Music feeds my soul, as I have said here many times. It’s a delicious combination of rhythm and rhyme, harmony and lyrics that reach inner nooks and crannies and send my soul soaring. One of the best places to listen is in my Jeep as the accoustics seem perfect to allow me to sing along with my enthusiastic, if not formally trained, voice. My favorite radio station is Philly based University of Pennsylvania’s WXPN 88.5 fm. It is where I have been introduced to the musicians who are now receiving main stream acceptance. One group is My Morning Jacket, whose song called Wonderful The Way I Feel is among my those that delight the ears of my heart. Yesterday morning, on the drive into work, I found myself immersed in the lyrics and endeavoring to figure out what they meant. The soothing voice of front man Jim James (who jokingly calls himself Yim Yames:) cascaded along the ceiling and walls of my magic machine as it tooled along.
It matters to me
Took a long time to get here
If it would have been easy
I would not have cared
Like a tropical forest
Like a cop on the beat
When all is order
You get lost in the heat
I feel so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
I feel so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
Doesn’t matter to me
I could take it or leave it
I could learn from way back when
And still live right now
With the sun on my shoulder
And the wind in my back
I will never grow older
At least not in my mind
I feel so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
I feel so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
So wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
I feel so wonderful, wonderful, wonderful the way I feel
I’m going where there ain’t no fear
I’m going where the spirit is near
I’m going where the living is easy
And the people are kind
A new state of mind
I’m going where there ain’t no police
I’m going where there ain’t no disease
I’m going where there ain’t no need
To escape from what is
Only spirits at ease
I meandered back and forth between thinking that it was a life after death song and a treatise on living completely in the here and now wonder of each precious moment. I imagine that I am called upon each day to experience that new state of mind in which I can be at peace, regardless of what is happening around me. Today was just like every other day in which I awoke in my comfy bed, peeling back new powder blue flannel sheets that I had gotten to usher in the new year. I prepared for a typical day of writing for an hour or so and then heading to my full time job as a social worker, serving people who sometimes struggle with believing these lyrics. Many of them are convinced that people are unkind and that a new state of mind is a near impossibility, given their histories. My role, among many, is to show them that indeed another way does exist. I have witnessed many people in my life who have been able to reframe their experiences, regardless of how painful they may have been. After work, came grocery shopping, dinner and then to the gym for my ‘playout’. On the surface, nothing exceptional and yet, as I wind down my day and prepare for restorative sleep, I can, with all certainty, declare that I feel wonderful.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFyelklEanQ Wonderful The Way I Feel by My Morning Jacket
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