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comment by flac
flac  ·  2354 days ago  ·  link  ·    ·  parent  ·  post: What are you scared of?

The same Emerson quote that's been haunting me for a few years: "We see young men who owe us a new world, so readily and lavishly they promise, but they never acquit the debt; they die young and dodge the account: or if they live, they lose themselves in the crowd". (from "Experience", an essay that shakes me every time I read it).

For the whole time I've been making music, I've also been making excuses for why I never play in public. Hell, even just go to an open mic every month or so. There are about 20 full, pretty good songs that I have written and nobody's ever heard. I'm scared of leaving behind less than I could have.

I'm scared of dying young and full of ideas, like my brother. It would be his 25th birthday this Thursday, and I'll probably spend some of the night looking over the notes he made in the margins of scripts he never got a chance to direct.



ButterflyEffect  ·  2353 days ago  ·  link  ·  

By losing themselves in the crowd, is that Emerson's way of saying they become complacent, or too comfortable in their own living?

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