as promised over the weekend, episode 057 is here! the show wasn't planned, so basically just amounts to me playing a few songs and spouting off stream-of-consciousness about love and regret and passion and history - how they intertwine and weave and feel with hindsight and perspective. it's a common topic for me, i know - but one of my favorites. especially when i'm travelling and wistful and out of the habit of routine. whenever i stop to remember where i've come from, and how life has gone (so far), i'm struck by the simultaneous feeling of being the same person i've always been, and also completely different and altered by time and experience and perspective. i guess this is just what it means to grow up? i know. but it's a weird feeling. i guess both are true somehow?

also, i'm a little sheepish to be going on about love again. seems like i talk about it a lot - which i recognize, and apologize for. hopefully you don't mind too much, and there are (at least) some aspects you'll find interesting and/or relateable in all of this. honestly, to me, it feels like we've just scratched the surface. someday soon i'd like to do another show specifically about relationship, and love, and expectation - romance, disappointment, longing - the impossibleness of it, the amazingness of it, etc. i'm especially interested in how you see that side. what do you think? good idea? bad idea?

either way, if you have time, i hope you can take a listen to episode 57. i'm interested how you see it - if you relate, or don't, or see things i'm missing, getting wrong, etc. i hope you'll let me know.

wishing you a great week,
russell

ps - i'm home now, but will be out of town for the rest of the week. don't know exactly what day the next podcast will be, but everything should be back on schedule by next week... thanks for your patience...

pps - oh, and many thanks to everyone who came out to ireland's 32 last night! it was fun, and a huge honor to share it. the show went well, and we've booked another one (slyway with varona) for sunday, december 9. if you missed last night, you shouldn't miss the next one! :)

Posted by russell at 05:15 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

i'm travelling, but just wanted to say hi, and send well wishes! also, wanted to let you know that i recorded episode 057 last night, and will post soon.

'till then,
russell

ps - don't forget slyway and varona this weekend. i'll be back in sf - hoping to see you!

Posted by russell at 06:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

as i mentioned on last week's show, i'll be in and out of town the next few weeks - so the podcast will be a bit out of sync. in lieu, i just uploaded a special weekend edition of the podcast, episode 056! if you have time, i hope you can check it out. it's a short show, featuring music by varona and slyway. and, hey, if you like the songs, don't forget that we're playing together at ireland's 32 one week from tonight - sunday, sept. 23 (details below). we'd love to see you there!

that's:
sunday, september 23
at ireland's 32 - 3920 geary st., san francisco.
show starts approx. 8pm.
more details at www.slywaymusic.com
and www.myspace.com/varonaband

hope everyone is well tonight. have a great week!
russell

Posted by russell at 02:27 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

tonight's podcast is about giving and trying and listening and growing. and hoping. they're all sorta related, aren't they? different versions of a similar thing? i think so. and i think they're natrually at the root of possibility for change and relationship - or the change in relationship - that exists between us, in our families, with friends, enemies, between nations, religions, cultures, etc. and it's funny, cuz this theme seems to keep popping up for me in different places and with different writers, and movies, and songs, and people i meet. ever since i first mentioned erich fromm several months back, lots of people have recommended his book "the art of loving" to me. i've been reading it this week, and it's exactly what everyone's been saying - mind expanding, revolutionary, honest, real, true, deeply challenging. yep. honestly, i haven't ready anything by fromm that isn't those things! and this book just continues his perfect score (with me, anyway).

most of my rambling tonight is about the book, and my thoughts and feelings in relation. the thing i most appreciate about fromm is the sense of iconoclasm he brings - in the true sense of "breaking images" - the challenging sense - the call for personal revolution. that's what happens to me whenver i stop and take time to really listen and engage with what he's saying and where he's coming from. he does that for me everytime. i don't know how. but he always inspires me to think more, push myself, talk, and try to share and open up dialog with others. so, as you'll see if you listen, that's pretty much where i was tonight.

one of the things i forgot to mention in the show is the idea of "respect," and how closely it's related to real love and seeing. as i type this, it's the thing that's hitting me most deeply. fromm talks about the root of the word respect ("respicere" = to look at), and how it relates to every relationship, or act of love towards another person. it's related (maybe even identical?) to the concept of "seeing from someone else's perspective" we've talked about before. and it seems deeply true to me. and new. every time i hear it, and experience it, and apply it to a different part of life, it's like i'm seeing it again for the first time. it's something i seem to always need to keep learning over and over. again and again.

