loud it rattles you to the core.
The same thing happens with mental noise. People’s opinions, our own thoughts, our harshness, our thoughts on loop that we can’t let go of. It can rattle and disorient us. It can make us shake.
Today, let’s think about where we are experiencing the most noise. Find your way, as Bob Johnson said, to a mausoleum or fortress inside. A place where it’s quiet. Where you can hear the voices that really matter. The voice of God. The moments when you don’t listen to yourself, but instead, you speak truth to yourself. Don’t let the man with the mic hollering Despacito take over. It’s just not worth it. And Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee are so much better at it. Cut off the noise. Original voices only.
GABRIELA YARELIZ 