“Have we been so brainwashed by capitalism that you have to be busy to be worth something?”

The above quote is from an article I read in the Guardian this morning about millennial women pursuing the “soft life”, so named for a generational movement towards not working your ass off for so little in return. Millennials get shit on all the time for being lazy and of no account. In this case, the lifestyle pursuit is one I can get behind.

My music has made little money over the years. I’ve always had a day gig to make ends meet. The forty hour work week is something I only did for a short time. I found a way, while employed in food service, to survive on a four hour work day, to keep the creative and utilitarian plates spinning. I spent all my free time developing my craft, while learning to carry out all the other aspects the modern singer/songwriter is required to be good at.

I was never one to pursue a career in any area other than the arts or to have “something to fall back on”. I knew what I was getting into. The risk. The odds. The potential to be crushed under the weight of one’s dream not coming true. Still, I went for it. Over the years my music got better, I learned more about everything, my writing deepened, as should any writing, with the experience of life and years gained.

Seven years ago, my marriage ended. We lived together for three years after that, due to the cost of living in Toronto being so high. I became a single Dad and solo householder in the midst of the pandemic. All of the above, coupled with an empathy and sensitivity to the forces at work in this world started to take their toll. I then underwent a botched surgery for a labral tear in my hip that resulted in graver pain than the issue itself caused. This has become a chronic condition where each day is met with serious pain. All this said, I still wake each morning with art in my heart, mustering the energy to put forth sound. To, hopefully, bring a bit more light into our often dark and disconnected world.

I tell you the above, not to fish for sympathy, but to illustrate the reasons by which I came to feel supportive of these women saying fuck that to being on the endless, thankless wheel of shit that is the current societal system. The nose-to-the-grindstone approach of the generations of old no longer works. It’s not news that our politicians and corporations don’t give a fuck about us. The divide grows. The middle class is disappearing. Hard work is good for us, but there are no guarantees or securities as a result of it.

I’ve done the sixty hour work weeks, with the day gig and music hours combined. It hasn’t resulted in the success I’d planned on. I’m not the only would be rock star who’s reframed the original dream for humbler aspirations. I know there are many out there who didn’t put forth the effort, mostly due to fear of failure, but I also know many who, like me, have done their time in the arena, taking the hits and savouring the shining victories. We’ve put our 10,000 hours in. We’ve faced the anxious quiver of soul-become-art, released into the world with bated breath.

It’s all exhausting. It is for me, anyway, and clearly some others. How many of us are just knuckling down, unhappy every day, telling the people we meet along the way that we’re fine, when we’re so far from it? Our real time connections wane. Bullshit AI is on the rise, with cowards and fools using it to create fake plastic “art” that sullies the genuine, beautiful things that take time, soul, love and struggle to bring into being.

We could all use a softer life. I’m not sure how to get there. We’re most of us working at maximum capacity and still feel the waterline rising, as though any grace or space we might offer ourselves means compromising cash flow or conditioned definitions of self-worth. We need to keep working hard, though in areas that will result in greater peace and fulfillment of that which we are called to.

I write all this down today to stave off the extended gaze over the edge. To find solace in the process and getting it out of my head and onto the page. And to communicate it to you, to hopefully find common ground between us. We’re missing so much, while we run so fast and hard to stay ahead and above the undertow.

Damn, I’m tired. Here’s to more Love, Light and Ease in our lives.

 

K. xo