The other day when Jieru and I sitting in front of the Xian Lake, she asked me how I regain the inner strengths every time we hit by the harsh reality or others negative emotions or situations, I told her mainly through 3 ways- which works for me the past 20 years perfectly:
First, getting closer to nature and emerge yourself totally into the wilderness of forests, lakes or plains with the best sunshine & fewer people. Second, music the love of my life (one&only)- I take it daily with me and reject caffein or any other kinds of stimulants. Third, I told her I believe in surreal things/forces- maybe it’s not a specific religion but definitely something mysterious where I could find patterns to the things gonna happen or already happened.
To me, the above three things seems separated but actually interconnected – the sound of the nature usually serves the best inspiration for great music, and music is actually the concrete forms of those surreal where we can’t touch and see but actually exists in the air. Great music piece is one of the best philanthropy practices of humans can created for each other.
My love for music starts really early but none of my parents were seriously attentive to it. They just reinforced their love of Chinese folk music to me and picked the easiest instrument among the Chinese traditional- Zheng for me and “force me” to practice it from the age of 6/7. It was hard in the beginning cuz my fingers were always not flexible enough and mum was always angry at me when I failed the exercise- so I actually preferred to practice my vocals following the easy trendy songs on radios/TVs. My real vocal practice starts in primary school’s chorus- which now I’m super grateful for the teachers who picked me and trained me during that intense 3 years, helping me lay the foundation of many vocal and performance skills.
Following the primary school training was another batch of advanced training during junior high school. It was the time when in our dorm the Korean/Japanese pop cultures were so influential that our whole class was directed by our dorm into Kpop/Jpop fever. It’s hard to imagine now what was the force behind all these “herd behaviour” to the pop stars and craziness grew across the targeted teenagers. Entering high school, my music tastes shift totally towards to Europe/US pop led by Taylor Swift/Lady Gaga in the 2010s. Music group was definitely part of the teen’s social identity and music as a form of social media flood driver were definitely underestimated until the birth of Musically/Tiktok/Douyin post 2015.
If you asked me what is the unchanged daily habit of mine since 2000- definitely grabbing my music players and let different music liked playing automatically to any tasks I’m performing. Guess I’ll bring this habit along with me into my tomb one day… Another great habit I’m trying to attach long-term and deeper is the ability to meditate whenever I felt like during the day.
The benefit of mediation has been promoted across quite a number of industry experts – better mood/sleep/memory- basically overall enhancing brain & mental health, which interestingly coincided with “good music”‘s benefits. Music and Meditation are basically a sacred ceremony to connect with our higher-self, or higher-others. The longer and deeper you practice it, the more you’ll experience being alive and realize our soul and flesh’s miracle combination and the meaning of true Taoism. (which I think the existence of Tao can be scientifically proved very soon in the next couple of years thanks to the AI assistance in physics discovery and advancement.)
Coming back to my unchanged passion and talents in music, it was also the most important reason I wanted to create and build “Ice’Q Entertainment” now. The best timing probably is 10 years ago but another great timing is definitely now.
Leave a Reply