Hey Friends! I also blog on wordpress and I wonder... is it completely against all blogging ethics to sometimes share one of my blog posts between platforms? Well I am about to find out...
Here is a post I did recently after watching the story of the band Queen... I hope you enjoy! (also, Steemit isn't allowing me to post photos at the moment so this one will be text only!).
BOHEMIAN RHAPSODY
When I was a young girl in primary school, I would bite my pinkie finger super hard to stop myself from crying. Way back then, when mean girls bullied me and I sat alone at breaktimes, when my year six teacher would slam the desk and bellow at us, when times tables were scrambled in my head and I couldn’t memorise them properly…I taught myself that biting my finger would distract my mind from my circumstance and avoid the welling tears from actually spilling down my face.
Last night I found myself subconsciously implementing this technique again as I sat in a very comfy recliner seat watching Bohemian Rhapsody at the Tea Tree Plaza Hoyts Cinema. The sheer volume of emotion that thumped in my chest as “We Will Rock You” was chanted across the stadium on screen bought forth a flood of tears that I forced back and when Freddie sung his heart, his stories, his life out at the “Live Aid” event I found myself once again biting my finger. There were about five moments in the two-and-a-half-hour cinematic extravagance where I employed this technique.
I told myself, and my bestie, that I would have cried if I wasn’t wearing mascara, but now that I think of it, the truth really was that I was too embarrassed to cry in the cinema where other people would see me and think I was petty, weak or ridiculously emotional crying in a movie.
I can’t believe it! Here I was watching a movie about one of the most creative, self-expressive, focused-on-his-talents, not-too-scared-to-take-risks, completely-not-afraid-to-stand-out-from-the-mainstream-and-not-care-what-the-critics-say people I have seen and here I was too embarrassed to cry in a dark cinema in case someone noticed me!
So today, as I type and eat my spelt pancakes in bed (thankyou Andy for spoiling me!) I tenderly feel my sore pinkie finger and reflect upon my insecurities in response to the absolutely epic adventure I went on last night with Queen.
Firstly, I wonder how far creativity can be pushed? The truth is that this question scares the pants off me. If we had zero insecurities, zero social norms, zero self-confidence issues and opened up our minds and souls to the flow of the ultimate creator who designed and made colours, soundwaves, intimacy, crashing waves, lightning and thunder…. then how far can we actually go with pushing boundaries of what has never before been dreamt of?
What could I possibly achieve if I followed my intuition and flung open my creative heart and held nothing back? What would I paint if I didn’t consider which colours were on trend? What would I photograph if I threw aside the rule of thirds? What would I wear if I was blind to the judging eyebrows and smirking lips? What would I sing if I wasn’t scared of my own voice? What would my movements be like if I didn’t worry that I was getting old and looked silly to the next generation? So many insecurities. So many chains holding me captive and pulling me back.
But what if we felt the pull of freedom? What if we knew that we had something greater in us? What if we abandoned the insecurities and stepped out like Freddie Mercury did all those years ago? When a pub band lost their lead singer, he had the confidence to offer himself. They even laughed at him and judged him on his appearance. He could have slunk away embarrassed and never tried singing again because of those hurtful words. But instead, he turned around and belted out a song in the middle of the alley. Now I don’t know if that’s how it actually played out in real life, but his choices along the way, his dress code, his pushing of musical boundaries, his ability to create art with his life was all something that I take pure inspiration from. To not be shaken by popular opinion, and then to take it a step further and actually BE the influencer of popular culture.
His anthems, his passion, his focus on pushing further and further without following a ‘formula’ all brought me to the point of tears and to a place of reflection. He is not the only human to have inspired me creatively. There is something noticeable about any artist who somehow taps into a raw state of soul and forgets that the mainstream even has limits and social boundaries. I aspire to such freedom but even more than that I aspire to the freedom of the promises of God because they are the purest form of love, design, creation, ecstasy and wonder.
So, may I weep openly and love passionately. Sing confidently and paint curiously. Dance wildly and wear whatever the heck I want to. Thankyou Freddie Mercury for reminding me of these things and for your incredible songs. Definitely go forth and see Bohemian Rhapsody while it’s still in cinemas, and be courageous in your lives.