"Hang the DJ, Hang the DJ, Hang the DJ..."
Ah, pressure: pushing down on me, pushing down on you, and so forth. They say that you should exhibit grace under pressure. They say that given enough pressure, you'll crack (presumably like an egg). Ferris Bueller explained that his friend Cameron was under so much personally-induced pressure that (pardon his French) if you shoved a lump of coal up Cameron's ass, in 2 weeks you'd have a diamond.
Pressure is a rather unique phenomenon. It's something that can actually tag along after you like a puppy dog. It will follow you wherever you go, no matter how hard you try to dogde it. It will even follow you into the bathroom, never giving you a moment's peace. Pressure has this way of consuming your thoughts and reducing you into a wreck, and then making you feel guilty for trying to find a moment's peace.
I'm getting to a point in my life where pressure is threatening to flatten me like a second-hand pancake found on the side of the road. Actually working to get your life up on two proverbial feet is at times a rather difficult process when it feels like everything is suddenly trying to kick said legs out from underneath you. Currently I've given up on caring about the pressure of the moment. Terrifying myself isn't going to make it go away. Frustrating myself isn't going to bring about any solutions. Fretting about it constantly is going to accomplish a great deal of nothing.
It's a peculiar sensation to look at the pressure dead on (metaphorically speaking, of course), and then upon realizing you've done all you can and the rest is out of your hands for the time being, you turn your back to it and not care. It sounds reckless, but there is a method to the madness, I assure all of you out there. I just won't be going into it here.
Instead I have been slowly letting go of all the tension, all the worry, and all the blind panic. Music, not surprisingly, has proven to be a valuable outlet. There are a handful of songs out there I can listen to in my darkest of days, and when I listen to them, I forget about the pressure, even if it's only for the duration of the song. The release is incredible, and the freedom is akin to an adrenaline rush drawn out over the course of a few minutes instead of a few seconds.
Pressure can push down on me right now, but I'm not yet about to let it crush me. If anything, I'm biding my time and saving my strength for one final coup de grace. Whether or not it will prove a brilliant stroke of insanity or just plain brilliant will depend on my success. But it's out of my hands right now. Worry is there, but I'm not about to let it consume me.
In the meantime, to paraphrase the Red Hot Chili Peppers, I have music as my aeroplane.
Today's Lesson: for those of you curious, the title to this little bit of nowhere is referring to lyrics from the song
"Panic" by The Smiths. Not only is the band sharing my surname, but it's also one of the few times I've heard such a cheery, almost prozac-like chant about hanging someone. Then again, this is disco the mob in the chorus is talking about....
posted by Phillip at 5:26 PM
