Finding Jon

I recently attended The Human Condition concert, with Jon Bellion and Beautiful Mind. It was a new experience for me. I’ve been to concerts before, I’ve just never gone as this person and allowed myself to just be. Connecting to the music and to the performers. Allowing my body to move… however it felt like moving. Letting the music penetrate me. There was something soul reaching about it. Singing along, taking that moment for myself to sing with Jon and feel what those words meant to my soul. It was a place of complete comfort. It was a perfect moment of just being. Contentment. Perfection so great that it wasn’t overwhelming… it just was.

The contentment of this night was a culmination of experiences, feelings, authenticity, and being true to myself. It started several months previous…

I came across a song of Jon’s on Facebook. The title caught my attention. I clicked and listened. I was intrigued by what I heard. My curiosity deepened. I heard lyrics about being let down and wanting to Run Wild.

The timing coincided with my own realization of spending my whole life trying to be everything that my mom wasn’t. That I had been rejecting, anything that resembled what she was within myself. It meant I conformed to what I thought the world, closest to me, perceived to be right. There was a line I had drawn in my mind and I worked hard to stay on the proper side of it. I thought it was a perfectly drawn line that existed in more than just my mind. I was determined to stay on the good side. I had to prove that I wasn’t my mom and that I was better than her. Being the human that I am, I would trip and fall over the line sometimes. Every once in awhile, I would just briefly stick a toe over the line… to allow myself a taste of something. I’d pull it back and continue walking where I was supposed to.

My realization, that I had been rejecting everything within myself that resembled my mom, led me to feeling like I now needed to allow myself room to breathe. To feel my whole self. Allow myself to discover the parts I had rejected… allow myself to essentially, Run Wild.

I went to Youtube. What else could I find by this musician? I found a documentary. Every artist in the band answered questions about each other and told their story of coming together. I instantly connected to these people who spoke so highly and praised one another’s talents and contributions. There was something special there. Each of them truly believed the talent of the other was above their own. They learned, respected, and lifted each other. I could feel the sincerity in the things they said. It wasn’t just a put on. It was real. It truly was a beautiful thing… the harmony, humility, and their belief in God. They gave credit to God for the gifts they had. It’s a rare thing to see in the world. It’s a rare thing to so openly talk about it.

I dove deeper. Finding more songs. Finding words in the songs that connected to me. Then it happen… I came across a song with the f-word in the title. Whoa. I don’t listen to songs with swear words. That crossed that line I had constructed, but was now redefining. I clicked it, listened, and looked up the lyrics. Words about faking feelings, being scared about putting yourself out there, taking down walls, life being staged, and time running out. Yeah, I totally related to these lyrics. Here I was in the midst of taking off my mask. I was facing the fact that time on this earth with my mom had ended. I was still mourning, the relationship we would never have.

I discovered videos of Jon creating his music. I was fascinated, watching and seeing his creative process and the fact he so openly shared how it was done. How the music was made using his mouth to make some of the sounds and recording them to replay and manipulate. Having the picture in his head as the music, sounds, and words came together. Playing with it all. It re-opened a desire I had, to learn how to play music so that I could put my words to it. I could understand the cleverness of the lyrics, how they intertwined with each other, and the deeper meaning or connection they had. I knew that feeling of putting words together that were meant to exist in unity. Most people won’t see that… they’ll listen and find the general meaning or rhythm, totally missing what’s below the surface, and move on to the next song.

Simple and Sweet. Ah, this quickly became a song I put on repeat. I felt it inside of me. When I listened I felt special. The sweet… it connected to the sweetness I saw in myself with my recent diagnosis of type 1 diabetes. I had sweetness running through my veins… literally. The sounds in the song made me feel light, bubbly, and floaty when life had been weighing on me so heavily. The simpleness of not having to get all made up to be beautiful. Just being beautiful as God created me without having to wear a mask. Permission to be me.

A new album was coming… it would be the first one he actually charged people for. Ah, he was a giver… a giver of his creations. He shared the gift that he openly gave credit to God for. This credit to God was mentioned throughout his music. Yeah, this aligned perfectly with what I knew in the depth of me to be true. I connected to the realism of him when he sang his songs. Like a laugh at a certain point in a song that said so much more to me than what the words were saying on their own. I pre-ordered the new album and couldn’t wait  to see what I would find there.

One of the songs talked about secrets, bones in closets, loyalty and still being loved even with all the flaws. I felt the acceptance and it resonated with what I felt in connection with my husband. He had stuck by me through all the craziness of my life and who I was. As we dated and got closer to marriage, I continued to reveal the damaged person I thought I was, making sure there was no secret untold, and he kept loving me. Through 23 years of marriage filled with my personal struggles and mistakes, he has continued loving me.

A song about Fashion. Just the title touched my love of sewing and creating. The words declaring the human desire to obtain more and more… never being satisfied… the selfishness that controls us and ultimately missing what’s really important.

Song after song…

Maybe IDK (I don’t know) all the answers in life. God gave us faith and grace because He intended for us to  have to learn and figure it out along the way. We’re not supposed to know everything. He is God, we are not. The Weight of the World is heavy and I don’t need to keep carrying it. I’m discovering The Good In Me and I’m not rejecting parts of me anymore. Being a robot. Knowing the act of numbing, existing, and just going through the motions to the next day to again avoid feeling anything. Having found that God is in control and my whole life is in the Hand of God.

This music, these lyrics, these creators have filled me with peace, understanding, connection, love, and courage.

Jon and all the artists that are part of this family have touched me, they have moved me. Discovering Jon and his music, was one of the catalysts for me to be brave and start writing and putting my honesty and authenticity out into the world…

In Part 2, discover my thoughts and what I did in preparation for the concert…