fromm reminds us:
"To respect a person is not possible without knowing him.... It is possible only when I can transcend the concern for myself and see the other person in his own terms. I may know, for instance, that a person is angry, even if he does not show it overtly; but I may know him more deeply than that; then I know that he is anxious, and worried; that he feels lonely, that he feels guilty. Then I know that his anger is only the manifestation of something deeper, and I see him as anxious and embarrassed, that is, and the suffering person, rather than as the angry one..."

amazingly true right? most of the time we're (or, i'm) so busy feeling my feelings and reacting to my reactions, that i forget to go beyond the walls of my own emotional illusions. i get lost and forget that my feelings and reactions are not why other people act the way they do in the world. my feelings and reactions are not why people are who they are and do what they do. they're just my side of the story. and love is about travelling that distance - from me to you. love is about noticing the difference. and being patient about it. and taking responsibility to transcend it.

but it's still a mystery. even when we get that glimpse of realization. cuz what is it that allows us to trust someone - to delve in - to care, listen, try, hear, relate? i don't know. but i'm deeply humbled by the power we all have to give this to each other. to be patient. to understand. to transcend how something feels, and go deeper, toward understanding. that's the kind of life i want. i suck at it most of the time, and fail seemingly endlessly. i gotta admit it. i'm broken. but that's not so unlike many of us out here, is it? and, in that sense, i guess it has to be ok? for all of us. cuz it just is. we are what we are. and the key is not giving up - that we keep trying. over and over again. and over and over. cuz i do see progress. really and truly. it's frustratingly slow - yes, no doubt - but still. progress is progress. i'm thankful for it.

thanks for being here tonight, listening, and reading with me. i'm touched and happy that we can share this together. really.

don't forget to check out:
more info on erich fromm and his book the art of loving.

i'm sending my heart,
russell <3

ps - as mentioned, i'll be in and out of town the next few weeks, so the podcast schedule will be a little off for a bit. i apologize! but, yes, podcasting will continue - just a little out of the normal sync. :)

pps - many xtra special thanks to julius caesar for sharing his music with us!

Posted by russell at 05:08 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

seems we all have a shadow side - where we go, or how we are, when we're in over our heads, overwhelmed, lost. it's not a good feeling. the last week has been rough for me in that sense. i've had lots of chances to observe myself, and the feeling of being not ok - spinning, emotionally overstimulated, etc. that's me sometimes. and it's one of those parts of me i wish wasn't true. i wish i was stronger, and more capable of bouncing back and being my better self in every moment and with everyone around me. i want to. but i'm weak. i fail a lot. there are so many areas i need to grow in and get better at. and, even worse, there are things i've been trying to work on for years and years and years - only to see that i haven't made any progress - that i'm further back now than when i started. how do we face that and keep trying? how do we find balance? i wish i knew. i mean - i know we can. somehow. but it doesn't always feel like it.

so, despite how it feels, i think there's something important to see in all of this - even (or because???) it's so difficult - the feeling of having failed, of having missed the point completely, of being incapable of finding it, or making it right. why does that make us so panic-y? it's weird. must be about insecurity, i guess? our weaknesses and failures remind us that we're incomplete, needy, broken. which we are. and which we hate, and try to run away from constantly, desperately. so, i guess, when failure looks us in the eye, and we can't get away - it's just one of those grudgingly needed reminders that we're not enough on our own. that we can't do it alone. we can't get there. all of our effort isn't quite enough. not even close. or, mine isn't, anyway. so, what do we do?

it's hard to take - but maybe that insolubility is the very thing that makes it possible to learn, and move, and do, and be more in the world?

i wonder. cuz within and around all of this, the bottom line feels somehow connected to the idea that darkness and light (+ and -), though opposites, aren't disconnected. weakness and strength, "good" and "bad," inside and outside. maybe they're not as opposite as they feel? maybe they work together somehow, and need each other, and only mean something in relation to each other? like flesh and bone? music and silence? space and time? i know it's sounds a little counter-intuitive, but - looking back at my life with some perspective - it seems like there's something real there. love and compassion and truth can (and do) come from desperation and failure and brokenness. they're opposites in way, yes - and different for sure - but they also act as complements, context, contrast. i don't get it. don't understand it. can't explain it. but it does seem true. i wonder how you see it?

if you can, i hope you'll take a listen to tonight's show. it's a short one! :)

links:
jonas - www.simplemuzik.com/artist-jonas.html
nick guerrero - www.myspace.com/nickguerrero
free mp3's - www.simplemuzik.com/muzik
(name + password = "muzik").

also, again, my deepest thanks go out to jerry at blog.goldfishandclowns.com for his incredibly kind words and support. i hope you'll take some time to visit his blog and listen to what he's doing.

hope your week is the best!
russell

ps - the secret ending is from alan watts. if you haven't already, check him out.

Posted by russell at 05:08 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)