You’re Old…Suck It Up…It’s Not Real!

So let’s see…there’s been this thing, whatever “thing” that may be, that’s been gnawing away at you since the time you first ran out of your cave to celebrate the invention of the wheel, am I right? This “thing” has kept you awake almost every night of your life until the point you are reading this right now. You think about it while you’re sitting at your desk fading into the grey abyss of monotony & staring off into the distant land of broken dreams where the magic of fairy dust has settled into just regular dust. This “thing” occupies every crevice of your mind and is eating itself inside of you because it longs to be free. The longer it is held in captivity the more it fights for its release causing you more suffering than necessary.

You have NOT developed the ability or even tried, over the course of your adult existense, to completely seperate yourself from the construct that is time. You have fed your subconscious bowls of honey nut lies that if this “thing” was not pursued during a certain period in your life, it must retire to the nursing home of unrealized dreams to fade away into all eternity. How have you failed yourself so miserably? How could you have given time so much of yourself, yet you gave yourself NOTHING. Profound right?

“But, Cicely isn’t time of the essence?

True. However, ‘essence’ is defined as “the intrinsic nature or indispensable quality of something, especially something abstract, that determines its character.” YOU are the determiner. YOU are of the essence no matter what stage of life you’re in. WHAT you choose to pursue in your life has absolutely, positively nothing to do with WHEN you pursue it.

“Yeah, but Cicely time waits for no man.”

*Insert slap to the forehead and wall slide here* Listen, life happens. Circumstantial things can most definitely postpone the all-glorious pursuit. I’m not a complete nimrod, but time, in terms of “when” things are supposed to happen, or SHOULD for that matter, stems from societal programming that is embedded in our subconscious and it does not align with foundational truth. Time doesn’t “pass us by”.

People say that unconsciously and therefore it manifests itself, but I am challenging you in this very moment as you read intently through my rambles to abandoned that thought. We are always IN time. IN a moment. IN the NOW and IN these moments you can choose to put in every effort you have to accomplish what you’ve always wanted to or not. It’s that simple. That moment could be at the age of 23 or 73.

“Oh, but Cicely it’s easy for you to say this, you look so beautiful, young and full of life in your profile pic. I know because profile pics tell a person’s entire life.”

Like, omg, I know right?! *attempts to flip bushy hair* I will be 38 years old this year according to my birth certificate and I’ll try to make a long story short which translates to it may still be long. Journey with me if you will. I was named after Cicely Tyson, you know, one of the most prolific and groundbreaking actresses of our time? She was a pioneer and was intentional with her body of work assuring a legacy that would live on through generations.

“Cicely, is that why you were named after her so that you too would be destined, somehow, for the same greatness?”

Of course not. This would not be a good blurb if it were THAT meaningful. Shame on you. Here’s the deal.

She used to be married to the incomparable trumpeter & composer Miles Davis and my dad was completely obsessed with him. If I were born a boy, what do you think my name would’ve been? It wasn’t going to be Steve I can assure you. My mom and dad had hundreds and hundreds of vinyls of all kinds of artists from all different genres - from Miles Davis & John Coltrane to Chicago & the Manhattan Transfers to Debby Boone & the Carpenters to Carole King. I literally was enamored with James Taylor at the age of ten.

As a child,listening to mixtures of sound as grainy as the sand beneath my feet and as fluid as the first sip of hot chocolate awakened the love of music inside of me. For some reason my little ears would always grab hold of the sound of the horns. (If the earth had lips to whistle it would sound like a trumpet.) One day I told my mother in all of my eloquent ten year old erudition that “The horns are loud. I want one.”

Over the course of let’s say seven years I basically received every instrument under the sun EXCEPT the trumpet. First, I got two flutes, one for my grade school lessons, the other was for home. Double the flutey pleasure. Next, I got a Casio accompained with piano lessons, later and lastly, an acoustic guitar. None of which pulled at my heart strings. Remember those life circumstances we discussed up top there? Well, when I was a teenager and in my very early 20s like most young people I was trying to figure things out. Figure myself out. You know. Figuring out how to be young which meant figuring out nothing. I never bought a trumpet and got lessons at an early age when people say you “should” study an instrument.

Let’s fast forward to now. Four months ago I decided to do that “thing” I’ve always wanted to do. I purchased a trumpet online for $80 and signed up for private instruction. I am reading music, having never really done so and I’m considering studying full time with the intention of attending a conservatory to study Contemporary Jazz Theory. Yup! At the ripe “old” age of 37.

I caught myself beforehand like an alternate me in the matrix. I said, “I’m going to start studying in 2016.” Right in that moment I realized my submission to time. Red or blue pill? I didn’t need a NEW year to start a NEW journey. I needed a new mindset. I’m presently in my fourth month of study. I may be well into my LATE 40s when I reach Wynton Marsalis and Maynard Ferguson status, but the point is I’m doing it and you should too.

Age is mental. Your dreams, your passions, your desires are timeless. There are no prerequisites for pursuit. Along with you, your pursuit is what’s of the essence. REPEAT THIS TO YOURSELF…WELL…REPEATEDLY. Do not allow people’s limited thinking to cloud yours. Do not let people’s expectations of you stop you from goal chasing. Do not allow yourself to wallow every passing birthday. I type these things because all these factors are contributors to the construct of time we cling so tightly to.

Someone actually said, “Well what does she have going on now?” “Isn’t she too old to play a trumpet?” You’ve heard it all before. As if you can’t tap into your innate creative self AT ANY GIVEN MOMENT just because others feel you SHOULD or SHOULD NOT be doing something that does not fit into this silent order of things. We give ourselves this timeline; these disgusting, vile, life stagnating limits and even project them onto others. When has life ever birthed extraordinary from order & limitations? I’ll wait.

Tap into that one “thing” that makes you, YOU. That “thing” that presses into the very soul of you. Get into some NOW. Pursue it and make it happen. Break out your pheonix wand and give the fairies back their magic dust. Tell the old geezer in your head to go back to old person-ville. For Pete’s sake be Benjamin Button. He OWNED time. (I think. I may have to rewatch that. Good movie, but analyzations welcome.) Anyway, you get the gist. Do not be a willing participant in the demise of your dreams because you’ve heard time and time again you’re “too old” to do something or “it’s too late.”

The saying goes that the “old” you - whether the layers of your many demensions or your age - has to get out of the way of the TRUE you. (I’ve actually NEVER read or heard that saying. I just came up with that. I have to be more confident with these gems.) Age is really JUST a number in the realization of your dreams. It is NOT just a number, however, where the legal limit for alcohol or rated ‘R’ movies are concerned. We want to inspire not corrupt. The only age you should be concerned about is that of cheese. Who doesn’t put that on everything, right?

Please do not steal my Pulitzer Prize worthy body of work. Thanks, but no thanks.