Can You Imagine

Mike and I just spent five days in NYC again and it was epic. The highlights were Smoke Jazz Club and Dizzy’s. 78 year old legendary jazz pianist George Cables just happened to be playing at Smoke and Lucy Yeghiazaryan was at Dizzy’s and I was in heaven. These two musical geniuses were beautiful and inspiring as they both honed in on their crafts and just lived in the moment, gracing those of us lucky enough to be there. It was quite a contrast to some of the other shows we saw. I don’t want to give negative reviews to anyone so I’ll keep it ambiguous, but Saturday I saw an off broadway shtick that was advertised as comedy and really was at its core nihilistic cynicism. It left me with a feeling of sadness and despair and I realized today as I was debriefing with my spiritual director it’s because it completely contradicts one of my core beliefs.

I don’t know much of anything. I don’t have the answers to the universe and all there is in it, yet somehow for some reason, I was born with the compelling thought that every single person ever born into this world matters.

A lot.

Infinitely matters.

So much that it can’t be quantified or calculated. In my soul I hear songs about how amazing and special you are, how if you only realized what you mean to the entire universe you would be blown away.

And this comedian was contradicting that thought at every turn. There was some truth in the message and I thought she might bring it around to hope, yet she didn’t. She ended it with fluff nihilism. Now that may seem like a contradiction. Some would argue nihilism cannot be fluffy. I disagree. When a person ends a show titled Death Let Me Do My Show with atheism and dark superficial jokes, they have definitely missed a deeper potential wrap up. I don’t mean you have to believe in God to say something meaningful. I’ve studied many deep thoughtful atheists who are still very careful with their words.

Death is imminent. Death sucks. Death of our loved ones seems absurd. This is why we all struggle with it so much, regardless of our belief, religion, culture, race, gender, etc. I want to be very clear here. I am a Christian in the sense I believe Jesus Christ is the Son of God and has reconciled all of creation to God. I am an agnostic on most days. Tbh, I don’t know much of anything. I only know my core purpose is to give hope and love and joy and laughter to whoever will stop and listen.

I am very careful with my words. According to the most ancient religions and traditions, words actually bring things into existence. Let me say that again in a different way…

your words make things happen.

If your words are dark and nihilistic and hopeless they will bring about that which is dark and nihilistic and hopeless.

If your words are edifying, loving, hopeful, joyful, honest, and uplifting, they will bring the like.

I don’t know why bad…no…I don’t know why horrific and unspeakable things happen, and in this lifetime I will never make sense of it.

I choose life, I choose laughter, I choose joy, I choose to believe the moon in all this darkness reflects the light of a very real sun that I hope to someday see.

I love CS Lewis’s The Magician’s Nephew in the Chronicles of Narnia. Aslan calls Narnia into being with a song of very powerful words.

In the darkness something was happening at last. A voice had begun to sing… the most beautiful noise he had ever heard. It was so beautiful he could hardly bear it… Then two wonders happened at the same moment. One was that the voice was suddenly joined by other voices; more voices than you could possibly count. They were in harmony with it, but far higher up the scale: cold, tingling, silvery voices. The second wonder was that the blackness overhead, all at once, was blazing with stars. They didn’t come out gently one by one, as they do on a summer evening. One moment there had been nothing but darkness; next moment a thousand, thousand points of light leaped out… If you had seen and heard it…, you would have felt quite certain that it was the stars themselves which were singing, and that it was the First Voice, the deep one, which had made them appear and made them sing…

I don’t know much of anything but I believe my words matter.

I use them carefully.

I teach music to elementary students, some have lots of encouragement from home, others don’t have a home. I feel my purpose in this life is to say to each one of them “You matter! You are unique and special and if you didn’t exist the world would be less bright.” I realized as I sat listening to this sad confused comedian that I actually want to share that message with everyone I meet, not just children. I wish I could give that message to her and that she would receive it.

As my song Can You Imagine states from the Watch Me Grow album:

“Can you imagine

all the things that you could do

if you just realize

there’s only one amazing you?

You’re special in this world

from other boys and girls

cause you’re the only you that’s alive

It’s time to recognize your worth!

Can you imagine?

Can you imagine!”

Can you?