Jealous of the Moon

There is a song that has been stuck in my head all week. I've tried singing other things, but that is just a temporary fix. Some songs speak to the heart. They speak from the heart. They express the inner longings of the soul in ways that I cannot explain. This is the chorus of "Jealous of the Moon" by Nickel Creek:

Staring down the stars,
Jealous of the moon,
You wish you could fly.
But you're staying where you are,
There's nothing you can do,
If you're too scared to try.

There are times when I think I could be great, and at times I see this same greatness in my friends. My generation is full of legacy that is still potential but is longing to be set free, and, although I am generally optimistic, I do, at times, become fearful that we will fall far short of all we could achieve.

I suppose that every generation dreams big when they are this age, but why then do we fail to achieve? If generation after generation has dreamt of a radically different way of doing things, then why is our culture so static. The surface may change, but a millimeter underneath is the same mildew that makes the tapestry stink.

There are two voices that affect our mindset. Our soul speaks in flashing moments of truth when the haze is drawn away, the problems become real, and the solutions become reachable. Opposing this first voice is our mind, like the radio on in the background tuned to the mix station. It is saying, "Sure. Write a new song, and we'll throw it in with the same old mix." It tells us that our originality and daring are only recycling and youth, and it is a tempting lie. If this lie were the truth, as it so often becomes, then we could take a rest. We could settle into comfortable and forget the things we have seen and heard before we went blind and deaf.

The voice of our soul is like a sprint. It gets our blood pumping, our heart racing, and our endorphins kicking. Still we stop before we go around the curve.

The voice of our mind is like a marathon runner. Like the energizer bunny, it keeps going. It looks back at the sprinter stopping to catch his breath and laughs with the knowledge that slow and steady wins the race, or at least it has with few exceptions for the past 10,000 years.

Here then is what we must do: We must discipline our sprinting soul. Slow down without losing the edge and take steps instead of leaps. We must become distance runners for change. If ever we do this, our souls will match stride with our minds, and we will find that the power of the two working in tandem is enough to break the mold. It is enough to churn the pond that has long been stagnant.

If we will discipline the part of us that longs to do great things, the part of us that longs to make things the way we see them on a clear blue day, then we will stop getting winded before we go anywhere.