It occurs to me at this point in the venture that I've made some choices that I can never change. By the venture I mean life, and by the choices I mean taste and lifestyle. I'll never be able to change the things that have happened to me, not that I would want to, but that I feel something akin to regret that things weren't better. It's difficult not to desire the things that you yourself would regard as the 'best', whilst that might not be available to you. I think that feeling is similar to what the people who call themselves entrepreneurs have, that is, a permanent need to better things. It's a long and hard road towards what you want, but I think the people who are unhappiest are those who don't know what it is they want before they set out. Then, they can never have a sense of regret, disappointment, or elation when something wonderful happens. One would be stuck in a void of never knowing at what point on the path one had reached, and thus never be able to enjoy the little progressions on the way that most of us are able to experience.
Possibly this is due to those people being the ones who try everything all at once - the jack of all trades. Expertise in a subject is, in my humble opinion, the most rewarding of my goals. The feeling you get when you have bettered yourself, and that you are considered an expert in a subject area, whatever that may be.
My time in Sussex has been one of the most productive ever, and as I have mentioned before, not for the traditional reasons. I did not necessarily achieve as much as I could have done, even though I have written more music in the Christmas period than in the past six months. It was to do with personal breakthroughs. I have come more to terms with who I am as a person, and exactly what I want to do, artistically speaking. Through discussions about visual arts, which I have realised had been getting quite stale over my previous visits, I have applied some new principles to my music. Just to explain the previous post about my epiphany (it's epiphany today), the simplicity is something which applies directly to music. I know now that I must apply everything I've ever learnt to my composition. When previously I've been told that I must apply this skill here, or that traditional techniques are not applicable to this kind of work, it's just not true. What post-modernism in the visual arts tell us, and what hasn't been properly implemented in music, is that everything is 'right' that we can have whatever influences we choose, and that if we want to draw a moustache on the Mona Lisa or stick cigarettes to a garden gnome, that's perfectly acceptable, in fact more so than things which don't mix or conjoin their roots.
People have tried to approach this in music, but what it lacks is the blatant contrast that the visual arts possesses. I just hope that my currently secret approach is going to be effective. I've only told one person so far what it is, and I don't think that it's necessary to divulge it to others yet.
I'm currently at Milton Keynes, on my way back to Glasgow. I think it's probably right that I should be going back to Glasgow for the moment, and that way I can reinforce in my mind the things which are most important to me, and impel myself to do whatever it is necessary to get to the next stage in my life.
